The Story of Yellowhead

A trapper, fur trader and explorer

The Yellowhead Highway is one of the most important highways in Canada. It runs from the Pacific Coast, all the way to Manitoba. The distance it covers is 2,859 kilometres as it goes from Masset, B.C. on Haida Gwaii, through Jasper National Park, into Edmonton and then Saskatoon before it comes to an end at Portage and Main in Winnipeg.

What about the name?

Where did that come from?

The name Yellowhead comes from the Yellowhead Pass that the highway goes through, but that is only part of the answer.

The pass is named for a man named Tête Jaune, also known as Pierre Bostonais or Pierre Hastination.

It is not known when he was born, but he was the son of Haudenosaunee and European parents.

As a Metis man, he worked as a fur trader and explorer for both the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company throughout the late-18th and early-19th centuries.

His nickname of Tête Jaune in French translates to Yellow Head in English. This was given to him because of his blonde hair. The name Bostonais, which is French for Boston man, refers to the possibility he was born in or around the Boston area.

In the early-19th century, he led a group of men from the Hudson’s Bay Company through the Yellowhead Pass area. He went through the pass again in December 1819. He was also known to hunt and trap in the area.

Originally, the pass was called Leather Pass due to the moose and caribou hides the Hudson’s Bay Company obtained there.

In 1828, he was killed by members of the Dunneza near the head waters of the Smoky River in present-day Alberta. It is believed this murder was in retaliation for the encroachment of the Haudenosaunee into Dunneza territory.

After his death, the pass was used by prospectors in the early-1860s to get to the Fraser River Gold Rush. When plans for the CPR were put forward, surveyor Sir Sandford Fleming recommended the Yellowhead Pass for the transcontinental railway before the Kicking Horse Pass was chosen.