A company town is a place dominated by an individual business or industry, which employs the majority of the town’s workers. This company owns the businesses and buildings in the town, making the community completely dependent on it for housing, goods, schools, and every other aspect of town life. When the company ceased operations, citizens had little choice but to leave and seek their livelihood elsewhere, turning the community into a ghost town.
Company towns were once common in BC, and we profile several that became lost towns. These photographs that depict their prosperity encourage readers to reflect on the true cost of these towns, not just to those who worked there and their families, but to Indigenous Peoples, the environment, and the legacy of resource extraction.
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British Columbia History (Digital) - 1 Issue, 56.2 Summer 2023