There is a great deal of work being done within the Columbia Basin to present various aspects of our collective history. As well, there are many wonderful sites in other parts of the world that support portions of our research interests. The purpose of the Links page is to present the sites we have found useful to a greater understanding of this region we call home, and to introduce them in a meaningful fashion. We hope, by doing this, to assist your own research and to open the way for researchers to find others who are working seriously at building an understanding of Basin culture.
Nelson & District Museum
The web site for the Nelson & District Museum is home to a number of interesting virtual tours. “Nelson’s Sacred Spaces” explores several of Nelson’s heritage churches. “The Silver King” investigates the discovery of the Silver King mine and the establishment of the community of Nelson. “The Dewdney Trail” virtual exhibit offers an opportunity to explore one of the early attempts to link East and West Kootenay with the BC mainland.
Castlegar & District Heritage Society CPR Station Museum
This site is an excellent introduction to the history of the City of Castlegar and the transportation links that made it central to development in the Columbia Basin. There is also a delightful discussion of Tolstoyan Alexander Zuckerberg and the magical island he inhabited on the Columbia River just below the confluence of the Kootenay River.
Kootenay Lake
This site is a delightful personal exploration of Kootenay Lake, the largest freshwater lake in the Columbia Basin. The author, without explicitly attempting to, makes the case for why natural history is indivisible from human history. This is a site for those who love good photography, appreciate the quirkiness of individual exploration, and have a respect for digital intervention.
Trail Historical Society
The site to go to when beginning research on the City of Trail or the Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company of Canada Limited and smelting history in British Columbia. This site also contains an introduction to Trail’s “Sports Hall of Memories”, the “Home of Champions” registry and the Trail City Archives.
The Kootenay Gallery
The Kootenay Gallery of Art, History and Science is a public art gallery that serves the entire West Kootenay region. The Kootenay Gallery’s rotating exhibitions feature established Canadian and International artists as well as the work of local and regional emerging artists.
Columbia River Basin Ethnic History Project
This is the home of the “Columbia River Basin Ethnic History Project”. The site combines the resources of Washington State University at Vancouver and Pullman with the holdings of the Idaho State Historical Society, Oregon Historical Society and the Washington State Historical Society. It has a great search engine that allows a user to explore primary research resources in the above institutions. The site is designed to encourage research and public discussion of the ethnic history of the Columbia Basin.
Virtual Museum Of The Kootenays
The “Virtual Museum of the Kootenays” is an ambitious project designed to bring museum collections out of the galleries and to the web. The focus is West Kootenay and the site does serve to introduce a number of historical themes and figures that visitors may wish to follow up on elsewhere. The “Kootenay Chronology” section affords budding historians a place to start when constructing their own investigative time line.
History Matters
Created by the American Social History Project, this site serves as a gateway to web resources on United States history. “History Matters” makes primary resources available and facilitates the exploration of how to use primary sources most effectively. This is a useful resource for all students, teachers, and those writing historical pieces.
Sandon Historical Society
Put up by the Sandon Historical Society, this site shows the historic town of Sandon as the “Capital City of the Silvery Slocan”. It gives visitors a good history of the resources remaining in Sandon and offers excellent presentations of both social and cultural history as well as the mining history of the area. This is a good preliminary site for investigating the development of the West Kootenay mineral resources in the 1890s.
