Sewall, sometimes incorrectly spelled Sewell, is an unincorporated locality located on the north shore of
Masset Inlet, on
Graham Island in the
Haida Gwaii
Haida Gwaii (; / , literally "Islands of the Haida people"), previously known as the Queen Charlotte Islands, is an archipelago located between off the British Columbia Coast, northern Pacific coast in the Canadian province of British Columbia ...
archipelago (formerly known as Queen Charlotte Islands) off the
North Coast of British Columbia
The British Columbia Coast, popularly referred to as the BC Coast or simply the Coast, is a geographic region of the Canadian province of British Columbia. As the entire western continental coastline of Canada along the Pacific Ocean is in the pr ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
. It is located 33 kilometres (21 miles) up Masset Inlet.
History
Sewall began its life as a real estate promotion dubbed Star City, after the developer, the Star Realty Company, during a real estate boom on Graham Island that also saw the foundations of
Juskatla,
Delkatla and
Graham Centre, but the name Sewall was finally chosen, being that of S.D. Sewall (the "Sewell" spelling is featured in the provincial gazette of 1930, but was a mistaken association with
Sewell Inlet nearby, which has a different name-origin.) By the end of 1913, seventy families had settled here, mostly
Icelandic Canadians encouraged to relocate from Manitoba. After the First World War, most families moved away, but one of the original homesteaders, Paul Bastian, bought up most of the land and continued to live on and raise his family there. S.D. Sewall said that he was interested in farmland in the area surrounding Sewall, and that it was not the intention of the developers "to force the new town's growth but to build up the area around it".
Sewall had been the site of a sawmill owned by the Masset Inlet Lumber Company.
''Started with the Sewall mill: Cheapens the Cost'', ''Masset Leader'', 6 February 1913
/ref>
Climate
See also
*List of communities in British Columbia
Communities in the province of British Columbia, Canada, can include incorporation (municipal government), incorporated municipality, municipalities, Indian reserves, unincorporated area, unincorporated communities or Locality (settlement), localit ...
*Sewall Sewall is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
* Arthur Sewall (1835–1900), American shipbuilder and politician
* Charles S. Sewall (1779–1848), American politician
* Doug Sewall, American wheelchair curler
* George P. Sewal ...
(disambiguation)
References
Populated places in Haida Gwaii
Unincorporated settlements in British Columbia
Ghost towns in British Columbia
Icelandic settlements in Canada
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