The Fraser River

Patricia Morley is professor emerita of English and Canadian studies at
Concordia University, and the author of Kurlek, Margaret Laurence: The
Long Journey Home, and As Though Life Mattered: Leo Kennedy’s Story.

This handsome large-format book has stunning visuals and a relatively
brief but excellent text with an environmental focus.

Archeologist and professional photographer Rick Blacklaws is described
as a “fanatic riverman who has been probing the Fraser system on many
fronts for many years.” He specializes in culture and land use, and
pioneered the first Fraser River Studies program at a B.C. college.
Full-color photos of some of the most dramatic sites along the river’s
850-mile course include Iron Canyon, Saddle Rock, The Cathedrals, and
the dry-belt landscape near Gang Ranch bridge. Towering canyons, such as
French Bar, dwarf the state-of-the-art river rafts that facilitate
Blacklaws’s art.

Alan Haig-Brown also has a long acquaintance with this vast and
powerful river’s “innumerable personalities.” British Columbia’s
modern economy was built on the river’s products: initially furs and
gold, later salmon, wood products, the rich delta-soil agricultural
harvests, the immense shipping industry around the estuary, and the
billion-dollar recreation industry.

The main text, along with the substantial photo captions, points to
current ecological concerns and to the pollution (such as the chlorine
from the pulp and paper mills) that is seriously damaging the Fraser.
(Public awareness is growing, and citizen groups are fighting to restore
the river’s health.) The text also covers the history and culture of
the Fraser basin.

This valuable book makes an important contribution to our understanding
of the interdependence of people, waters, and land.