Search results for ""royal british columbia museum""

What would you do if you came face to face with a Large Yellow Waxwing, Wild Turkey or Weather Loach? Who would you call if Common Wall Lizards or Giant Hogweed crept into your back yard? Alex Van Tol can help. In Aliens Among Us, she identifies more than 50 species of alien animals and plants that have established themselves in British Columbia. With the help of colour photographs and Mike Deas’ illuminating illustrations, Van Tol exposes the invaders, then explains how they got here and what they’re doing to the local environment. A former middle school teacher, Alex Van Tol has written eight books for young readers. For Aliens Among Us, she has harvested the knowledge of museum biologists to alert the next generation of responsible environmentalists. Her list of invaders includes Purple Loosestrife and Yellow Perch, Norway Rats and American Bullfrogs, Northern Snakeheads and Zebra Mussels, to name just a few. This readable and alarmingly informative book will help young people prepare for the invasion, and arm them with the tools to stop the spread of unwanted aliens in British Columbia.

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Nancy Turner and Richard Hebda present the results of many years of working with botanical experts from the Saanich Nation on southern Vancouver Island. Elders Violet Williams, Elsie Claxton, Christopher Paul and Dave Elliott pass on their knowledge of plants and their uses to future generations of Saanich and Coast Salish people, and to anyone interested in native plants.Saanich Ethnobotany includes detailed information about the plants that were traditionally harvested to use in all aspects of Saanich life, such as for food and medicines, and to make tools, buildings and weapons. Each plant is listed by its common (English), scientific and Saanich names. Each listing contains a brief botanical description with a colour photograph, where to find the plant and how it was used traditionally by the Saanich people.This important book celebrates the richness and tremendous value of locally based knowledge in a rapidly changing world.

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In 1934, in the middle of the Great Depression, millionaire Charles Bedaux spent $250,000 in an attempt to cross northern British Columbia in five motorized vehicles. The Bedaux Expedition ranks as one of the most audacious and unusual events in the province's history. Bannock and Beans tells the story of this extravagant failure from the perspective of one of the cowboys who worked on Bedaux's team. Bob White's reminiscences, recounted in the tradition of the cowboy storyteller, describe the hardships of cutting trails and hauling supplies on horseback, the beauty of the wilderness landscape and many of the unique aspects of the expedition. Bannock and Beans also reveals the complex character of the expedition's leader, Charles Bedaux, a French entrepreneur who made his fortune in the United States. The book includes White's experiences in Bedaux's attempts to develop a ranch in northern BC after the expedition. Editor Jay Sherwood supplements with original Bedaux Expedition correspondence and photographs to show Bedaux's strong attachment to the remote wilderness area of northern BC from 1926 to 1939. Bannock and Beans provides new information and a fresh perspective on this unique event in BC's history. White's memoirs take us back to the campfire stories of people who were part of the vast wilderness that still covered much of the northern part of the province 75 years ago.

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In Up-Coast, award-winning author Richard A. Rajala offers the first comprehensive history of the forest industry on British Columbia's central and north coast. He integrates social, political, and environmental themes to depict the relationship of coastal people and communities to the forest from the late 19th century to the present. The account begins with the emergence of a small-scale industry tied to the needs of salmon canneries and early settlements, and traces the development of a diverse structure involving sawmills, tie and pole producers, and hand loggers struggling to profit from participation in domestic and foreign markets. But from the early 20th century on, government policies favoured the interests of giant pulp-and-paper firms such as Pacific Mills at Ocean Falls. A turn to sustained-yield forestry after World War II promoted further concentration of ownership, a pattern that saw Columbia Cellulose capture the Skeena and Nass watersheds to meet the fibre needs of its troubled Prince Rupert pulp enterprise. At the same time, postwar development drew the region into a role as hinterland log extraction site for southern plants fed by enormous Tree Farm Licenses. Relating these themes to a tradition of activism against capitalist inequities, Up-Coast discusses First Nations, union and community protests against corporate exploitation of labour and resources. In addressing the modern era of land claims, environmentalism and capital-flight, Rajala turns to the complex and unresolved struggle for a more equitable and sustainable human relationship with British Columbia's forests.

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Culled from the hand-written pages in old-fashioned scribblers and almost-forgotten typescripts amid drafts for her published stories, Unvarnished features among the last unpublished and highly personal writings of the iconic Canadian author and artist Emily Carr.This highly readable manuscript—edited by Royal BC Museum curator emerita Kathryn Bridge and illustrated with sketches and photographs from the BC Archives—spans nearly four decades, from 1899 to 1944. In an almost stream-of-consciousness outpouring of stories, Carr chronicles her early years as an art student in England, her life-altering sojourn in France and subsequent travels to Indigenous villages along the coast, her encounters with the Group of Seven, conversations with artist Lawren Harris, and her sketching trips in the “Elephant” caravan in the company of a quirky menagerie. Also included are stories written in hospital recovering from a stroke, a particularly vulnerable time in her life.Emily Carr’s books have remained in nearly continuous print since the 1940s. Unvarnished is a fresh addition to her enduring oeuvre, to be enjoyed as a complement to her other writings or as a jewel in its own right.

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Frank Swannell contributed greatly to the shape of British Columbia by surveying and mapping large portions of the province over three decades. He also took thousands of photographs and kept detailed journals of his travels. In his second book on Swannell's adventures, Jay Sherwood presents central BC through the eyes and words of one of BC's most famous surveyors. Swannell photographed First Peoples, settlers, various methods of transportation and the daily life of a surveying crew. Of about 1,500 photographs he took between 1920 and 1928, Jay Sherwood has selected the best for this book. Many have historical significance, showing the changes beginning to occur in this largely wilderness region of central BC. Surveying Central British Columbia is based primarily on Swannell's diaries and photographs. It is supplemented by interviews with descendants of some members of Swannell's surveying crew, research and the author's personal visits to several places where Swannell surveyed. It includes a database of Swannell's photographs online at the BC Archives.

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The heyday of anthropological collecting on the Northwest Coast took place between 1875 and the Great Depression. The scramble for skulls and skeletons, poles, canoes, baskets, feast bowls, and masks went on until it seemed that almost everything not nailed down or hidden was gone. The period of most intense collecting on the coast coincided with the growth of anthropological museums, which reflected the realization that time was running out and that civilization was pushing the indigenous people to the wall, destroying their material culture and even extinguishing the native stock itself.Douglas Cole examines the process of collecting in the context of the development of museums and anthropology. The main North American museums with Northwest Coast collections – the Smithsonian Institution, the American Museum of Natural History, Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History, the Royal British Columbia Museum, and the Canadian Museum of Civilization in Ottawa – were intense rivals in the race against time.For the new edition of Captured Heritage, Douglas Cole has written a preface in which he outlines developments since the book’s first publication in 1985. Since that time, for example, the Kwagiulth Museum and Cultural Center on Quadra Island and the U'Mista Museum and Cultural Center at Alert Bay have been successful in having some of their artifacts repatriated.

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