Tyaughton Creek

Tyaughton Creek is a 50 kilometre tributary of British Columbia's Bridge River, entering the main flow of that river about mid-way along the length of Carpenter Lake, a reservoir formed by Terzaghi Dam of the Bridge River Power Project.

History

The name Tyaughton is an adaptation of the Chilcotin word for "jumping fish", and has also appeared on the map in the form Tyoax or Tyax, the latter being the simplified form used by the Tyax Mountain Lake Resort, a five-star resort on Tyaughton Lake, which is tributary to the creek. The name appears to have been conferred by Chief Hunter Jack, chief of the Lakes Lillooet (a subdivision of the St'at'imc, today's Nequatque and Seton Lake First Nations) during the later 19th Century and a legendary hunting guide who held claim to the title of Hyas Tyee (king) of the Bridge River Country.

Hunter Jack's gold wealth was also legendary and is believed to be based on a mysterious placer find, believed to be somewhere in the uppermost reaches of Tyaughton Creek (he is known to have chased off parties of Italian and Chinese miners who were getting too close). His adoption of a Chilcotin name for a lake in his territory conforms to other Chilcotin names in use in St'at'imc territory, notably that of the adjacent Shulaps Range (just east of Tyaughton Creek) and the Yalakom River, just east of that range, and also Noaxe Lake, high on the side of the Shulaps Range above the Tyaughton basin.

Hunter Jack was one of the few Lillooet natives who spoke Chilcotin, and is said to have learned it in order to end a bloody war which had raged over the rich hunting and food-gathering grounds of the area of the upper Bridge River, including the basin of Tyauughton Creek. The end of the war is said to have come about at a place now called Graveyard Valley, which lies over a narrow defile from the head of Relay Creek, Tyaughton's northernmost tributary, into the upper basin of Big Creek, a tributary of the Chilcotin River.

The polychromatic mineralization of the Tyaughton basin's geology caught the eye of early explorers, but despite extensive exploration no viable mines have ever operated in its boundaries. In the 1930s, times when the Bridge River Country was as much known for big-game hunting as for gold mining, Charlie Cunningham, a guide and multi-faceted entrepreneur in the goldfield hub of Gold Bridge first promoted the idea of protecting the region north of Gun Creek and west of Tyaughton and south of Relay, as a wildlife preserve and scenic wilderness treasure, and in the process became a pioneering wildlife cinematographer. In the years since the region has been a hot-point in the mining industry's complaints about protectionist restrictions, and mining interests have been the primary factor in blocking full park status for the area. Although some of the area has been established as a provincial protected area and the adjacent basins to the north and northwest are now provincial park, controversy over its eventual boundaries continues.

Tributaries

Tyaughton Creek's main tributaries are Liza Creek, Eldorado Creek, Noaxe Creek, Mud Creek and Relay Creek. Tyaughton, Eldorado and Relay Creeks have their sources in the area known as the Spruce Lake Protected Area and has seen various park proposal names, most recently the "South Chilcotin Provincial Park" but this status was downgraded from park to protected area in 2006.