Savona Thompson-Nicola 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. S side Kamloops Lake, near W end, Kamloops Division Yale Land District

Mapped Location

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

 

Information

General information on Savona

  • Feature Type: Place

 

Official, historical, colloquial and alternative toponyms for Savona

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

Name Description
Savona Official

 

Origin Notes and History of Savona

References to Savona that document the origin of its place name

Savona (Post Office & Station) adopted 7 June 1927, NOT Port Van Horne. Confirmed 21 June 1946 on 92I. Identified as Savona (Post Office) in the 1953 BC Gazetteer. Form of name changed to Savona (community) 28 February 1983 on 92I/15.

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 Francis Savona (François Saveneux), a stockraiser, who settled here before February 1859 and established a ferry across the Thompson River. A Corsican, his surname was so difficult to pronounce that he was known by the name of his native city, Savona. The ferry crossing is identified but not named on Lieut. Mayne's Sketch of the Fraser Canyon, 1859. The settlement that grew up adjacent to the HBC post on the north shore became known as Savona's Ferry. Savona's Ferry Post Office was opened 2 July 1866, W.H. Mouat, postmaster; closed in 1870; re-opened 1 June 1881. During subsequent CPR construction a townsite was laid out on the south shore and called Port Van Horne, after Willian Cornelius Van Horne, CPR General Manager. The settlers from Savona's Ferry relocated to the townsite but continued to refer to their settlement as Savona. See also "Ranching in the Southern Interior Plateau of B.C." by T.R. Weir, Geographical Branch Memoir 4, Ottawa, 1964, p.81; also Akrigg, British Columbia Place Names.

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

"Francois Saveneux settled here on the south shore in 1858 to run a cable ferry across "Boute du Lac", catering to miners who were then swarming into the country, mostly from the States. It seems to have been a profitable enterprise, and was run in conjunction with the HBC wharf and warehouse on the north shore, where a tiny village grew. Saveneux died in 1862 but his wife continued (to run) the ferry for a few years, and in 1870 it became a government operation. Following CPR construction the village moved to the south shore, and was known briefly as Van Horne. The CPR dignitary apparently regarded such a small place as beneath his worth, so the name reverted to Savona's Ferry, contracted to Savona about 1910." (Mary Balf, Place Names of the Kamloops District, Kamloops Museum, 1978)

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

Pronounced "SAV an-aw" by residents, who are amused when visitors mis-pronounce the name "sa VONE ah", like the town in Italy.

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

 

Thompson-Nicola Regional District

Political Boundaries

Last updated: 2023-10-02