| Feature Type: | Mount - Variation of Mountain: Mass of land prominently elevated above the surrounding terrain, bounded by steep slopes and rising to a summit and/or peaks. ["Mount" preceding the name usually indicates that the feature is named after a person.] |
| Status: | Official |
| Name Authority: | BC Geographical Names Office |
| Relative Location: | Near head of Hellroaring Creek, NW of McBride, Cariboo Land District |
| Latitude-Longitude: | 53°33'50"N, 120°25'38"W at the approximate centre of this feature. |
| Datum: | WGS84 |
| NTS Map: | 93H/9 |
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Origin Notes and History:
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Adopted in the 15th Report of the Geographic Board of Canada, 31 March 1917. Elevation of 8244 feet. Also Haggard Glacier. Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office |
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After Sir Henry Ryder Haggard (1856-1925), a popular novelist who, in July 1916, travelled on the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway from Vancouver to Edmonton, passing by this mountain. [Note: it is not clear WHY Sir Haggard's name would have been used, nor is it clear whether the GTP station here (known as Knole until 1916, then renamed Rider) was named in association with the mountain, or vice versa.] Haggard's given name is consistently spelled "Rider" (not "Ryder") on book jackets and in catalogues. Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office |
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"The Grand Trunk Pacific Railroad wants, if the Geographic Board of Canada consents, to name a great Alp in the Rockies after me - Sir Ryder Mountain and Haggard Glacier, a great and unusual compliment..." wrote the British novelist Henry Ryder Haggard (1856-1925) during his train trip from Prince Rupert to Edmonton in July 1916. "I saw it. It is a wonder and magnificent Alp, some ten thousand feet high and measuring many miles around its base. Snow lies on its summit even in summer and it has deep, ripped glaciers and fir-clad ravines upon its flanks, while the crest has some resemblance to a Lion." The Geographic Board consented, although the name is spelled "Rider", and the mountain is just over eight thousand feet high. Haggard, the author of adventure stories for boys (King Solomon's Mines, She, Allan Quartermain, etc) was on a final leg of his pubic career as an advocate of "national regeneration through agriculture." He was sent by the Royal Colonial Institute to investigate prospects for settling war veterans on plots of land in South Africa, Australia and Canada. He arrived in Victoria in June 1916, finding himself an extremely popular figure.... (quotes from "Days of My Life" by H. Rider Haggard; Longmans Green, London, 1926; excerpted and explanations provided in "British Columbia place names in the vicinity of Mount Robson" by James L. Swanson, published by Fraser-Fort George Museum Society, 1987.) Source: included with note |