Stewart is a

district municipality A district municipality is a designation for a class of municipalities found in several locations, including Canada, Lithuania, and South Africa. Canada British Columbia Under provincial law, municipalities in British Columbia are to be desig ...

at the head of the

Portland Canal , image = Hyder Alaska IMG 0276 (22495379342).jpg , alt = , caption = Portland Canal from Hyder, Alaska , image_bathymetry = , alt_bathymetry = , caption_bathymetry = , location = Alaska and British Columbia , group = , coordinates ...

in northwestern

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

, Canada, near the

Alaskan panhandle Southeast Alaska, colloquially referred to as the Alaska(n) Panhandle, is the southeastern portion of the U.S. state of Alaska, bordered to the east and north by the northern half of the Canadian province of British Columbia (and a small part ...

. In 2011, its population was about 494. 2015-08-07 Salmon Glacier, BC, Canada 1016

History

The

Nisga'a The Nisga’a , often formerly spelled Nishga and spelled in the Nisga'a language as (pronounced ), are an Indigenous people of Canada in British Columbia. They reside in the Nass River valley of northwestern British Columbia. The name is a ...

, who live around the

Nass River The Nass River is a river in northern British Columbia, Canada. It flows from the Coast Mountains southwest to Nass Bay, a sidewater of Portland Inlet, which connects to the North Pacific Ocean via the Dixon Entrance. Nass Bay joins Portland In ...

, called the head of Portland Canal , meaning "safe house" or "strong house", probably because it served them as a retreat from the harassment of the Haida and

Tlingit The Tlingit ( or ; also spelled Tlinkit) are indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Their language is the Tlingit language (natively , pronounced ),

from the outer coast. They travelled in the area seasonally to pick berries and hunt birds. It and the rest of the Portland Canal had previously been the domain of the Tsetsaut people, also called the Skam-a-Kounst Indians, or in

, an Athapaskan people who became decimated by war and disease and were driven out of the Stewart area by either Haida or Nisga'a in 1856–57. The Portland Canal was first explored and named in July 1793 by Captain George Vancouver in honour of

William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland William Henry Cavendish Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland, (14 April 173830 October 1809) was a British Whig and then a Tory politician during the late Georgian era. He served as Chancellor of the University of Oxford (1792–1809) ...

(1738–1808), Home Secretary from 1794 to 1801. Vancouver met two friendly native people at the current site of Stewart. The area around the Portland Canal was again explored in 1896 by Captain D.D. Gaillard of the

United States Army Corps of Engineers , colors = , anniversaries = 16 June (Organization Day) , battles = , battles_label = Wars , website = , commander1 = ...

(after whom the Gaillard Cut in the Panama Canal was later named). Two years after Gaillard's visit, the first prospectors and settlers arrived. Among them was D. J. Raine, for whom a creek and a mountain in the area are named. The Stewart brothers arrived in 1902. In 1905, Robert M. Stewart, the first postmaster, named the town Stewart.

Gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

and

silver Silver is a chemical element with the symbol Ag (from the Latin ', derived from the Proto-Indo-European ''h₂erǵ'': "shiny" or "white") and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical ...

mining dominated the early economy. Nearby Hyder,

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S. ...

, boomed with the discovery of rich silver veins in the upper Salmon River basin in 1917 and 1918. Hyder became an access and supply point for the mines, while Stewart served as the port for Canadian mining activity, which was centred on the town of Premier, which was accessed by a road from Hyder. Other mines in the area were the Jumbo, BC Silver, Red Cliff, and Porter-Idaho. More large camps were south of Stewart at Anyox and Maple Bay. Disney's ''

Eight Below ''Eight Below'' is a 2006 American survival drama film, a remake based on the 1983 Japanese film ''Antarctica'' by Toshirô Ishidô, Koreyoshi Kurahara, Tatsuo Nogami and Susumu Saji. It was produced by Patrick Crowley and David Hoberman, direc ...

'', starring

Paul Walker Paul William Walker IV (September 12, 1973 – November 30, 2013) was an American actor. He was known for his role as Brian O'Conner in the ''Fast & Furious'' franchise. Walker began his career as a child actor in the 1980s, gaining recogniti ...

and

Jason Biggs Jason Matthew Biggs (born May 12, 1978) is an American actor and comedian. He is best known for playing Jim Levenstein in the '' American Pie'' comedy film series and Larry Bloom in the Netflix original series ''Orange Is the New Black''. He als ...

, was partially filmed here. The exterior shots from

John Carpenter John Howard Carpenter (born January 16, 1948) is an American filmmaker, actor, and composer. Although he worked in various film genres, he is most commonly associated with horror, action, and science fiction films of the 1970s and 1980s. He ...

's science fiction classic '' The Thing'' were filmed within Salmon Glacier. STEWART FIRE HOUSE, BRITISH COLUMBIA

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

conducted by Statistics Canada, Stewart had a population of 517 living in 256 of its 337 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 401. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

Transportation

Stewart is accessible by highway from the British Columbia highway system, via Highway 37A, by boat through the

, or by air through Stewart Airport.

Location

West of Stewart is

Hyder, Alaska Hyder is a census-designated place in Prince of Wales-Hyder Census Area, Alaska, United States. The population was 87 at the 2010 census, down from 97 in 2000. Hyder is accessible by road only from Stewart, British Columbia, is popular with mot ...

, which is only from the town. Northwest of Stewart, and accessible only by way of Hyder, is Premier, British Columbia, notable for being in Canada, but only accessible through a portion of the United States that is only accessible from Canada. East of the town is Meziadin Junction, which is from the town. Also east is

Kitwanga, British Columbia Kitwanga or Gitwangak or Gitwangax ("people of the place of rabbits" in the Gitxsan language) is located where the Kitwanga River runs into the Skeena River in British Columbia. A long-standing village before contact, the village is within G ...

, which is located from the town, and Dease Lake, British Columbia, which is located north of Stewart. It is the northernmost point on Canada's Pacific coast.

Climate

Stewart has a

humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...

(''Dfb''), with about per year of precipitation, much of it as snow, and an average yearly temperature of , according to Environment Canada. Environment Canada�
Canadian Climate Normals 1981–2010
accessed 16 July 2014 Stewart is Canada's most northerly

ice-free port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as Ha ...

. Due to its proximity to the ocean, the climate retains strong maritime influences, with winters being far milder than locations farther inland. With an average of 985 hours of annual sunshine, Stewart is one of the cloudiest places in the world.

References

External links

* * {{Authority control District municipalities in British Columbia Ghost towns in British Columbia Populated places in the Regional District of Kitimat–Stikine Stewart Country