The Canadian Rockies: New and Old Trails

John Abbott is a professor of history at Laurentian University’s Algoma University College. He is the co-author of The Border at Sault Ste Marie and The History of Fort St. Joseph.

This book was originally published in 1911. Those who travel through,
pause in, and explore portions of Alberta and British Columbia between
the eastern fringe of the foothills and the western extremities of the
Selkirks, from the Canada–U.S. border north to Mount Robson, will find
the description of the landscape compelling. Others interested in the
construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway will find Coleman’s
comments on terrain and construction procedures fascinating, because his
first excursions occurred in 1884 and 1885, when he used the road and
its uncompleted right-of-way to penetrate the wilderness between the
north-flowing and south-flowing extensions of the Columbia River.

Coleman was a Quebec-born geologist, who earned a Ph.D. from the
University of Breslau, and went on to teach at the University of Toronto
and to work as a provincial geologist in Ontario. Anyone interested in
geological theory and its practical application before the theories of
plate tectonics and continental drift revolutionized the discipline will
enjoy his explanation of landforms. Of course, hikers and mountain
climbers will be fascinated by his accounts of trail-finding,
trail-making, camp-making, and mountain ascents long before the word
“technical” was applied to any article of clothing or climbing
apparatus.

Coleman and his companions endured hardships and hazards beyond belief:
insect plagues of biblical proportions; rivers in full spate, engaged in
the process of tearing down the very mountains he sought to climb;
unremitting rain, sleet, hail, and snow; miles of chaotic, trackless
terrain choked with deadfalls and black-blasted by fire; cirques,
taluses, rock falls, ice falls, avalanches, glaciers, and the prospect
of damage or death at the next heartbeat.

Why did he do it? He needed to climb “high mountains,” to view the
rush of spring flowers in August at 10,000 feet, to explore the Columbia
Icefield that sends great rivers to Hudson’s Bay, the Arctic Ocean,
and the Pacific Ocean, and to be the first to stand atop Mount Robson,
which he attempted twice, in 1907 and 1908. This is a book to read with
pleasure, and a measure of wonder.