William F. Cull

Don Waite alerted us to this small obit in the Maple Ridge/Pitt Meadows. Another early Pitt Lake Gold searcher gone. In his book The Fraser Valley Story Don wrote in 1988:

"…William F. Cull, a mailman from New Westminster, contacted me about the lost mine. He stated that he had become intrigued with the legend in the late 1950s from reading newspaper clippings and, as a result, had made several trips by helicopter into the remote wilderness. On one trip, Cull spent 10-12 days exploring and discovered a very weathered pick and shovel hidden in the crevice at the base of a tent-shaped rock, near the top of the divide between Pitt and Stave watersheds. Clearly visible on this rock was the letter ‘J.’ Cull concluded that the letter had been carved with the pick left by the original owner of the tools. Unfortunately, he had gone too early in the year and there was still ice on the creeks and several feet of snow on the higher elevations. Cull told me that he planned to charter a helicopter to go in again once the snow melted; he invited me along for the trip. In June 1975, my father and I were deposited beside the tent-shaped rock. Unfortunately the snow was still too deep and we found nothing. "