The journal of James Colnett is the last unpublished account of the early maritime fur trade on the Northwest Coast. Between 1786 and 1789, Colnett's expedition traversed the coast from Prince William Sound to the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Its members were the first Europeans to encounter the Tsimshian and the southern Heiltsuk, and the first to land on the southern Queen Charlotte Islands.

The journal is reproduced with full scholarly apparatus, as well as extracts from a second journal by Andrew Bracey Taylor, 3rd mate on one of the ships in Colnett's command. Focusing on the...

The Kwakwaka'wakw, speakers of the Kwak'wala language, lived on northern Vancouver Island and the adjacent mainland of British Columbia long before the arrival of non-Natives. This important book, newly back in print, provides a geographic overview of the changing demography and settlement patterns of the Kwakwaka'wakw between 1775 and 1920 and is a reference guide to the location and use of Kwakwaka'wakw settlement sites. Robert Galois has utilized a vast quantity of unpublished archival data to show that much changed in the 150 years after contact, and he examines some of the...