(Bert
Orleans, Ray Skoglund, Lloyd Johnstone)
Mount Layton Hotsprings
Excerpts
taken from The Northwest Star,
Written
by Pam Whitaker
Mt. Layton Hot
Springs is the latter. At least, the sparkling mineral waters are purported to
be healing – and steam billows from them, too, in cool weather.
The hot springs are
located about two-thirds of the way down Lakelse Lake on the east shore beside
Highway 37.
Water slides mark the
spot, which is named for a mountain situated near Williams Creek on the Old
Lakelse Lake Road. (Layton was the name of a man who lived at its base at the
turn of the century.) It is the beginning of a natural resort, which, according
to its owner, Bert Orleans, will be the only one of its kind in the world.
There were not always
buildings there. Prior to 1910 it was a boggy, densely overgrown area where
spruce trees and plants grew bigger because of the minerals and warmth, and
crowded a little closer together. The area has a dozen individual springs of
varying temperature and mineral content.
The subterranean
heated waters are among the highest and purest known on the North American
continent. There is no sulphur smell or scum. (Many individuals use it to water
their houseplants with beneficial effect).
Before the first
commercialization of the hot springs, man doubtless bathed there, although the
pools were generally murky on the bottom and the main ones were too hot. An
early Lakelse resident said that you sink up to a foot in some of them.
Bruce Johnstone,
Terrace pioneer, was the first owner of the hot springs area. He pre-empted the
property with a railway station in mind. According to Nadine Asante in the
History of Terrace, the Kitimat Upper Skeena area was buzzing with railway talk
in those days and the Kitimat Omineca Railway was slated to pass the eastern
side of Lakelse Lake to its terminus in Kitimat. When the western terminus was
changed to Prince Rupert by the Grand Trunk Pacific in 1908, Johnstone,
undeterred, proceeded to build a hotel with dining lounge and twelve guest
rooms which was open for business by 1910. Advertising his spa in the United
States and the west coast, Johnstone kept the register of the small hotel full
about seven months of the year.
This hotel was used
as changing rooms when Johnstone built his second hotel on the lakeshore in
1929.
To
provide the healthful mineral water from the springs for his guests, Johnstone
ran an eight inch pipe one mile to the lakeshore hotel.
A young girl who worked at the second hotel
recalls going into the old bathhouse and finding snakes curled up near the tubs
for warmth! The original hotel burned to the ground in 1936 and the second in
the fifties.
After a period of dormancy from
1936 until after the Second World War, the property which had been partially
sold to others, was once again restored to the Johnstone family –
Bruce’s son Lloyd brought it (Lloyd Johnstone was mayor of Terrace during
1972 and l973.) In 1958 he sold the property to Ray Skoglund.
Lloyd and his wife Lorraine reside at Lakelse Lake today, just half a mile from where Bruce Johnstore built his first hotel. Ray Skoglund had an operation at the hot springs for several years He had a good operation, Lloyd Johnstone said. He then sold it to a party from out of town and it changed hands several times. The provincial government eventually took it over and dismantled it. It had become run down and also was badly damaged by water in a 1978 flood.
Today the Lakelse hot
springs property is owned by Bert Orleans of Kitimat He pretty well had to
start over.
Presently in operation are a hot pool and warm mineral
swimming pool with waterslides, motel, lounge and restaurant with banquet
facilities.
For More
Information See Ray Skoglund's Story