A previous co-author of local history books about the Okanagan region, Peter Tassie struck out on his own to write Water from the Hills: The Story of Irrigation in the Vernon District (Okanagan Historical Society, Vernon Branch 2018). It's the little-known story of how B.C.'s largest irrigation project was built, from the first hand-dug ditches on the Coldstream Ranch to the completion of the 32-mile Grey Canal. It was an engineering feat that helped make, as Tassie writes, "the Okanagan Valley the premier fruit-growing region in Canada."

Tassie has lived most of his life on an orchard that depended upon irrigation for its survival. He was also a long-term planner for the Regional District of the North Okanagan and has been a member of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of B.C. and the Engineering Institute of Canada.

BOOKS

Water from the Hills: The Story of Irrigation in the Vernon District (Okanagan Historical Society, Vernon Branch 2018) 978-1-7750547-0-2

Co-author of:

Harris, R.C. Old Pack Trails in the Cascade Wilderness (Summerland: Okanagan Similkameen Parks Society, 1982).

Harris, R.C. & Hartley Hatfield & Peter Tassie. The Okanagan Brigade Trail in the South Okanagan, 1811 to 1849: Oroville, Washington, to Westside, British Columbia (Vernon: Wayside Press Ltd., 1989).

[BCBW 2018] "Local History"