Shelley, British Columbia
Shelley, northeast of Prince George in central British Columbia, was often misspelled as "Shelly", especially during the earlier years. The First Nations Shelley Reserve No. 1 is on the northwest side of the Fraser River, and the Reserve No. 2, on the southeast side, includes a gas station and convenience store. Beyond the west of the latter are freehold properties, comprising about 30 residences immediately and in the vicinity. To the south is the Shell-Glen volunteer firehouse, which lies on the west side of the Gleneagle neighbourhood.
History
Railway
Shelley, like Foreman to its southwest, and Willow River to its northeast, was an original train station on the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. The name, a locational surname from any one of the places called "Shelley", derives from the Olde English pre 7th Century "scylf" meaning literally a shelf cut out of the hillside, plus "leah", an enclosure or wood. Since Shelley, BC, lies on flat lowland, the name likely acknowledges an individual instead. The most probable candidate was a GTP contractor. Another possibility was Percy Bysshe Shelley, the famous poet. If the latter, it was likely on the list prepared by Josiah Wedgwood.Shelley lies at Mile 136.3, Fraser Subdivision. In 1912, Magoffin & Berg subcontracted with camps to the west and east. By 1913, the Mitchell & Ahern camp was at Mile 223, the Nugent & Co. camp at Mile 225, and the Magoffln & Bergh ones at Miles 226 and 230. The latter relocated a steam shovel downstream to Mile 226.
The 36 tons of flour, loaded on two scows that reached Mile 226 before the river began freezing that November, merchants Kennedy, Blair & Co. later hauled over the frozen ice to Prince George. A tie camp existed at Mile 226. This may have been Tony Jack's operation, at which the sheriff seized 10,000 ties in 1915 to settle outstanding liabilities. During this era, ties were also hauled across the frozen river from the Salmon Valley.
In 1915, when ordered off an eastbound train at Shelley, train hoppers rushed the crew and threw rocks at them. After a rock cut the scalp of George S. Hughes, a conductor acting as brakeman, he fired a gun to frighten the attackers, but unintentionally shot assailant John Kozook in the leg. Hughes was arrested at McBride, but later released on bail. Kozook received treatment for his minor wound. The public sympathized with Hughes because criminal gangs frequently stole railway freight. The trial outcome is unknown.
Running backward across a trestle to the southwest, a work train struck Rosarius Simonson, a Shelley preemptor. His companion escaped by leaping over the side, but Simonson's foot became wedged in the ties when he attempted to outrun the train. Unaware of the accident, the crew did not stop to render assistance. About half an hour later, conductor Hughes' westbound freight brought the man to the city. However, the blood loss from the leg crushed below the knee was too severe for the hospital to save him.
In 1920, two speeders collided nearby, sending three men to hospital, one with serious injuries.
In 1944, two boys received a lecture in juvenile court for taking a CNR speeder and following the westbound passenger train from Shelley. A heavy winter snowfall could block access roads for a week or more, but flagged down westbound freight trains would transport medical cases. Although not as comfortable, a speeder fulfilled the same role.
In December 1948, Frank E. Moore dashed after his departing eastbound passenger train at Prince George station, but found the car door locked. Holding on with his ungloved hands for almost, his grip weakened and he fell off at Shelley when the train slowed. Returned by car to Prince George, he convalesced in hospital with bandaged hands and bruised arms. In 1959, when the brakes failed on a CNR dump truck used for transporting gravel, the driver jumped clear. A CNR work crew later recovered the vehicle from the river at Shelley. In 1967, a train appeared to have struck Jerry Dick, because he sustained a fractured skull and other injuries. The next summer, a westbound passenger train ran over and killed Leonard Michael Leo, while he apparently slept on the tracks about one mile west of Shelley.
During the 1970s, when an eastbound freight train struck Rosemary Paul while sitting on the track, the 12-year-old sustained merely a broken leg and bruised hand. A collision with a moose derailed two freight cars east of Shelley. A 73-car freight train near Shelley killed seven horses that strayed onto the track. A train demolished a helicopter that had landed on the right of way to collect some passengers in the vicinity.
Although collisions between vehicles and trains at the Mile 136.08 main railway crossing were destructive, some were also fatal. In 1976, driver Andre Gerald Gagnon
, and John Louis Wheatley died, and Dominic Joseph Fredrick and Larson Prince were seriously injured. In 1999, the driver exited his car stuck on the Mile 136.05 crossing into the Shelley Reserve before the vehicle became wedged under the lead engine of an eastbound train. A similar situation occurred at a crossing west of the community. In 2011, a $322,000 upgrade improved safety at the mile 136.05 location.
During 1980–81, Northwood built of track and a $14m combined road/rail bridge across the Fraser southeast of Shelley. When a 1985 massive mudslide wiped out a BC Rail bridge and track near Prince George, coal trains temporarily diverted across the Northwood bridge to reach the CNR line. In 2010, 16 carloads of coal spilled when a 150-car westbound coal train derailed west of the village. With the permanent closure of the Shelley mill, Northwood appears to have lifted this track around 1991.
Built in 1914, the standard-design Plan 100‐152 station building, and the Plan 100‐318 freight and the passenger shelter relocated from Foreman in 1963, were demolished in 1969. An nondescript building remained at the closed station into the 2000s.
| Service | 1914–c.1916 | c.1917–c.1921 | c.1921–1931 | 1932–c.1939 | c.1940–c.1948 | c.1949–1957 | 1957–1968 | 1968–1977 | 1977–c.1989 |
| Passenger | Regular stop | Flag stop | Flag stop | Flag stop | Regular stop | Regular stop | Flag stop | Flag stop | |
| Way freight | Flag stop probably | Flag stop probably | Regular stop | Flag stop | Regular stop | Flag stop | Regular stop | Regular stop |
Forestry
The narrow strip of accessible spruce forest bordering the railway that stretched some east of Prince George was known as the East Line. In 1920, the Prince George Sawmill Co. built a 10,000-foot per shift capacity mill. A delegate from the Lumber Workers Industrial Union, who visited that company's logging camp at Shelley the following spring, reported on the abysmal living conditions. Injury and death for humans and horses were common in sawmills and logging camps. In a 1925 incident, logs falling from a sleigh in a pole road accident killed the hauling horse team.Facing financial troubles by the summer, the mill experienced a change of ownership and name to the Shelly Lumber Co. Legal wrangling continued regarding the debts of the former operation. Claude I. Bristol owned and operated the mill. Mary Agnes Bridgman, who married Claude in 1925, was sister to Percy Daniel Howatt. The latter, who later ran a poolroom, was likely related to storekeeper R. Howatt. In 1933, her daughter, Helen Bridgman married Elov John Samuelson, and the couple remained in Shelley until his death by drowning. The Bristols relocated to Mayerthorpe around 1930. A resident for 60 years, Helen Samuelson left during the mid to late 1980s.
Following Arnold K. Shives' venture at Aleza Lake, he engaged in the lumber business at Shelley during the 1920s, probably the partnership with John Munro.
John MacNeil from Telkwa had a 100,000-tie production goal for the 1921/22 winter. In 1922, raging forest fires south of Shelley, where the Foreman Lumber Co. was logging, threatened the railway station and the Shelly Lumber Co. mill, but about two million feet of fire-killed timber remained loggable. The following winter, contractor H. Brawn had a 60,000-tie goal. In the spring, Samuel A. McLean, in partnership with son Sinclair D., relocated their mill from Fraser Lake and commenced operation on Samuel's newly acquired farmland.
The 1923/24 winter saw contractor M.P. McCaffrey, ex-mayor of Prince Rupert, set a 100,000-tie goal, the Buchanan camp 25,000 ties, and one smaller outfit 10,000 ties. The Mclean mill employed about 50 men in the bush and at the mill, and the Shelly Lumber Co. about 20 men. This totalled about 200 men working in the sawmills and tie camps. The McCaffrey Brothers produced a little over 75,000 ties, which satisfied their CNR contract.
A 1926 fire, which started in slash, threatened the McLean mill. Two months later, despite the efforts of employees from both mills, fire completely destroyed the Shelly Lumber Co. mill and the finished lumber stacked in their yard. The ability to accommodate 50 seated guests for a golden wedding anniversary banquet indicates the size of the McLean family home. In 1928, leasing 16 acres of Crown land, the company abandoned the old mill on the slough to build a new 30,000-foot capacity mill at Mile 134 on the Fraser, which was the only one operating in the vicinity at that time. McLean Lumber closed during the Great Depression. Samuel A. McLean died one week after his wife Emma Nettie McLean. By this time, their son, Sinclair solely ran the mill, one of the more important East Line producers. McLean Lumber opened a new planing mill in the fall. In 1939, a small tornado lifted the McLean blacksmith shop roof and carried it about 35 feet. A year later, the sheriff seized company assets to settle outstanding workers' compensation premiums.
During the loading of a truck at the McLean logging camp, near Shelley, a log falling from the log deck fatally crushed Felix Masiulis. The increased wartime lumber demand required upgrading the McLean mill and caused an acute housing shortage. Increasing labour shortages caused some of the smaller mills to close down and focus upon logging crews. Daniel Goucher lost a finger in an accident at the McLean mill. In 1943, a fast-moving drive belt dragged millwright Gordon Burton when he was fixing a sprocket chain at the mill. He fractured his skull, arm, thigh, foot and ribs. Gordon Cumming
, who suffered a painful injury when a large sliver of wood pierced through his hand, faced later periods of medical leave. That year, the company drove piles into the river to hold logs for their new mill at Mile 136. Called Shelley Sawmills, the summer cut finished that November. Sinclair McLean owned both mills.
Sinclair & Carol McLean had sons Stanley, Samuel and Lawrence. In 1925, widower Sinclair married Helen Kraker and had children Sinclair Neil, Marilyn H.I. and Lynne June. Helen was the first female trustee on the Prince George district school board. In 1949, she survived being the victim of a hit and run driver in Prince George. In 1946, S. Stanley McLean
, based in Shelley, married Laura Elizabeth Lockhart, eldest daughter of Mrs. J. Rix of Shelley. The couple raised their children in the hamlet. Samuel McLean also remained, marrying the schoolteacher, Margaret Murdoch, in 1939. In 1947, when Sam was repairing a broken tire chain on his vehicle, a runaway team of horses bolted toward him. Trampled, he sustained a lacerated scalp and ear, a broken rib and loosened teeth. A few weeks in hospital were the beginning of his rehabilitation. In 1948, his wife Peggy, and sons W. Daniel , and Samuel T., died in a Fox Moth aircraft that plunged into Six Mile Lake. Pilot Roy Archer was the sole survivor and searchers dragged the lake to locate two of the bodies. Ruth E. Aronson, a teacher, married Sam a year later. Lawrence McLean, who lived in Prince George, married Frances M. Saunders in 1938. Sinclair Neil McLean completed his secondary and tertiary education in Vancouver. His sister Marilyn H.I., followed him to UBC. She became the 1950 Miss Prince George, and married Gordon Victor Cave Baum of Vancouver. The youngest sibling, Lynne June McLean, married William de Wolfe Mann.
In 1944, the breaking river ice destroyed the McLean Sawmill boom pilings, and logger Don Sullivan sustained severe gashes to his hand when kicked by a horse. The following year, remedial pile driving occurred. On jumping from a truck, Don Edwards pierced his left foot with a spike. A board ejected by the edger struck Peter Ivanusic on the buck muscles causing severe bruises and injuries. With war-time demand ended, the Shelley Sawmills worked the summer season, and the McLean Sawmills the winter one, before the former became the sole operating mill. At the logging camp, Evan Seymour lost a finger and sustained painful bruises when a fan belt caught his right hand. A falling tree bouncing on a stump fractured George Onuczko's right collarbone.
In 1947, a swinging log on the sawmill skidway knocked Pat Doherty off the riverbank, requiring hospital treatment. During loading for transit, a rolling log crushed Don Blakely's foot. At this time, the logging camp at Mile 134 closed to relocate upriver. While riding the saw carriage, which steadily moves a log through the saw blade, dogger Frank Stefanik received a painful eye injury from a spruce knot ejected by the saw. In 1948, S. McNutt, logging camp foreman, suffered a deep cut above the knee when a broadaxe slipped from an employee's hand. That year, Sam and Neil McLean left for Malakwa to construct the McLean Lumber Co. sawmill. A year later, a falling treetop struck and killed logger Rauol Emard.
In 1950, Emanuel A. Nelson caught his foot in a mill saw, culminating in a hospital amputation. A 1951 fire razed the Shelley Sawmill, idling 80 millworkers. During the blaze, workers saved the planer mill and yard lumber, and CNR moved to safety boxcars and other railway equipment on the nearby track. Months later, Clint Geddes and Al Hetherington purchased the 50,000-foot capacity mill. Sinclair McLean, and son Sam McLean, moved to Sicamous to join Stan McLean, in operating the McLean Sawmills east of Malakwa. Soon, sons Stan, Sam and Neil managed the operation. Neil married Margaret Helen Humphrey. Sinclair McLean returned to the Shelley farm, and in retirement, this half-section of land became home during the milder months. In 1965, the couple advertised the 488-acre property for sale.
In 1951, Ernest & Juanita E. Bellavance arrived, accompanied by children Anthony, Eugene and Patricia. Ernie became general manager for Shelley Sawmills, which joined those mills voting for strike action that year.
In 1954, Reyal Rochon fractured his leg when thrown from the saw carriage he was riding. Reyal & Kay Rochon had children Paulette and Claudie. Paulette left in 1962. Apart from short absences, the family remained active in the community until the mid-1960s, when they moved to Prince George. His brother, Edmond, & Helen Rochon were residents at least from the late 1950s. Their children were Linda, Lenard, Cheryl, Carol, Edmond Jr. and Arthur. The year after his father's death, Arthur died in a single-car accident in the vicinity. The family had moved by the early 1980s. Reyal, and another brother Gaston, were among the 12 who later died in an airplane crash near Terrace. Jack Rochon was one of Gaston's sons.
In 1954, Reginald W. Hilton, president of the Northern Interior Lumbermen's Association, and a Prince George City alderman, became general manager of the mill, and joined the board of the British Columbia Research Council. A 1955 modernization comprised a 40-foot extension to the south end of the sawmill to accommodate a new gang saw capable of cutting several boards simultaneously using thinner blades. Capacity increased to 60,000 feet per shift. Shelley Sawmills joined those mills voting against strike action in 1958, whereas Shelley logging operations joined those voting for it. Ernie Bellavance had continued as superintendent, and his family remained in Shelley. Eugene attended UBC, and Patricia enrolled at St. Ann's Academy in New Westminster. In 1961, Ernie & Juanita, accompanied by Eugene and his wife, relocated to Avola. Anthony remained until his marriage to Diane D. Gauthier.
In 1960, the company received one of the nine tree farm licences that followed from the 1956 Royal Commission Report. Weeks later, a fire possibly started by unnoticed welding sparks, destroyed the sawmill and planing mill. Only the green chain, loading platform and burner escaped damage. Replacing steam power with electricity, the owners immediately rebuilt the mill. In 1962, Eagle Lake Sawmills of Giscome purchased the 75,000-foot capacity Shelley Sawmills and 150,000-foot capacity planing mill, with Hilton remaining as plant manager. Logging operations were about up the Fraser River, whose summer flow transported the logs to the mill. In 1964, Inland Natural Gas dramatically increased its rates. Adverse publicity stopped the supplier from actioning a threat to force the mill to sign a nine-month contract, while the latter installed heating from an alternate fuel source. That year, Hilton became vice president of Eagle Lake Sawmills.
In 1966, Northwood Pulp and Timber purchased Eagle Lake Sawmills, which included Shelley Sawmills. The next year, after voting in favour of strike action, the IWA strike at BC interior mills ended the following month in the north, but in the south lasted seven months. The mill provided woodchips to Northwood Pulp in Prince George as a by-product. While unloading his truck, a rolling log fatally struck driver Louie Edward Cardinal on the head.
In 1973, a freight car shortage increased finished lumber inventory. When exacerbated by a nationwide rail strike, all five northern BC sawmills operated by Northwood Pulp and Timber closed for a week. By 1975, although weakened lumber markets resulted in massive layoffs and reducing to single shifts at other Northwood sawmills, the Shelley mill, which exported much of its product to the United Kingdom, maintained two shifts a day. The pulpworker strike months later put many sawmill employees on indefinite layoff, owing to a lack of burning capacity or space to store the chips. IWA members at Northwood sawmills, having accepted their latest contract, continued on the job despite the ongoing pulp mill strike. In 1977, the IWA was pressing for one province-wide set of negotiations, while employers in the north, which included the Northwood sawmills, clung to separate talks. The following year, owner-operators of logging trucks stopped deliveries for a month to protest their compensation rates. This resulted in a two-week layoff of workers from the midnight shift at Shelley.
Northwood sawmills at Prince George, Upper Fraser, Shelley and Houston supplied half the woodchip requirements for the Prince George pulp mill. With weakening market demand during 1980, Northwood temporarily introduced a four-day workweek at all sawmills except Shelley, whose off-shore sales again saved it. The following year, lack of progress in contract talks led to illegal strikes, which included Shelley. A month later, Northwood sawmills temporarily implemented four-day workweeks. In early 1982, with the ongoing market slump, the mill implemented a series of one-week shutdowns, which soon became a two-week on and two-week off work schedule. The company consolidated all vacation time into a four-week period to shut down the mill for the summer. When a five-day week returned in August, Shelley was the only Northwood mill running with a full staff.
In 1984, two week's secondary picketing of the mill by the Canadian Paperworkers Union, initially had minimal impact in discouraging IWA members and independent truckers from crossing the picket line, but eventually the mill closed for three days until a court order restrained the picketers. CNR crews honoured the picket, which continued another two weeks. Rolling strikes throughout the north during 1986, which escalated into a four-month province-wide woodworkers' strike, resulted in a moratorium on contracting out work normally performed by union members until a royal commission had studied the issue. In 1988, market conditions necessitated a permanent reduction from three to two shifts per day at the mill. To secure log supplies months later, Northwood increased subcontractor payment rates to improve compensation for logging truck owner-operators. The mill permanently closed in 1990 with a loss of about 100 jobs, and the equipment auctioned.
In 1995, when Northwood was installing some trim saws to determine the viability of reopening the mill, a suspicious fire destroyed the planer building and kiln area.
Farming
William Allely, who arrived by scow in 1912, before the railway, settled on land that he later subdivided to become the Shelley town site and the final sawmill property. He later purchased 50 acres for a dairy farm, but died from pneumonia after a minor operation on his hand. Son Vayne R, who took over the poolroom, later built a modern poultry unit to house 600 pedigreed Leghorn chicks, but left in 1934.Andrew Iverson arrived around 1913. In 1937, he escaped serious injury when he lost control of a team of horses hauling a load of ties down a Ferndale hill. He farmed until 1958, when he moved to Prince George.
Prospector John Colosky, who owned a one-acre lot, was a foundational member of the community, as was John Terentiuk, who remained a resident until death. Jack bred pigs, and grew potatoes and hay. He served as the inaugural Shelley pound keeper, a facility that attracted many stray horses, of which the unclaimed were sold.
William & Lillian Loopol settled in 1925. Sigrid Maria Berggren married the divorced William in 1938. Their farm included pigs, dairy cows, poultry, and potatoes. They retired to the coast in 1945, but unable to sell, they leased out the farm. After returning in 1950, they again unsuccessfully advertised the 153-acre property, bisected by the railway about southwest of the station. He reared pigs and cattle, and harvested hay. Bill and Lillian reunited by 1961. In 1965, the second time an intruder came onto their property in the middle of the night, Bill scared off the trespasser with two revolver shots.
A. Edward & Edith E. Roberts farmed from 1921, remaining residents until death. Trapped when heavy snow collapsed their woodshed roof, Ed managed to extricate himself, but died two weeks later.
In 1920, farmer Herman G. Griese married Muriel Mildred Pariso of Ferndale. As a section hand, he worked various locations, but died at Aleza Lake. J. Norman Nelson, whose farm was one mile west of Shelley, lost his horse team and three cows in a 1931 stable fire. In 1934, a playmate discharging a shotgun, accidentally shot Lawrence Nelson, his son, in both feet. The Nelsons, and sons Donald and Laurie, left in the early 1940s. Another farmer of this era was John Gavryluk. On purchasing the Gavryluk quarter section, Andy Iverson skidded the barn to his existing property. After relocating to Prince George, John was the assailant in a murder, suicide.
In 1937, farmer J W. Kaufman, a senior, received about 54 offers of marriage in response to a letter published in a western newspaper. He survived an appendicitis operation the next year, but allegedly met his end when gored by his ox. Possible, but unlikely, this is one and the same as Jacob William Kaufman, who experienced a natural death.
Alexander Pigura , arriving in 1923, worked at McLean Lumber, but later purchased a farm near the station. In 1933, daughter Annie married John Delawsky and the couple relocated to Vancouver in 1939. In 1937, son Walter married Mary Kozak, and he moved as a CNR section hand. A cow moose once ran Alex off his farm, until a rifle shot sent it running. On other occasions, bears mauled and killed some of his pigs. Son Donald attended high school in New Westminster. In 1944, Alex's horse fell through the ice while hauling hay from the reserve. With 20 acres cleared, the 140-acre farm was advertised, but no sale eventuated. While logging at a Willow River bush camp in 1958, Alex broke his arm.
Joseph & Michalina Poburko were Shelley residents 1931–65. Joe, a CNR section hand, was also a dairy farmer. Promoted to army sergeant, their son Antonio returned briefly after the war, before leaving in 1949 to settle in Vancouver, where he later married and started a family. Eldest daughter Julia remained in Vancouver on marrying Gordon Warren. Younger daughter Emily remained at home until marrying Roy Edward Davies.
Paul & Pauline Domonkos Sr., having relocated several times with the CNR, settled in 1939. Their children were Rose, Julie, Paul Jr., Olga, Barney, and William . In 1937, Rose married Andrew Gaal , where they initially remained, but within a few years moved to Aleza Lake. Julia married a number of times. Paul Jr. enlisted. Irene Fosshiem, daughter of Mrs. P. McNutt of Shelley, later married Paul. In 1958, he suffered a leg injury while logging at Willow River. Olga relocated to Penticton, and Barney to Vancouver. Bill married Betty Jean Campbell and they resided briefly in Prince George, before returning to Shelley for about four years. Paul Jr. and family returned and stayed at least 1960–89. Non-residents, Barney married Marlene, and Olga married Calvin Frederick Howard.
Community
With limited entertainment opportunities, residents attended dances in nearby larger communities. The school, located almost mile west of station, opened in 1922, with Mrs. Edith Emmett as the inaugural teacher. Marrying Thomas Austin in 1926, Mrs. E. Austin, returned in 1953 to teach for a further six years. In 1922, John Newsome of Willow River erected and opened the general store. R. Howatt and his sons managed the business and was postmaster 1923–24, a role commonly performed by a storeowner in such towns. They also provided meals and lodging.The one-room schoolhouse, in which a dance floor was laid, was also the venue for social gatherings. In 1924, a box social raised funds to cover an operation for resident George Duke, who had lost sight in both eyes owing to cataracts. That year, Richard H. Kidston acquired the store, the Shelly Mercantile Co., and became postmaster 1924–50. The following year, he applied for a liquor licence for adjacent premises, which became a small hotel. In 1926, the Commonwealth Trading Co., which carried groceries and men's furnishings, had a closing down sale. The dances held at the schoolhouse were sometimes combined with card party fundraisers. Lutheran church services took place in the schoolhouse during 1925/26. In the late 1920s, the predominately black local baseball team ranked respectably in the league.
During the 1930s, the population hovered in the 100–150 range.
From the mid-1930s, interschool sports were periodically held with different groupings of schools. During the late 1930s, the hockey team completed an open-air skating rink. Local lad, Edward L. Wurko, was gifted both musically, and as a hockey player. Evangelist James Murray held gospel meetings for a week. Victor J. Carlson of Ferndale held Sunday school and church services at Shelley school every Sunday evening, which he continued under the Salvation Army umbrella during the early 1940s.
When R. H. Kidston was shorthanded, locals such as Tommy, or Joe Chance helped in the store. John Newsome took charge on special occasions. The golf course that opened in 1943 lies to the west of what became the Gleneagle neighbourhood. Victor J. Brailsford, son of Joshua and Bertha, formerly at Shelley, died in action during the war. That year, R.H. Kidston installed a new lighting plant in his home and store. The following year, he extensively renovated the warehouse and store. The Shelley Girl Guides were likely members of another company. Including temporary workers, the population was around 200 in the mid-1940s.
For several summers from 1947, Knox United Church brought a team to hold a Sunday afternoon/night service in various communities surrounding Prince George. An informal picnic supper followed the Shelley ones. Of the student ministers, Archie Carmichael led in 1949, and Dave R. Stone held weekly meetings during May and June, 1950. That summer, an outboard motor fuel explosion at Six Mile Lake sent a boat's occupants into the cold water. Owing to his heart condition, Shelley storekeeper R.H. Kidston did not survive, but rescuers saved the three children on board. John Newsome, executor of the estate, again returned to manage the store until its sale to Mr. and Mrs. Donald S. Watson, and Donald became postmaster 1950–52.
In 1952, Emile G. & Lilian Fairgrieve purchased the store, accompanied by sons David and Lorne. Emile became postmaster in 1952. Lil was sister to Harold Pennington of Willow River. She played the piano proficiently. After finishing high school, David and Lorne relocated. In special circumstances, Harold Pennington attended the store. Seemingly, the post office closed in the early 1970s. For sale in 1983, and receiving final mention later the next year, the store assumedly closed around this time.
Shelley held the title for the first baby born at Prince George hospital in the new years of 1955 and 1958. In 1959, the school board rejected a petition from concerned residents who believed the ongoing admission of certain students displaying behavioral issues presented a safety hazard to fellow pupils. Plans to move a portable from Bonnet Hill never eventuated, but the Ferndale school building moved instead to provide a second classroom. The seven schools having difficulty attracting teaching staff finally reduced to just Shelley for the 1963/64 year. The 33 students were bussed to other schools until qualified teachers filled the two positions. Abandoning the dilapidated teacherage, the school brought in two Atco structures for living quarters and installed plumbing. Plans to replace the classrooms unlikely came to fruition. Student enrolments ranged 15–28 in the late 1940s, 15–23 in the 1950s, and 24–26 in the 1960s. On the school's closing, busses transported students to Blackburn Road from the 1965/66 year.
During the late 1960s, the Prince George Evangelical Free Church included Shelley on its bus pick up route for Sunday school children. The teacherages, which were often vacant, were sometimes rented. A portable classroom tendered for disposal did not sell since both portable classrooms were advertised in 1971. The occupant of the dilapidated teacherage during this era may have been a renter, but it too was tendered for removal in 1973. School District 57 disposed of the surplus school site in 1984.
The RDFFG implemented house numbering in 1989.
Crime, Calamity & Safety Measures
Fred Wright, who stole a large quantity of grocery supplies from the Maggoffin warehouse at Mile 226 to finance a partnership interest in a restaurant, was subsequently arrested.In May 1913, a scow struck a logjam in the vicinity, ejecting the cargo. Of the nine on board, the three who jumped upon the jam pulled out four of those who fell into the water. The remaining two drowned and disappeared in the swift current. Three hours after the accident, the crew of the Chilcotin rescued the survivors from the jam. In December that year, after a boat travelling downstream struck an ice jam, the three occupants fell through the ice. Hearing cries for help, camp workers at Mile 226 threw a rope and dragged the sole survivor to safety.
In 1926, Arthur Mullet suffered eye injuries when attacked by a swooping bird at the McLean mill, and surgeons later removed one eye. In 1933, J. H. O'Neill, who represented himself as a mining machinery person, was reported missing. However evidence suggested he had engineered his own disappearance. That year, a robbery with violence at Shelley, arose from a disgruntled loser at an illegal gaming house in Prince George. The three assailants received either brief jail times or fines. A charge against the gaming house was dismissed.
Bodies of upstream drownings, which washed ashore near Shelley, included ones from Willow River, Upper Fraser, and two from incidents at Hansard.
In 1939, Arthur Renauld , well-known trapper, was convicted of setting traps for big game. He had a prior brush with the law for drunkenness and malicious damage. He relocated to Hansard a few years later. A resident for 18 years, Yakim Vachuk lay dead at least five days before the discovery of his body. In 1945, the weight of wet snow collapsed a large barn lean-to on the McLean farm, which killed six yearlings and extensively damaged machinery. A 1946 brush fire, which threatened a number of homes, took two days to bring under control. In 1947, a sudden hailstorm severely damaged field and garden crops. That year, three-year-old Earl Larson sustained two severely cut toes and one severed, when his seven-year-old brother wielded an axe. In 1948, two-year-old Derek Oleson suffered severe burns when he fell against a hot stove.
During the 1950s, the province constructed a flood control station that comprised a concrete shaft, recording station, and two 50-foot steel towers. The automatic readings of volume and velocity provide a preview of expected water conditions on the southern course of the river. A crew took days to fight a fire to the east, which jumped wide fireguards and consumed about 50 acres of logged-over land. After an intensive search, a civilian found a confused senior on the little-used road just south of the village. Missing for 48 hours from his South Fort George home, the man was minus his cap and one shoe.
Charles Gagnon succumbed to exposure when returning to his shack after midnight.
Donald W. Jael committed robbery with violence in Prince George. Owing to his previous conviction for theft, he received three years, reduced to eight months on appeal. An indecent assault near Shelley earned a two-year suspended sentence. Passing a worthless cheque, merited one year probation and restitution. His body found on wasteland, he had died from a blow to the head.
Steven Jael Sr., brother of Donald, received 60 days for wounding his estranged wife Dorothy with broken beer bottle glass requiring stitches. Initially temporary, the committal of his abandoned children to child protective services became permanent. Completing a false social assistance claim resulted in a one-year suspended sentence. Archie, a son, failed to report to serve an intermittent sentence. Rosa Anne Jael, a daughter, earned six months jail in 2009 for waving a syringe at store employees who confronted her about shoplifting. A series of subsequent thefts with threats and a breach of probation, gave sentences of 144, 1, 104, and 90 days, victim surcharges, and probation.
Ferenc Mihad Sziraki, a resident at least during the 1960s, who had three previous convictions for causing a disturbance by fighting, received a fine for physically assaulting a man in Prince George. When he assaulted a soccer player during a match, he earned a two-month jail sentence. David Parker, who attacked Sziraki in Prince George with a hammer, causing 13 deep cuts to his face and head, received a 22-month jail term.
In 1961, a 30-foot riverboat sank after striking a steel cable dangling across the river during the oil pipeline construction. Alerted by cries for help, residents of the reserve used a boat to rescue the sole occupant. Months later, delinquents, who had been shooting at aerial gas and oil transmission lines strung across the river, may have been the culprits behind a ricocheting bullet that glanced 15-year-old Mabel John's leg.
Farmers welcomed the new impounding act in 1954, because straying livestock often destroyed grain and hay fields. Juvenile vandalism and pilfering included smashing windows, and prowlers on the store roof.
In 1962, John Bozoki, a Hungarian immigrant living on the reserve, and two compatriots, unsuccessfully broke into the Prince George Imperial Oil bulk depot. Months later, he received a $100 fine for assaulting a 16-year-old band member and was evicted. In 1965, he earned a three-year sentence for a jewelry store robbery. Three decades later, John Jr., his son, spent 14 days in jail for welfare fraud while living with his wife on the reserve.
In 1965, two youths burgled and burned the two-storey store to the ground. Six separate burglaries of the store had occurred in prior years. Gerald Louis Mattess, 18, of Shelley, earned a two-year sentence. His juvenile companion received probation. A 1968 stabbing incident, resulted in a referral to a mental health clinic. That year, Clifford Quaw, 20, a.k.a. William Mitchell, received a one-year sentence for breaking and entering the store, and James Frederick, 18, earned four months for being in possession of a stolen vehicle. The following year, Quaw collided with another vehicle injuring four people. His impaired driving and possession of a stolen car merited 14 days and four months respectively.
A camp near Shelley for troubled high schoolers, was halted in 1971 and saw a federal youth grant withdrawn, because leaders William Douglas, 25, and John Hubler, 27, were fined for cultivating marijuana on the property. That year, Leonard Hay, 10, accidentally shot his sister Ella, 9, in the head with a pellet gun. While working for the Lheidli T’enneh First Nation in the bush about northwest of Prince George in 1998, a 1,200-pound grizzly sent Leonard flying by a paw swipe.
In 1983, Robert Lafleur received four years for an axe attack that cut the victim's ear and gashed his neck.
Not long released from a two-year sentence for sexual assault, resident Wayne Victor Willier received two and a half years for a convenience store robbery in 2001. His first kidnapping, assault and extortion charge was in February 2007. While on bail six months later, he committed another, resulting in a motor vehicle death. These earned one year and five years respectively. He received five and a half years for the third offence in 2014.
Many residents lost their possessions when their houses burned to the ground. In 1957, Jack & Madeline Rochon also lost their three young daughters in such a fire. The family moved to Prince Rupert, then Prince George in the early 1960s. Shelley and Gleneagles residents wanted a fire service, but the major enterprises, Northwood Pulp and Timber, and West Coast Transmission, opposed the plan. These companies would bear much of the cost but receive little benefit, because they had their own firefighting capabilities. The residents, wanting to minimize the initial outlay, dismantled and moved the former Pineview fire hall, which that department was replacing with a new building. The rebuilt hall for the Shell-Glen volunteer fire department opened in 1987 with a $9,000 fire truck, all financed by community loans and donations.
In a 2000 incident, a man fired a rifle at a vehicle at the south end of the village. In another, youths blockaded access to the band office in protest over the funding for youth programs on the reserve, and one participant faced a charge of uttering threats.
In 2007, the RDFFG added rip-rap to the river bank to protect from erosion, with further revetment work in 2010.
In 2012, resident Tyson Michael Martell received fines and one year probation for a series of theft-related offences. In 2015, driving with a suspended licence and failing to stop at the scene of an accident earned 27 days in jail, fines and probation. Six months later, the failure to comply with the probation conditions, netted 20 days in jail, 60 days time served, two years probation, and a three-year firearms prohibition for assault causing bodily harm. In 2018, uttering threats to cause death or bodily harm resulted in a $500 victim surcharge and probation.
A bullet fired across the river into a Shelley residence did not appear to be a targeted shooting. Trent Seymour, a 16-year-old star athlete and son of the former chief, suffered a severed spinal cord, when a friend's loaded.22-calibre rifle accidentally discharged on the reserve. The Prince George community held fundraising events to purchase an all-terrain wheelchair and make the family home wheelchair accessible. He became an ambassador for the Rick Hansen Foundation.
Roads
The 1915 completion of a wagon road, stretching from Prince George via Six Mile Lake almost to Willow River, likely motivated theBertschi brothers of Ferndale to build a feeder road connecting Shelley with Ferndale. In 1922, the Public Works Department took control of this the Shelley Road East. Settlers used the railway line as a southwest trail via Foreman to Prince George. By the mid-1920s, the only road for hauling ties and farm produce to Prince George was the indirect route via Ferndale.
In 1927, a ferry installed to connect Salmon Valley farmers with the railway and the market opportunities of the sawmill camps on the south side of the river, also provided an alternate route from Shelley to Prince George via the Summit Lake road. John Burton, who lost his $3,000 rabbit-breeding farm in the 1926 Miworth fire, formerly ran the ferry at that location. John & Maude B. Burton, with children Gordon, Stanley, Cyril and Gwen, relocated to Shelley, where John became the ferryman. The ferry, which ran until the mid-1930s, included runs as far as Prince George. John died around 1940. Stanley R. bred pigs, enlisted, and settled in Vancouver. Maude became a poultry farmer. Gordon E. J. Burton married Margaret E. Otto in 1941. The couple left in 1943. Gwen married Gene Smith and settled in Prince George. Cyril moved to Vancouver, married, and had children. Maude appears to have left during the late 1940s.
A road was completed southeast to today's Gleneagle neighbourhood to provide a more direct access to Prince George. However this route was not maintained, except occasionally. When compared to the longer distance via Ferndale, it was described as "ten miles less bumps". Shelley Road East, like other side roads, broke up with each spring thaw and could not be fixed until it dried sufficiently. Even after summer gravelling, logging trucks quickly made the road impassable for many cars. During the early 1980s, the building of the Beaver Forest Service Road east from Shelley separated this heavy traffic. In 1975, the lower section of the southern access received paving as far as the Shelley Road North intersection and would ultimately become part of Highway 16. North of the intersection, the road condition remained poor, but was eventually paved.
Electricity, Broadcast Transmissions & Communications Devices
A 1929 proposal was the stringing of a telephone line from Prince George to connect with the existing line from Shelley to Aleza Lake.During the pre-electric period, households had battery-operated radios and propane appliances, and some residents had installed their own electrical generators, which ultimately became surplus to requirements. In 1961, with customers sharing in the capital cost, BC Hydro installed distribution lines, and the community also implemented street lighting. CKPG-TV of Prince George, coming on air in 1961, offered a clear reception. BC Hydro extended the power line across the river to the reserve.
Street lighting was upgraded in 1991. The next year, cell phone coverage reached the area. Broadband followed in 2010. In 2016, high-speed internet came to the reserve.
Oil & Natural Gas
During 1956, Westcoast Transmission built a 1,290-foot natural gas pipe crossing the Fraser, immediately west of the reserve on the north bank, and the township on the south one. Two 150-foot towers on each bank support cables attached to steel rings that carry the 30-inch aerial pipeline, which links Fort St. John to Huntingdon on the international border. By September 1957, gas flowed through the Westcoast Pipeline.Following the gas line right-of-way, the Taylor-Kamloops 12-inch oil pipeline opened in 1961.
A 1996 referendum voted overwhelmingly to establish a natural gas service for Shelley-Gleneagle residents, the capital cost recoverable over a 10-year period through property taxes.
Residents on the north side of the reserve temporarily evacuated when a 2018 rupture in the natural gas pipeline created a fireball. Repaired within weeks, restoring to 85 percent capacity took longer, creating a gas shortage that affected customers in British Columbia and the northwest U.S.
Shelley Reserve
With the railway arrival a certainty, speculators focused especially upon the Fort George Band Reserve property and the real estate to its west. After comprehensive negotiations, the band accepted the GTP's $100,000 offer for the reserve in 1911, plus $25,000 relocation costs. Part of the tribe moved to Otway and the remainder to Shelley. Initially, band members lived in hastily constructed shacks and tents until the government erected some 22 homes in 1913 on the new Shelley Reserve. Father Louis was the first Roman Catholic priest at the iconic church, with its stained glass windows, built about 1913. Once the GTP began burning the final shacks occupying the old site in 1914, the band, headed by Chief "Louie", completed their relocation. The 1918 influenza pandemic wiped out the Otway faction, being in closer proximity to infected European arrivals.By 1919, there were plans for a wagon road from Prince George to the Shelley north bank and the clearing of the land for agriculture.
During 1959 and 1960, residents built a funded eight-unit housing project to replace all the old, decaying dwellings. From 1961, children on the north side, who did not attend the Shelley school, were bussed to St. Mary's Catholic.
Charged with looting religious paintings, statues, and furnishings from the church, Judith Patricia Faye LePage was acquitted, because witness testimony supported her claim that the items had a precarious future in what appeared to be a vandalized abandoned building. During the late 1970s, 30 of the 76 band members lived on the reserve, very different from the 1950s when many hundred resided there. By 1980, the accommodation was run-down because housing subsidies were limited, tenant neglect, and most of the approximately 40 residents were welfare recipients.
In 1983, using a $15,000 grant from the B.C. Heritage Trust, band members restored the church exterior and put plexiglass over the stained glass windows. Previously stolen, the bell from the tower remained missing, but one of the statues, discovered in a deceased estate, returned after a 10-year absence. Grants totaling $67,604 enabled six unemployed band members to construct a band office-community hall on the south side of the river. Other grants allowed for the construction of three houses for seniors on the north side. The restored non-denominational church held a midnight mass for the first time in 15 years. Officially opened, the hall catered to social events, meetings, and adult and cultural education.
In 1987, the members received a $500,000 grant to establish a beef farm on their 1,320-acre reserve on the north side. An additional 40 acres exists to the south.
The Carrier name for Prince George was Lheidli. From 1990, the band, a subgroup of these people, were alternatively known as the Lheit Li We'tens, Lheit-Lit'en or Lheit Nation Band, indigenous spellings meaning the "People From Where the Rivers Meet". That year, an $83,000 grant and a $306,065 mortgage, financed four new houses on the south side. At the time, 12 families lived on the south site and eight on the north, but including those off reserve, numbers totaled 193, increasing to 212 by 1993. Although the water supply was substandard, it was safe to drink. About $236,000 earmarked for water improvement had been used for other purposes.
Treaty negotiations began in December 1993 with the federal government and the province. Chief Barry Seymour admitted that prior poor management was the reason that almost half a million dollars designated for a water system on the north side, and seven housing units, had been spent on other matters. Indian Affairs commented that the band had operated for several years with a great deal of autonomy in administering their own money. The department's only requirement was that the agreed projects be eventually done.
Unsatisfied with headway from the $1m costs incurred, the band council dismissed their head treaty negotiator. The band modified its name to Lheidli T'enneh. Chunzoolh Forest Products, a joint venture between Northwood Pulp and Timber and the band, planned to build a new sawmill on the reserve or former mill site. The expected 67 sawmill and logging jobs created would have alleviated the band's 80 percent unemployment rate. The plan downsized to a 16-employee shingle plant, and a commitment to offer band members priority for 32 jobs at the Northwood pulp mill.
A mortgage and grants financed nine new housing units in 1998. By this time, band membership totaled 262. That year saw the new water system installed, and six further houses finished the following year, which enabled 140 residents to live on reserve. Year 2000 saw another six houses.
Summer students from UNBC restored the graveyard beside the historic church.
In 2000, the city renamed Indian Reserve Road, leading to the north side, as Landooz Road, which means cottonwoods. However, the city turned down a request to extend fire protection and road maintenance to the area.
Negotiations throughout 1999 and 2000 were on the cusp of a treaty agreement in principle. When presented, the band rejected an offer comprising 2,000 hectares of land and $7.5 million. That year, it gained complete autonomy in the use of reserve land. The band opened an economic development office in downtown Prince George in 2012. Treaty negotiations continue.
Shell-Glen Volunteer Fire/Rescue contracted to supply emergency services to the south site from 2015. No fire protection service exists for the north side. A gas station and convenience store opened on the south site in early 2017.