The history of the lumber trade of British
Columbia has been one of considerable fluctuation and
recurring crises occasioned by historical changes over
which the industry has had no control. With no large
permanent home market to depend upon for stability,
it has had to attain a flexibility which would allow
it to accommodate itself to the ever-changing complexity
of world markets,
In its pioneer phase (1851-1886) the trade could
depend on only small local markets in Victoria, New
Westminster and, to some extent, San Francisco. With a
scarcity of operating capital , no rail transportation
whatever, and inadequate water transportation controlled
by San Francisco brokers, the infant industry located
on Vancouver Island, on Burrard Inlet and at New Westminster
struggled for survival. Despite these handicaps, certain
fairly reliable markets were gradually established In
the awakening Pacific community in Australia, Chile,
the Sandwich Islands, and China.
The completion of the Canadian Pacific Railroad
(1886) marked the real beginning of the lumber trade in
British Columbia, it made possible the exploitation of
the interior forests, presented the trade with the
Prairie market, which was to sustain it until 1913 and
it attracted plentiful capital to the industry for the
first time. The completion of the Panama Canal in 1914
marked the third phase of the history of the trade,
for it opened to the industry the communities of the
Atlantic, especially the seaboard of the United States
and the important United Kingdom market, This new
cargo trade rescued the ailing industry from the collapse
of the Prairie demand.
The pattern of the lumber trade changed again
after 1940. War-time shipping difficulties, followed
by a seemingly permanent dollar shortage in the sterling
area largely diminished the importance of the United
Kingdom market a sustained period of prosperity in
the United States, however, facilitated a shift of
trade lines from the Old World to the New. The change
was accelerated and consolidated by the rise of giant
American cellulose corporations which invested heavily
In British Columbia forest lands and production plants
and integrated them into vast international complexes
of industries whose main market is the pulp, lumber,
and cellulose-hungry industries of the United States.
This thesis attempts to trace these economic
changes in the light of changing historical conditions
and to discover the pattern which emerges from them. / Arts, Faculty of / History, Department of / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/41675 |
| Date | January 1957 |
| Creators | Lawrence, Joseph Collins |
| Publisher | University of British Columbia |
| Source Sets | University of British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis/Dissertation |
| Rights | For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use. |
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