Prince George is a thriving city of 74,000 people on the Fraser and Nechako rivers, and lies on the Yellowhead Route #16 of the TransCanada Highway, and on the main Canadian National Railways line to the Pacifici Ocean. The community, which is a major market centre for the region’s 340,000 residents has a diverse economy, including forestry, mining, healthcare, education, and tourism, as well as home to the University of Northern British Columbia. There are many outdoor recreational opportunities close-by, including skiing, hiking, and fishing.
Prince George History
The Prince George area has a long history of human habitation by the Carrier and Lheidli T’enneh, here for thousands of years,
The first European fur traders arrived in the late 1700s. And the Hudson’s Bay Company established a trading post at Fort George (named after King George III ) in 1807. The fort was the main trading post in the region for many years.
In the 1860s, the discovery of gold in the nearby Cariboo region led to increased activity in the area (with many prospectors travelling through by land from Edmonton. Prince George grew rapidly as a result.
The arrival of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway in 1914 made the community a major transportation hub for the region’s agriculture, forestry, and mining. The railway made this town a divisional point (where staff rested and where trains resupplied with fuel and water. During World War II, Prince George was home to a major military base.
After the war, the city continued to grow and it doubled in population over the 1960s and 1970s. Prince George has 3 pulp & paper mills, several chemical factories, several saw mills and an oil refinery.