John Fannin ‘Fathered’ Royal British Columbia Museum

John ‘Jack’ Fannin is one of the few of our bigger-than-life pioneers who has been immortalized, although this may be about to change.

The first curator and virtual creator of the Royal British Columbia Provincial Museum, John Fannin was more than a remarkable public servant.

Few who knew the stocky, white-bearded figure with the braying laugh and twinkling eyes realized that–not once but twice–he’d survived a hostile wilderness.

In October 1874 Jack and George Florrence, a French Canadian, were commissioned by the B.C. government to explore the headwaters of the Stikine River for evidence of gold. Four harrowing months later they staggered, near death, into Wrangell, Alaska where they gave a breathtaking account of their ordeal.

Twice turned back by ice when they’d attempted canoeing upriver, they decided to await freeze-up and set out on foot. On December 5^th they headed out, estimating that the 60-mile trek to their supply cache would take four days. To be safe, they packed a week’s grub.

Their journey would last 22 agonizing days!

Soon after leaving the mouth of the Stikine, they encountered the worst snowstorm either man had known.

“For 15 days,” according to the record, it “continued with scarcely an hour’s intermission; snow, rain and hail, accompanied by a wind so penetrating that there were moments it was utterly impossible to face it. During all this time they travelled on with heads bent forward, the one following in the tracks of the other, their snowshoes sinking a foot at every step.”

On the 12^th day their grub was gone. Worse, when a lull in the blizzard had allowed them to get their bearings, they saw they were scarcely halfway. They faced each other in mute despair. Finally, Florrence suggested retreat. Fannin shook his head, sure that their only chance lay in abandoning their sleds and gear, including blankets, and pushing onward.

Keeping only an axe, they began a race against death.

Night was spent ceaselessly marching about the campfire to keep warm until at last it was morning and they struggled onward–only to find that the river was “open from bank to bank with high and perpendicular cliffs”. They could go no farther and Florrence, taking Fannin by the arm and pointing downriver, said, “We will go back to our blankets and have a good sleep.”

Faint and perishing from hunger they commenced retracing their steps.

That night was the worst, Fannin having to walk Florrence about the fire, talking, talking, talking–anything to keep his comrade from succumbing to a sleep from which there would be no awakening.

Once, exhausted, Florrence fell into the fire and Fannin had to drag him to safety.

“The next day,” the account continues, “while they were travelling by the side of an open slough, Florrence stopped suddenly, and taking off his snowshoes, plunged into the water, returning almost immediately with a salmon grasped so tightly that his fingers met through the fish!”

This tiny windfall lasted them five days, the starving men even rationing fins, gills and bones. Upon reaching their abandoned sleds they recovered a single blanket apiece and staggered on downriver. On Christmas Day, five miles from Wrangell, they were stopped by open water. They made a crude raft but, after only a mile, Fannin was thrown into the river and their voyage was ended.

Then–rescue. A passing native rushed them to town. A week later, John Fannin headed back into the sub-Arctic wilderness to complete the job he’d begun.

I mentioned that Jack Fannin had survived two encounters with extreme hardship.

Years before his Stikine River adventure he’d been one of the famous “Overlanders of ‘62.” These were gold-seekers who came to B.C. the hard way, by Red River cart, on horseback, afoot and on rafts. Many died. Fannin survived that ordeal and another 12 years later founded what became our Royal British Columbia Provincial Museum.

(It was established in the east wing of the Parliament Buildings, which is where, as a kid, I first visited it with a classroom outing. Many a time I returned on my own, or with a chum after school, to ogle the stuffed animals, the fossilized dinosaur tracks, the gigantic earwig—a replica, like something out of a horror movie and really scary—and the First Nations exhibits. All thanks to John ‘Jack’ Fannin although I’d never heard of him then, of course.)

Fifty years ago the current Fannin Building was built on Belleville Street to house provincial museum collections. More recently, because the building is crowded, lacks proper ventilation and is non-seismic friendly, it has been proposed that it and the adjoining Archives be demolished and replaced by a larger museum/archives complex with the latest amenities and building codes.

It’s to be hoped that, should the Fannin Building bite the dust, its successor will also honour this remarkable man whose personal collections and personal dedication were the nucleus of today’s and tomorrow’s B.C. Provincial Museum.

Speaking of which, today’s RBC Museum (www.informationvine.com/BC+Royal+Museum