A TIMELINE OF TWELVE SONGS
- U’MISTA / Rise again (Alert Bay Homecoming) – The return of ancestral masks to Alert Bay breathed new life into this First Nations community on Cormorant Island in Johnston Strait and renewed its ties to our ancient past with the peoples of the Pacific.
- And a candle burned: James Cook RN – An explorer of global stature who spent time on both our east and west coasts, Cook was a scientist as much as a naval officer: a Spock rather than a Kirk in the first Star Trek series. He set new standards in diet and discipline on his ships.
- The Ballad of Juan Quadra –The Spaniards under Señor Juan Quadra were comfortably established at Nootka Sound on Canada’s west coast when Captain George Vancouver arrived to continue the survey work of Captain Cook. But unlike the rivalry between Britain and France that marked eastern Canada, the Spaniards welcomed the newcomers and facilitated relations with the First Nations. The British and Spanish commanders differed on a number of issues but agreed never to let these issues come between them as friends. This song is about a man to who we owe our “pacific” history in both senses of the word.
- Captain George Vancouver (Geoff Noble Ganymede Music) – Namesake of our largest western island and Pacific port, served apprenticeships under a number of distinguished seamen including James Cook. After Cook’s death Vancouver returned to the Pacific Coast to finish his work.
- Richard Blanshard – Vancouver Island’s first governor stayed on the job only a few months when he discovered the real power on the Island was the Hudson Bay Company Chief Factor, but his short term moved the colony a step closer to self-government.
- Sir James Douglas – His name is everywhere in Victoria and his influence included the First Nations on both the Island and the BC Mainland. Douglas was of mixed ethnicity with a Scottish father and a Creole mother, and had a long and close marriage with Amelia Connolly who was Métisse with a Cree mother.
- When Kaiser Wilhelm drew the line across the Georgia Strait – The Second German Empire was founded four years after Confederation, and its new Emperor, formerly the King of Prussia, was called up seven years later to mediate a boundary dispute between Canada and the US in the Gulf Islands.
- The E & N: Island Survivor – When BC joined Confederation on the promise of a railway from the east, it expected the line to reach the capital, Victoria, as most of the non-indigenous peoples lived there at the time. When it complained that the line stopped on the mainland, Sir John A. commissioned another shorter line on Vancouver Island and came to open it himself.
- The Princess Mary – One of 40 Canadian Pacific “princesses” (the last of which was namesake of the later “love boats,” the Princess Mary plied Georgia Strait, north to Alaska and the open Pacific on Vancouver Island’s west coast. A section of her promenade deck survived as a Victoria restaurant for many years.
- Titanic struck the iceberg/Prince Rupert’s hopes went down – Titanic’s impact on Canada was greatest on a Pacific port that hoped to rival Vancouver. These dreams perished with Charles Melville Hays, President of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, who had chosen Rupert as his western terminus.
- Emily Alert – The eighth member of Canada’s Group of Seven, Emily Carr, discovered her strength in vivid depictions of the imagery of First Nations on the West Coast. Alert Bay on Cormorant Island was one of the places she painted. Skidgate, on Haida Gwai, was another.
- The COHO – Of all the ferries and steamers that called regularly at Victoria’s Inner Harbour, this is the last. Built in 1959 to link Victoria and Washington State, she became a model for the first two BC Ferries that entered service on Georgia Strait a year later. It is fitting this last survivor bears a Salish First Nation name as did her earlier sisters of the Puget Sound Navigation Company (Black Ball Ferry Line) and completes the cycle beginning with U’MISTA.