Morrison Parsons Bridgland, 1878-1948

Publication Year: 1949.

MORRISON PARSONS BRIDGLAND 1878-1948

Morrison Parsons Bridgland was a Canadian surveyor and a lover of mountains who had been a member of the American Alpine Club since 1903. A full account of his climbing is given in our Annals.1 He was born at Fairbanks, Ontario, on 20 December 1878, and died in Toronto on 15 January 1948.

After graduation from the University of Toronto and a year in the School of Practical Science, he went west as assistant to the late A. O. Wheeler. In 1910 he was placed in charge of the triangulation surveys in the Railway Belt of British Columbia and was almost continuously engaged in mountain assignments until 1931, when work on the Interprovincial Boundary Survey was terminated.

He came to the early camps of the Alpine Club of Canada with a great experience of the local mountains and was in charge of the climbing for a number of years, giving much painstaking work to the education of young mountaineers.

He was the author of an authoritative treatise on photographic surveying, and produced with E. Deville the Description and Guide of Jasper Park, based largely on his field work of 1915. He was an original member of the Alpine Club of Canada, and its vice- president from 1908 to 1911. A fine peak north of Yellowhead Pass, visible from the railroad, worthily bears his name.

J. M. T.

1 A.A.J., VI (1947), 345-8.