Byron A. Riblet: Tramline Titan

Last week, I reported that a new book has been released across the line in Washington. Byron Riblet: Forgotten Engineering Genius by Ty A. Brown is the story of the man who perfected the tramlines that are in use and identifiable, today, as ski-lifts.

But they started out as tramlines to carry ores from isolated and mountainous mining operations. Mr. Riblet brought one of his effective and economical cable systems to the Cowichan Valley just after the turn of the last century.

That’s when he was commissioned to connect the Tyee Mine on Mount Sicker to the E&N Railway at Tyee Crossing, the copper ores being carried in aerial buckets.

It was far more efficient and less costly to build and to maintain than the competing Lenora Mine’s narrow gauge railway to Crofton. With the Tyee’s closure, the tramline hardware was recycled at a mine in the Barkley Sound area.

Sadly, until recent years, two of the wooden towers had survived, tall and firm, but were downed by loggers.

Sadly, too, although there’s an entire chapter on the Riblet tramlines in B.C.’s silvery Slocan, not a mention of the Tyee on Mount Sicker. A slight that I correct in next week’s Chronicle.

* * * * *
PHOTO: Looking up from the Lenora townsite on Mount Sicker to the ore pile of the competing Tyee Mine which Byron Riblet successfully linked to the E&N Railway with his aerial tramline.