22 June 2010

Turning Back the Pages...
Swiss Guides Exhibit Opening

A party of climbers ascends Mount Abbott under the watchful eyes of their
CPR Swiss Guides - circa 1910 Canadian Pacific Archives A10976.

Golden British Columbia - Months of planning are finally coming to a conclusion as we prepare for the opening of a special exhibit on Saturday, 26 Jun 2010. "Swiss Guides:  Shaping Mountain Culture in Western Canada" was prepared by the Swiss Consulate under the direction of the Consul General, Walter Deplazes. It was curated by Ilona Spaar.
 
The Golden Museum is really proud and excited to be the first outside of Vancouver to host this look into the people who helped create this unique mountain culture that we are so proud of, and it will remain at the museum until the end of August. To prepare for the opening we will be closed through this week, opening on Saturday. We hope you will come see what all the fuss is about.
 
This exhibit leads us into the centennial of the building of the Swiss Village of Edelweiss in 2011. The following article was one of the first that I ever wrote for the Golden Star. It appeared in the 8 Apr 1992 edition of the paper:
 
As civilization follows the path of least resistance, so it follows the rails through the Rockies, opened up new opportunities and challanges.
 
Once the railway was through to the coast, the CPR found that it needed lodging and entertainment for its passengers, and set out to build mountain hotels to accommodate these needs.
 
These hotels were strategically placed to allow passengers to stay overnight, as travel through the mountains was quite slow. Some stayed for days at a time, hiking through the mountains, visiting lakes, climbing into the Alpine regions to look for flowers and fauna, (much of which grows nowhere else in the world) and for the more adventurous, the incredible mountain peaks that had never before been climbed.
 
Seeing the need to have these often unskilled groups of people guided through the wilderness areas, and to the tops of the mountains, the CPR began in 1899 to bring skilled guides from Switzerland.
 
The guides, who were stationed at Lake Louise, Field, and Glacier came to Canada every spring, and returned to Switzerland in October of each year. The long separations made this a very difficult time for the guides and their families and in 1910 the CPR made the decision to build permanent lodging for their guides.
 
In January 1910, the CPR sent B.J. Hamilton to Golden, to scout the best location for the "Swiss Village," as it soon became known. Many different aspects had to be taken into consideration when choosing the right piece of property. The view had to not only be satisfying to the families who would live there but it also had to be visible to the passenger trains, making them a good advertising tool.
 
They saw no reason to build the house in level land, using valuable agricultural land and after checking properties owned by Messers. Moody, Connors, and Hoar, they took a serious look at the property owned by F.X. Sammers.
 
Mr. Sammers owned 160 acres of property north of the right-of-way, the southwest quarter of Section 24, Township 27, Range 22 west of the 5th meridian. About 60 acres lay on the flat, hidden from view, while the other 100 acres was on the hillside.
 
Just to the north of the Sammers property were several springs with a great volume of water that flowed year round and never froze. Water would be brought by flume for domestic use.
 
The decision to purchase Mr. Sammers property was made quite quickly and it is believed that the original asking price of $4,500 was given.
 
On 11 Mar 1911, the Golden Star ran the invitation to tender, for six Swiss style chalets to be erected for the CPR at Golden, B.C., in the area that was known as "Edelweiss".
 
The announcement of the award of the contract was made on 15 Apr 1911, to the company of Hayden and Skean of Calgary. All six of the Swiss houses were completed by 1 Sep 1911.
 
On 14 Jun 1912, five families arrived in Golden to take up permanent residence in the new "Edelweiss Village." Among the first residents were:  Mr. and Mrs. Aemmer, Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Feuz, Walter Feuz, H. Heimann, Rudolph Aemmer, and Christian Haesler.
 
Colleen Palumbo.