Agassiz Fraser Valley Regional District, British Columbia

Community - An unincorporated populated place, generally with a population of 50 or more, and having a recognized central area that might contain a post office, store and/or community hall, etc, intended for the use of the general public in the region. N side of Fraser River, S of Harrison Lake, Yale Division Yale Land District

Mapped Location

Agassiz: The mapped location is an approximation and should not be used for navigation or wayfinding.

 

Information

General information on Agassiz

  • Feature Type: Place

 

Official, historical, colloquial and alternative toponyms for Agassiz

A brief list of names that this geographic feature has been named

Name Description
Agassiz Official

 

Origin Notes and History of Agassiz

References to Agassiz that document the origin of its place name

Agassiz (Post Office) adopted 6 October 1936; form of name changed to Agassiz (Post Office & Railway Station) 4 October 1956; form of name changed to Agassiz (community) 15 December 1982.

B.C. Geographical Names in Province of British Columbia
BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office  |  Province of British Columbia

Ferney Coombe Post Office opened here 1 May 1884; name changed to Agassiz Post Office 1 May 1888

B.C. Geographical Names in Province of British Columbia
BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office  |  Province of British Columbia

Lewis Nunn Agassiz (1827-80) was born in Essex, England, and immigrated to PEI after retiring as an officer from the British Army. He moved to Ontario with his wife, Mary Caroline Schram (1829-1921, see Schram Rocks), and children, then left them to chase gold in California and BC. The family reunited at Victoria in 1862 and lived for a time at Hope and then Yale, where Agassiz was constable and postmaster. In 1862 he pre-empted land in the east Fraser Valley, where he and his family took up residence in 1867, calling their home Ferney Coombe. Agassiz left Canada again in 1875 to embark on a solo world tour, dying in Constantinople while visiting his brother. After the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1885, a community grew up around Ferney Coombe and the name was changed to Agassiz. Root crops, hops, corn, and dairy and beef farming have all been important to this rural farming district. Agassiz Banks was named by regional hydrographer Henry Parizeau in 1926.

B.C. Geographical Names in Province of British Columbia
Scott, Andrew; "The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names"; Harbour Publishing, Madeira Park, 2009.  |  Province of British Columbia

Named after the family of the first settler at this point: Captain Louis Agassiz of Stour Lodge, Essex. ... He came to the valley during the gold rush of 1858. It was not possible for Mrs. Agassiz to join him in the Cariboo with her children so she stayed at Yale for several years. She, herself, was Miss Caroline Von Schram of United Loyalist stock. Finally the family took up land here, where they have remained ever since. Captain Agassiz had called the place "Ferny Coombe" but it had an Indian name signifying "beautiful valley". When the CPR was completed to the coast, the station and post office were called Agassiz by the Sir Joseph Trutch, the Dominion agent in BC.

B.C. Geographical Names in Province of British Columbia
Nelson, Denys; Place Names of the Delta of the Fraser River; 1927, unpublished manuscript held in the Provincial Archives  |  Province of British Columbia

The former dwellers at Agassiz were the Siyita tribe of Cowichan Indians whose village was Skuhamen (SQuha'mEn), according to Franz Boas. They belonged to the Halkomaylen Division of the Salish linguistic stock.

B.C. Geographical Names in Province of British Columbia
Nelson, Denys; Place Names of the Delta of the Fraser River; 1927, unpublished manuscript held in the Provincial Archives  |  Province of British Columbia

 

Fraser Valley Regional District

Political Boundaries

Last updated: 2023-09-30