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Museum page

Paddlewheelers
on the Shuswap River

Back in the paddle wheel days, there were not many ways to import goods to the Okanagan. Railroads were not built until 1892 which was still a long way off, and roads were not that great, especially with nothing economically feasible to transport the goods with.

The cheapest and easiest way by far was on water via the Thompson-Shuswap (Spallumcheen) river system.

However, there was no water route between the Shuswap and Okanagan Lake (there was a canal planned but it proved to be too costly, and was never built.) The best that could be done was to take the goods as close to the lakes as possible, and take them overland. Once they got there, there was no problem re-loading goods back onto a steamer and moving the goods up and down the lakes. The townsite of Enderby is this closest point, and all goods destined for the Okanagan had to be taken as far as Enderby by paddlewheeler, then off-loaded and taken over land as far as Okanagan Lake. This fact alone is responsible for the location of Enderby today.

When the first flour mill was built near the Okanagan Mission, it needed mill stones, but they couldn't come from out east because there was no railway. So what the builders had to do was to order them from California. They were put on a sailing ship destined for Victoria. When they arrived at Victoria, they were transferred to a paddlewheeler and taken as far as Yale, on the Fraser River. They were then loaded on freight wagons and taken as far as Savona on the Cariboo Wagon Road, where they were transferred once again on to a paddlewheeler, and taken as far as Sicamous. From Sicamous they were probably taken to Enderby aboard the Kamloops #1 and off-loaded, placed on the freight wagons and taken to the head of Okanagan Lake near O'Keefe's Ranch. From there they were placed on a very large row boat and rowed to Okanagan Mission where they were taken off and then skidded from the lake shore to the mill site by horse team.

For more information, please see "Paddlers on the Shuswap".

Bernie Schaloske, Alan Ross
ALF School 1989