Service on the Skeena: Horace Wrinch, Frontier Physician
Service on the Skeena
Horace Wrinch, Frontier Physician
by Geoff Mynett
$26.95
- December 2019
- print ISBN: 978-1-55380-575-5
- ebook ISBN: 978-1-55380-576-2
- PDF ISBN: 978-1-55380-577-9
- 6″ x 9″ trade paper, 50 maps and photos, 450 pages
- History
The previously untold story of a remarkable British Columbian
His name was Horace Wrinch. It was 1880. He was 14 years old, a farmer’s boy from England travelling on his own to Quebec. Twenty years later, a qualified doctor and surgeon, he arrived in Hazelton on the Skeena River in northern British Columbia as a Canadian citizen. At this time the northern interior of the province had no qualified doctors, no surgeons and no hospitals. In 1904 Horace built the first hospital in the northern interior. Over the next thirty-six years he became widely respected as a doctor and surgeon, hospital administrator, medical missionary, Methodist minister, magistrate, farmer, community leader and progressive politician. Ever innovative, he instituted a form of health insurance for the Hazelton community as early as 1908. Upon his death in 1939, he was called “the most influential and best liked man that ever blessed this district with his presence.”
Winner, George Ryga for Social Awareness in literature.
“Mynett brings the human side of Horace Wrinch to life in this accessible and superbly written work.” – BC BookWorld
“Through this rigorous study, he portrays a compelling account of Wrinch’s life and work.” – The British Columbia Review
“Service on the Skeena not only provides the fascinating life story of this remarkable man, it also fills important gaps in the history of northwest B.C.” – Neil Sterritt, Former Gitxsan-Wet’suwet’en Tribal Council President
“I highly recommend this excellent biography of an outstanding pioneer doctor.” – BC Medical Journal
“Many in the general public and among scholars will appreciate Mynett’s contribution, and future historians of northern British Columbia, of the history of health care and health insurance, and of missionary doctors will find in this book an excellent source for further research.” – BC Studies
