rancher there in the 1870s the areas was known both as Heffley Creek and Edwards Creek. The name was officially Heffley Creek in 1905 with establishment of the post office, but the name Edwards Creek was commonly used for many years. During the days of stage coaches frequent rest stops were necessary for the horses. Heffley Creek was known as Fourteen Mile in 1897 when the road went as far as Louis Creek. A cattle trail was cut through to Bridge Lake in 1898 by cattle boss J.T. Edwards to enable transport of cattle to various mining districts in northern B.C. In 1897 the ranching Spratt family of four brothers opened a small hotel at Heffley Creek called the "Travellers Retreat". The hotel included a licensed bar and general store. It opened on January 19 with a duck shoot and community dance. The name of the hotel was changed to the "Halfway House" in June and by September it was sold to N.G. Armstrong. During the mining boom in the Kamloops region a gold dredge operated from August 1901 to May 1902 at the mouth of Heffley Creek. Results were not satisfactory, however, and it was moved to Tranquille where it also failed to earn its keep. It was left derelict at Tranquille for many years. The dredge lived on in memory at Heffley Creek, however. The hotel there was renamed the "Gold Dredge Hotel", a name it retained until 1910. The building was originally log in construction, but in the 1900s wood siding was added There were nine bedrooms upstairs and a bar downstairs. By 1905 Denis Spratt was operating the hotel once again, and he held a turkey shoot to advertise its new ownership. He seemed to have trouble keeping a liquor licence, however. The licence expired in 1910 but the boarding house and stables remained open. In July 1910 the village was threatened by a forest fire. Exhausted local residents appealed for help from Kamloops, and damage to homes and crops was averted. The Edwards Creek School, built in 1909, had been the most threatened. 1911-1930 In 1911 W.R. Austin purchased the old Edwards Ranch, comprising over . He also bought the hotel and built a general store. This was the period of construction for the Canadian Northern Railway, and Austin was optimistic about the future. By 1913 he had built a dairy and a sawmill and