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By 1911 there were 35 marine coast stations, a mix of government and private, between Cordova Alaska to San Diego California. There were 112 vessels on the north American west coast fitted with wireless.
In November 1919 all British registered vessels were required to be fitted with a serviceable wireless station and licensed operator.
In July 1907 the Union Steamship "Camosun" was the first vessel on this coast to be fitted with Marconi wireless equipment in anticipation of the promised coast stations. The Marconi Company had a strict policy of not communicating with another station, either a ship or a coast, unless it too was fitted with their equipment. The new British Columbia marine coast station chain used Shoemaker patent transmitters thus the Camosun's Marconi equipment, being useless for its intended purpose, was removed from the "Camosun" eleven months later.
Sources
The history is given in the photos and narratives of the people who were there. All the original staff have passed away now, but their descendants stumble across this site and pass on photos and family information.
Newspaper clippings help fill in some of the blanks.
Resources used are:
Victoria Colonist & Victoria Times archive,
Newspapers.com archive,
Victoria Library newspaper microfilms,
British Columbia Government online Archives,
Larry Reid's book "The Story of the West Coast Radio Service", Chameleon Publishing 1992,
Leona Taylor and Dorothy Mindenhall, "Index of Historical Victoria Newspapers". It appears these two ladies have leafed through old newspapers and copied marine news relating to Vancouver Island's west coast.
Canadian census documents.
British Columbia commercial directories, such as Henderson's, in the 1910's.
Relatives of several radio operators who stumble on this site.
In 1907, the Dominion Government constructed a six-foot-wide life-saving trail along the northern edge of the Strait, spanning from Carmanah Lighthouse to Bamfield settlement. Cabins were strategically positioned along its length to provide shelter for survivors of shipwrecks, interconnected by a telephone line linking the cabins and lighthouses. Maintenance of the trail, including its bridges, ladders, and telephone infrastructure, was entrusted to a resident of the Bamfield fishing village. However, severe storms frequently disrupted the telephone communications for days at a time, caused by falling trees or gale-force winds damaging the wires.
In addition to a trail, a communications network of wireless (two way radio) stations would blanket the BC coast. The first four wireless stations, Vancouver, Victoria, Pachena Point and Estevan Point were all operational by January 1908. These stations stretched along the north coast of the Strait. Cape Lazo came on line a few months later to help cover the Gulf of Georgia (Salish Sea). By the time the decade was out, Triangle Island, Ikeda Head (Moresby Island), Dead Tree (Graham Island) and Digby Island (Prince Rupert) were added to the list of stations, thus wireless coverage along the British Columbia coast, north to south, was complete.
Within a decade Triangle was shut down and replaced by Bull Harbour. Concurrently Ikeda was decomissioned and Alert Bay added to cover the busy northern inside passage.
The 20 by 100 nautical mile long Strait of Juan de Fuca was the primary passage connecting the main population centers to open ocean. The Strait often had adverse winds and was tricky to locate from seaward. There were lighthouses on either side but in fog they were useless. Ships would sail and vanish, while expected arrivals failed to reach port. Often debris dicovered on a remote coastal shore would be the sole indicator of yet another maritime tragedy.