Identity area
Type of entity
Corporate body
Authorized form of name
Bella Coola Colony
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
History
The Bella Coola Colony was established in 1894 to bring Norwegian immigrants to the area. Approximately 80 immigrants travelled from Minnesota to Bella Coola that year, becaming the largest non-Native settlement in the valley. Prior to that, there had been fewer than 20 non-Natives living in the area, and many of these had only arrived in 1892.
The area was chosen for several reasons. The Canadian government was in the process of encouraging Scandinavian, German and British citizens to settle in the province, and Norwegian anthropologist B F Jacobsen had written favourably about the area, comparing the landscape to that in Norway. At the same time, Reverend Christian Saugstad in Minnesota sought to move his congregation, partly due to a disagreement within the church. As a result, each settler was promised 160 acres of land contingent on the fulfillment of homesteading duties such as clearing the land and erecting buildings.
By 1895, the colonists had erected a post office and built additional roads and bridges and a further 98 colonists arrived. The settlers began to collect taxes and opened a general store. The post office in Kristiana, later known as Hagensborg, opened and a school was built.
The community relocated in 1904 to the north side of the Bella Coola river.
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Internal structures/genealogy
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Access points area
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Level of detail
Dates of creation, revision and deletion
MCARTER 2011-05-31
Language(s)
Script(s)
Sources
Amicus Memory BC
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Created by: MCARTER