Coldstream's Kalamalka Lake named after First Nation chief

Photo: GVMA

Looking south from Middleton Mountain over what used to be Long Lake Reserve #5 circa 1950.

It comes as a surprise to many that one of Vernon’s most popular summer destinations, Kal Beach, is located on what used to be First Nations reserve land.

Needless to say, the ancestral territory of the Syilx people of the Okanagan Nation comprised much of Kalamalka Lake.

The lake, which bore the name Long Lake until 1953, is named after Chief Kalamalka after all.

Moreover, members of the OKIB still reside on land around the lake where historical villages once stood.

However, little evidence remains to mark the bounds of Long Lake Reserve #5, which once stretched from approximately Kal Beach to what is now the Kalavista subdivision.

The reserve was allotted in 1877 by the Joint Indian Reserve Commission, established two years earlier by the federal and provincial governments to set the boundaries of reserve land in B.C.

In 1909, Hlakay (also known as Pierre Nequalla), Chief of the Nk'maplqs (Head of the Lake) Band, opposed a sale of the land, suggesting that grave irregularities had occurred in obtaining proper surrender permissions.

This was later confirmed by the federal government, and the sale was set aside. However, in 1913, the land was “cut-off” under the McKenna McBride Royal Commission.

The stated goal of the commission (named after the two men who signed it into effect, federal commissioner Joseph McKenna and B.C. Premier Richard McBride) was to adjust the acreage of reserves in B.C., based on gathered evidence from both Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples as to their adequacy.

As a result of the commission, an additional 87,000 acres of reserve land were added to most bands, while 47,000 acres of far more valuable land was removed from 54 bands.

This included the 128 acres of Long Lake Reserve #5.

This “cut-off” land was later sold to a Mr. John Kennedy, who then released portions of it to the City of Vernon for beachfront access, and to the Canadian National Railway Company.

The beach is now part of Coldstream.

– Gwyneth Evans is research and communications co-ordinator for the Museum & Archives of Vernon