Harrison Mills, British Columbia

Harrison Mills
An event at Harrison Mills, c. 1910
Nickname(s): Kilby
Location of Harrison Mills
Country	Canada
Province	British Columbia
Region	Fraser Valley/Lower Mainland
Regional District	Fraser Valley Regional District
Founded	1859
Population (2016)
• Total	484
Time zone	PST (UTC-8)
• Summer (DST)	PDT (UTC)
Area code(s)	604, 778
Website	http://www.kilby.ca

Harrison Mills, formerly Carnarvon and also Harrison River, is an agricultural farming and tourism-based community in the District of Kent west of Agassiz, British Columbia. The community is a part of the Fraser Valley Regional District. Harrison Mills is home to the British Columbia Heritage Kilby Museum and Campground.

Harrison Bay is the home of the Scowlitz (Scaulits) people, whose main reserve is on the bay's western shore, across from Harrison Mills, and also of the Sts'Ailes or Chehalis people, whose reserve is located on the north side of the bay along the lower Harrison River and around that river's confluence with its tributary, the Chehalis. The Scowlitz and Chehalis peoples once had large and famously-carved longhouse villages, long since destroyed by the encouragement of missionaries . An archaeological site on the Harrison Mills side of the bay, the Scowlitz Mounds, also known as the Fraser Valley Pyramids, is under investigation by Simon Fraser University and the Scowlitz First Nation and represent an unusual period in the anthropological and cultural history of the Fraser Valley. The Scowlitz are Halqemeylem-speaking and are part of the Sto:lo cultural group, while the Sts'ailes (Chehalis) identify themselves separately and speak a dialect of Halqemeylem that has similarities with the Lower Lillooet River dialect of St'at'imcets (Ucwalmicwts).

The dialect spoken by the Sts'Ailes, whose name means "beating heart", includes the word sesqac, which is the source of the English word "sasquatch". The vicinity of Harrison Bay, Harrison Mills and the lower Harrison River is reputed to have the greatest number and density of sasquatch sightings worldwide. The sasquatch is the emblem of the Chehalis First Nation and is sacred in Sts'Ailes culture. The opening of Fort Langley in 1827 downriver began changing the traditional patterns of life for the Scowlitz and Chehalis by the introduction of new goods and also an end to raids by the Euclataws Kwakwaka'wakw (Southern Kwakiutl) of Cape Mudge and other northern coastal tribes.