Queen Charlotte, British Columbia
The Village of Queen Charlotte, more commonly known by its residents as Charlotte (), is a village municipality on Haida Gwaii (formerly the Queen Charlotte Islands) in the province of British Columbia, Canada. It is located on the southern end of Graham Island at Skidegate Inlet and is a member municipality of the North Coast Regional District. The Queen Charlotte Islands date from 1787 when Captain George Dixon was on a trading cruise along the coast. It was named for his two hundred-ton vessel, the Queen Charlotte. The village was founded in 1891 and in 1908  was the first townsite registered in the islands although it wasn't incorporated as a municipality until 2005. It was previously represented as part of Electoral Area F of that regional district, which was coterminous with the Queen Charlotte Islands (which now comprises Electoral Areas D and E). The town site was established when the first sawmill in the archipelago began operating in 1908. In the wake of World War I, additional work force was needed to supply allied warplanes with lumber. The town infrastructure quickly developed, offering public education, a hospital, general stores and other amenities, even a newspaper . Logging and fishing were the main source of jobs in Queen Charlotte when the demand for lumber again increased by the second half of the 20th century. Today, few inhabitants are working in these resource-based jobs and a recent shift towards tourism-oriented employment has been observed, although the main economic driver is government jobs, including: hospital workers, school district, BC Ferries, local Forestry and Parks offices etc. Queen Charlotte was incorporated in 2005 and offers several motels, shops, restaurants, a gas station and auto repair, a credit union, RCMP station and a hospital. It is also the location  of the Queen Charlotte Visitor Centre, which is open year-round. With its small harbour. Queen Charlotte is often the starting-point for chartered tours into Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve and Haida Heritage Site on southern Moresby Island. Queen Charlotte is just to Skidegate with its BC Ferries landing and connections to Prince Rupert. Demographics. In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Queen Charlotte had a population of 964 living in 488 of its 574 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 884. With a land area of , it had a population  density of in 2021.