McCulloch Regional District of Central Okanagan, British Columbia

Locality - A named place or area, generally with a scattered population of 50 or less. Just N of Hydraulic Lake, E of Kelowna, Similkameen Division Yale Land District

Mapped Location

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

 

Information

General information on McCulloch

  • Feature Type: Place

 

Official, historical, colloquial and alternative toponyms for McCulloch

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

Name Description
McCulloch Official

 

Origin Notes and History of McCulloch

References to McCulloch that document the origin of its place name

McCulloch (Railway Station) adopted in the 1930 BC Gazetteer, as labelled on BC map 1EM, 1915. Re-approved 6 October 1936 on Geological Survey sheet 420A, Kettle River. Form of name changed to McCulloch (Locality) 18 June 1979 on 82E/14.

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

After Kettle Valley Railway chief engineer Andrew McCulloch, characterized as the genius behind construction of one of the world's most difficult railways to build - the line between Midway and Hope. Following the 1877 discovery of silver deposits in the Kootenays, and faced with the possibility that Canada would lose economic & political control of the BC interior to the United States, it was determined that an all-Canadian railway route would be established to reach the Kootenays (instead of the historic transportation routes through the States via the north-south valleys). There were numerous false starts, and staggering engineering difficulties encountered as the route had to run east-west across several mountain ranges, but by 1916 trains were running from Vancouver, through the Kootenays thence to the rest of Canada. Economic development in the interior is linked to the presence of the rail line, but passengers & freight were eventually lost to the highways. By 1959, Kettle Valley Railway was owned by CPR, and following several washouts through the Coquihalla Pass, that portion of the line was abandoned. Track east of Penticton was removed in 1978, and in 1990 CPR received permission to abandon what little was left of the KVR.

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

McCulloch railway station on the divide between Okanagan and Kettle Valleys. After Andrew McCulloch....now retired in Penticton. (Rupert W. Haggen, BCLS, Origin of Place Names in Boundary District, January 1945 manuscript, file H.1.45.)

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

"....Andrew McCulloch CE, (1864-1945). Served with various railways including GNR, CPR and GTPR; chief engineer Kettle Valley Railway, 1910; general superintendent [KVR], 1918-1933. Died at Penticton 13 December 1945." (12th Report of the Okanagan Historical Society, 1948).

B.C. Geographical Names in Province of British Columbia
included with note  |  Province of British Columbia

 

Regional District of Central Okanagan

Political Boundaries

Last updated: 2023-09-27