When a standing evacuation order was issued for Wells, and by extension Barkerville Historic Town and Park, Carrie Chard and her partner, along with a handful of staff, were the only people left remaining in the museum town as a wildfire raged just two kilometres away.
“Everybody else had left the district of Wells," said Chard, now the pioneer village's general manager. "We had a couple of other staff that lived in the area that stayed behind as well to help out."
Barkerville also had some local help. Structure protection equipment was lent to Barkerville by the City Of Prince George after it was bought with funds raised by Miracle Theatre through its 2024 production, A Comedy of Tenors.
"With BC Wildfire moving in it became complex, we ended up with structure protection that arrived to help finish what we had already started with installing rooftop sprinklers and hose lines," Chard said. "BC Wildfire was also here helping build and test equipment we had never had before. It soon just became common knowledge that we were probably about 80 per cent prepared, but we were still missing 20 per cent.”
In what seemed like a miracle, the combination of the “moisture dome” provided by the structure protection installed and a recent rainstorm helped the historic site avoid destruction. Besides a few burnt spots from ash and burning debris from the sky, the town was left very soggy but unscathed.
Despite remaining intact, the historic town still had some hurdles to overcome when it came to reopening.
“It hit us right in the middle of the heart of the tourism season," said Chard. “Having to evacuate residents and tourists … We had to evacuate everybody out of here. We were closed for 10 or 12 days which had a huge impact. Then afterwards trying to make a comeback and get people to come back to the end of the road to come visit. Our season was devastated. So we never fully recovered. People came back, but not how it should be.”
Despite this, Chard is still optimistic about the future.
“We are trying to expand into other opportunities with groups like mountain bike groups or hiking groups, stuff like that, and try and give them a base camp. We know that we're going to live with fire on the landscape moving forward and we knew it was coming. We just didn't know how we were going to prepare for that at the time.”
Barkerville is well-prepared for the next possible fire, training its staff in fire protection both for themselves and the village's wooden buildings. They are also learning the realities of living with the possibility of wildfires in the area and they hope to pass that knowledge to guests as well.
Chard expressed thanks to BC Wildfire, The Wells Fire Brigade and all the locals that helped before, during and after the wildfires. She also thanked financial donors like Seneca Enterprises, Swiss Gold Mines and West Fraser.
The structure protection equipment is currently in the process of being returned to Prince George and will be formally handed over Monday.
