BELLA COOLA

As our Wilderness Air 12 seater plane broke through the clouds and began its descent along a steep mountain pass to the isolated valley of Bella Coola, British Columbia, I felt a rush of excitement.

The snow capped peaks surrounding the valley, the blinking river rushing through its bottom and the green, glacier-fed fjord leading from Bella Coola to the Pacific Ocean, really did bring back memories of Norway. The thick forests on the sides of the valley were dotted with lakes, ponds and rushing streams. I could sense, if not see, the trout jumping in the lakes, salmon swimming up the river, and the abundant wildlife sheltered by the dense brush.

Little wonder the group of Norwegian settlers who arrived here exactly 100 years before me, on a quest to create their own isolated, Christian Norwegian colony, wrote ecstatic letters about their newly found "paradise".

Unlike many of the "Utopian" projects of the last century, when small groups of idealistic settlers established remote colonies which eventually disintegrated, the Norwegian project in Bella Coola not only survived but thrived. To this end the colony had to adapt, and the original idea of a "culturally pure" and "morally and religiously superior" outpost soon gave way to the realities of changing times. Locals, when today asked about the population of Bella Coola will often reply, ì2000, of which 1000 are Native Indians, 500 Caucasians and 500 Norwegians. Add to that the number of "non Norwegians" in the area who can trace a great-great-grandmother to Bardu or Bergen, or whose grand aunt married a Norwegian, and it is obvious the settlers had quite a local impact.

The saga of the Norwegians in Bella Coola began in 1884, when a young Norwegian, Bernard Filip Jacobsen, happened to stop in Bella Coola on his way to Alaska. Jacobsen was collecting native Indian artifacts for German museums, and was mightily impressed by this paradise. He wrote a letter to the provincial government of B.C., which resulted in the valley being surveyed for future settlement. He returned to Europe, accompanied by eight members of the Bella Coola Indian band, who toured the continent staging their ancestral dances in front of European royalty staying in Europe for two years. Jacobsen in the meantime wrote glowing articles about the valley, including one in the Norwegian language newspaper Seattle Posten. This article happened to be read by pastor Christian Saugstad in the Lutheran Free Church at the Augsburg Chapter in Crookston, Minnesota.

Saugstad was looking for a place to bring a group of devoted followers, who were fed up of the dismal life of prairie farming, tough winters and a sharp divide in the Church over the emergence of Haugianism. He set out to take a look at Bella Coola in British Columbia, Canada. What he saw sent him hurrying back to Minnesota, where he set about gathering a group which would total 120 Norwegians bound for what he originally called "New Norway".

The original settlers arrived on October 31, 1894, after an exciting journey across the Canadian prairies, across the Rocky Mountains, and finally by the chartered steamship "Princess Louis" along the coast of British Columbia and up the 120 mile long Burke Channel to Bella Coola. Saugstad had been warned against traveling that late during the year, but couldn't bear the thought of another winter in Minnesota. All but one made it safely to Bella Coola. The one who didn't, Ole Olsen, was sent back to the U.S. after being arrested for "drunken and disorderly conduct" on the streets of Victoria. The Constitution of the new colony did not allow for the consumption of alcohol.

The chronicles of the Norwegian settlement are detailed in letters and diaries which have been preserved to this day, as well as in "Nybyggeren", a hand-written newsletter which was published monthly and brought from log cabin to log cabin. These early records tell of hardship in clearing land of tree trunks as big as a house, of how the Norwegians came to rely on native Indians for help, transportation and advice on living off the land, and of close encounters with local wildlife. (One of the Norwegian ladies wrote about how she was walking through the forest with a knapsack full of household goods when she suddenly encountered a giant bear standing in her path. She grabbed two frying pans from the pack and started banging them together - so hard in fact, she wrote later, that they were bent beyond repair. But they did the trick, the bear fled and she continued safely on her journey.)

The Norwegians had certain skills which came in handy for survival in the Canadian wilderness. One was the ability to build solid log cabins, in fact so solid that some of them are still standing today. A second was their diligence in gathering food for the long winter, and a knowledge of how to smoke, pickle or dry fish and meat, prepare jams and jellies, and build winter storage cellars for potatoes and other produce.

Today, few if any of the Norwegian Bella Coolans speak or understand Norwegian, and the Norwegian Lutheran Church now is an interdenominational place of worship. At the Sons of Norway lodge, like in many other places in North America, youíre as likely to find folks who are married to Norwegians but are not Norwegian themselves, as the descendants of the original settlers.

But the tradition of Saugstad and his group of pilgrims is still alive. In Hagensborg, at the head of the valley, there is a pioneer museum in a restored log cabin. Names like Hans, Kaare or Ingrid are still common. And during long winter evenings, when talk is centered on hunting stories (Bella Coola still is home to some of the largest grizzly bears in North America, and a large colony of black bears, wolves and Bighorn Sheep) and the latest political developments in Victoria, B.C., the "old country" is fondly woven into the stories.

On my last evening in Bella Coola, the day before a friend with a Cessna 172 was scheduled to fly over the mountains and pick me up for the long journey back to Vancouver, I strayed over to the local pub. A sign beside the door announced the upcoming Rodeo in Williams Lake. Outside, pickup trucks with antlers on the hood and hound dogs in the back were lined up. Folks with cowboy hats and leather boots who filled all the tables didn't exactly look like theyíd welcome a city slicker.

But then I noticed, on the back of one of the old chevvy trucks, two bumper sticks: One with UFFDA on it and another proclaiming I Love Norway. I figured it would be safe to go inside.

The Norwegians in Bella Coola celebrated their 100th anniversary in 1994, amid praise and congratulations from other local communities. Here is what the Victoria Daily Colonist wrote about the Norwegians upon their arrival in 1894: ìWe trust that the hopes and expectations of the Norwegians who are on their way to settle Bella Coola will be more than realized. Scandinavians make good settlers. They are intelligent, sober, industrious and self-reliant. They do not expect too much. They come from a country where nature is not very generous - where men have to work hard and continuously to gain a comfortable livelihood, and they therefore will not be discouraged when they are required to face the difficulties and endure the hardships and privations incident to pioneer life.î

The Norwegians in Bella Coola certainly lived up to that.