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authority records
Corporate body · 1896-2002

West Kootenay Power & Light (WKPL) was founded by Sir Charles Ross, who was a Scottish noble. Ross arrived in Rossland between 1895 and 1896 and was involved in the Centre Star Mine. He formed West Kootenay Power & light to supply power to the Centre Star Mine, and in doing so he received a charter to supply electricity to the entire West Kootenay region. WKPL was incorporated in 1897. The first plant built was the Lower Bonnington Plant (plant No.1), which was built between 1897 and 1898 on the Kootenay River.

West Kootenay Power & Light first supplied light in Rossland in 1898 on the south side of Columbia Avenue. To do this, 51.5 kilometres of powerline was built between Rossland and Bonnington. The No.2 plant was built to keep up with energy demands between 1905-1906, above the Kootenay River on the Upper Bonnington Falls. This dam was expanded in 1914 and in 1916. Later, WKPL bought the charter of the South Kootenay Power Company and then expanded into the Boundary County and supplied their mines with power. In 1907, the Cascade Power Company sold its assets to WKPL and gave them ownership of the Cascade Dam on the Kettle River. In 1916 the Consolidated Mining & Smelting Company was anticipating the growing energy demands from the First World War bringing large zinc contracts, so they acquired WKPL as a wholly-owned subsidiary. To keep up with the greater electrolytic zinc operations at CM&S, a third dam, the South Slocan Dam, was built in 1928. A fourth dam, the Corra Linn was built 14.5 kilometres downstream from Nelson on the Kootenay River. In 1944 to meet CM&S’s power needs, a fifth power plant was built at the mouth of the Kootenay River, named the Brilliant Dam.

After WWII, CM&S wanted to connect their new Sullivan Mine operations in Kimberly to the electricity produced at the South Slocan Dam. The connecting powerline needed to cross Kootenay Lake, so WKPL completed the longest powerline span in the world at that time, measuring 3.4 km. CM&S hired a private contractor to build a dam on the Pend Oreille River, named the Waneta Dam. Construction was supposed to begin in the 1930s, but the Great Depression led to the project being abandoned until the 1950s.

Ownership of WKPL changed to the private, U.S.-based company Utilicorp in 1987. Ownership changed again in 2004, with FortisBC buying the business. Fortis has remained as the operation of the former WKPL dams ever since.

Notable personnel who worked at WKPL are Sir Charles Ross (1872-1942), the founder, Lorne Argyle Campbell (1871-1947), the General Manager, and J.D. McDonald (1874-1944), the General Superintendent.

B.C. Mining School
Corporate body · [ca.1971]-1982

The B.C. Mining School in Rossland was original an open pit program at the Molybdenum mine on Red Mountain which started in June 1971. It was a twelve-week course, and the students were chosen by Canadian manpower. The students were typically from the metropolitan Vancouver area with an average education level of grade eight. Due to its success, an underground program was suggested, with the site of the school moving to the base of Kootenay Columbia Mountain. The first sixteen-week course started in October 1943. The school was to later produce the first open pit, and underground female worker. On fifth August 1981 newly arrived students came to the school to find a padlock on the door. The school was abruptly closed with little warning. The last open pit and underground classes had their graduation take place on third July 1981 and nineteenth June 1981. Multiple letters and resolutions were sent to the Minister of Education (later Minister of Energy Mines, and Petroleum Resources), Brian Smith (1975-1983), and many other ministers and organizations to try and reopen the school. This included a considerable amount of action was taken by Harry Lefevre.

There are multiple different reasons that were given for the student closure of the school, two of which being that (1) according to Smith, that the Canadian Employment & Immigration Commission refused to sponsor any more students after September 1981, and that, (2) according to Gerald Bell of Western Industrial Relations, major mining companies no longer wanted to employ graduates from the school. This, apparently, had nothing to do with the standard of teaching but rather that Canada Manpower had not carried about sufficient screening of potential students, which resulted in an excess of poor-quality students. Harry Lefevre attributed the closure to a breakdown in the financial support agreement between the Ministry of Education and Canadian Manpower.