Just in time for holiday gifting, Revelstoke Museum & Archives is releasing their new book, "Stories Beneath The Surface", an accompaniment to their on-site and digital exhibits of the same name.

The photographs in this book portray life in the valley prior to the building of the Hugh Keenleyside dam, particularly the area known as Revelstoke Reach, from Revelstoke to Arrowhead. Discover the rich history of this region, as you dive beneath the surface and discover the lost stories of the valley.

"Stories Beneath The Surface" is available in-person, or online through the museum's store. 

Full Summary:

On June 9, 1969, the Hugh Keenleyside dam on the Columbia River was officially opened just north of Castlegar, B.C., creating a reservoir that stretched over 240 km.

The reservoir created by the dam wiped out or severely affected several communities between Revelstoke and Castlegar, and displaced 2000 people.

The construction of the dam was part of the terms of the Columbia River Treaty between the governments of Canada and the United States, and it was originally built solely as a storage dam, with no hydro-electric generation. It was built to control the flow of the Columbia River into the state of Washington, for flood control, irrigation, and maximization of the Grand Coulee Dam. The people who lived on the Columbia River were not consulted, nor were the Sinixt people or any other Indigenous nations.

More than 50 years later, the impacts of a dam built so far away and so long ago are often not understood by people moving to the valley. People visit the “flats” south of Revelstoke and notice the fluctuation of the water, but don’t know its cause. The stories of the valley have been flooded out along with the farmland and the communities that once existed.