Gustavus Blinn Wright was a surveyor and merchandiser in
the Cariboo.
1 He arrived in
British Columbia in
1858 where he began packing supplies on the
Harrison-
Lillooet trail.
2 Wright became a prominent figure in the field and by
1862, he was one of three contractors awarded a contract to build the Cariboo Road.
3 He became embroiled in controversy when he chose to divert from the original route
for the road, opting instead to have it pass nearer to a roadhouse he had purchased
in
Deep Creek.
4 The owners of the roadhouses in
Williams Lake accused him of deviating the road’s path for his own benefit, but colonial officials
ultimately sided with Wright.
5 After the completion of the project, officials awarded him further road construction,
as well as rail surveying, contracts, despite ongoing complaints that the government
was biased in Wright’s favour.
6 Wright further contributed to the development of the
Kootenay Region by opening the first general stores in Revelstoke and Ainsworth, as well as some
of the first major mines in the area.
7Little is known about Wright’s early life, apart from his time spent as a placer-miner
in
California during the
1850s.
8 In the
1870s, Wright occasionally wintered in
Portland, Oregon, where he met his wife Julia Anna Sutton, with whom he had three children.
9