Mary Jobe Akeley

Our new publication, "Reflections - 4 Decades of Photographs by Earle and Estelle Dickey" features approximately 100 images taken by this local couple. Their photography and research have helped to preserve so much of our local history.

One of my favourite photographs is on page 125. It shows Mary Jobe Akeley at Kinbasket Lake in September of 1937. This was a return trip for Mrs. Akeley, who first came to the area in 1905, as a young unmarried woman. She was with a botanical party from a college in Philadelphia who were here to collect plant specimens. The group camped on the Big Bend road, then just a rough trail, and spent some time in Ground Hog Basin. During that trip, Mary and others made a ten-day trip into the Selkirks from the Big Bend. She spent time at Glacier House, before going on to Banff, where she went on more climbs.

Mary Jobe was born in Ohio in 1878. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy in 1897, and received her master’s degree in English and American History from Columbia University in 1909. Mary came back to the Selkirks in 1909, to join an expedition to the headwaters of the Gold River. She and fellow climber Bess McCarthy joined the expedition of Professor Hershel C. Parker (head of physics department at Columbia University) and Howard Palmer (a lawyer from Connecticut) who were heading the expedition for the Dominion Topographical Survey. As a result of this expedition, Palmer produced a 1915 Reconnaisance Map of the Big Bend.

During the expedition, Mary climbed Mount Sir Sandford. An account in the New York Times of September 25, 1909 gave details of her ascent. "Miss Mary L. Jobe, an instructor in history at the Normal College of this city, and in her student days an athletic Bryn Mawr girl, was a member of the recent Canadian Topographical Survey expedition exploring in the Big Bend of the Columbia at Mt. Sir Sandford, British Columbia, the highest of the Selkirks. The party traveled over uncharted rivers, cut through a primeval forest and explored dangerous glacier-clad mountains, bringing back scientific data and a picture history of a region never before penetrated by white men. While admitting that the trip was strenuous, Miss Jobe says that it was altogether delightful, and that she never felt overtaxed even after a twelve hours climb. She says it is not too difficult for any woman of courage used to outdoor sports and exercise."

Mary made other climbs in the Selkirks and Rockies, and Mount Jobe in the Rockies is named after her.

In 1924, Mary Jobe married Carl Akeley, explorer, scientist, sculptor and taxidermist. Carl Akeley was the African specialist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, collecting and exploring in Africa on behalf of the museum. Carl died of a tropical disease in the Belgian Congo two years after their marriage, and Mary succeeded him as adviser in the development of the African Hall of the museum, later renamed the Akeley African Hall. She held this position until 1938. The recent movie, "Night at the Museum" takes places in the American Museum of Natural History, and the African gallery shown in the movie is modelled after the Akeley African Hall.

In September of 1937, Mary Jobe Akeley returned to this area. In company with Miss Shella Dickey, (sister of Earle), she made a trip up the Big Bend Highway as far as Goldstream, camping overnight at Downie Creek. She rediscovered several spots which she had first visited in 1905, when she made the trip on foot and with pack-horse. Mrs. Akeley reminisced about her 1905 visit, recalling how she had walked from Revelstoke to the Ground Hog Basin, where the expedition leader, Dr. Charles Shaw, had his scientific camp.

During the 1937 trip, Mary Jobe Akeley, Shella Dickey, George Merkel and Earle Dickey travelled to Donald by train, from which point they went by car to Boat Encampment, Canoe River and other places on the east leg of the Big Bend Highway. It was during this trip that this photograph was taken.