# Neal Evans

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{{short description|Canadian businessman}}
{{No footnotes|date=July 2017}}

{{Use Canadian English|date=July 2017}}

'''Neal "Curly" Evans''' ({{circa|1888}}{{ndash}}1945) was a freight industry entrepreneur in the [Bridge River](/source/Bridge_River_Country)–[Lillooet Country](/source/Lillooet_Country) of the [Interior of British Columbia](/source/British_Columbia_Interior), [Canada](/source/Canada). He acquired a reputation in that region for his enterprise, daring, and personality.

Evans was born in the Dakotas and came to the Cariboo as a boy.  His nickname derives from the curly, dark hair of his youth ("a mass of raven locks"), although later in life he was balding.  His freighting career spanned the age from {{Glossary link|glossary=Glossary of carriage and driving terminology|jerk line}} times on the Cariboo Road to bush piloting, instructed by no less than [Ginger Coote](/source/Ginger_Coote), who pioneered flying in the Bridge River and Fort St. James areas of BC.  Around 1910, Evans was employed by the [BC Express Company](/source/BC_Express_Company) (formerly [Barnard's Express](/source/Barnard's_Express)) out of [Ashcroft, British Columbia](/source/Ashcroft%2C_British_Columbia). Like many others in this region, he also became a cowboy and a miner.

As gold extraction began to boom into the [Bridge River Goldfields](/source/Bridge_River_Goldfields), Evans was one of the many who started freighting operations to supply the mines and prospectors in that area and earned a reputation for reliability in delivering freight despite all obstacles, including floods, mountain slides and blizzards.  With the development of a proper road into the Upper Bridge River from [Shalalth](/source/Shalalth) on [Seton Lake](/source/Seton_Lake), Evans expanded his personal operation into a fleet of trucks and passenger vehicles, eventually becoming the owner of one of the largest transportation firms in the BC Interior, most of its business derived from [Bralorne Mine](/source/Bralorne_Mine) and other Bridge River mining camps, and also from the construction of the [Bridge River Power Project](/source/Bridge_River_Power_Project).  Although never seen to fruition, Evans intended his company to expand into air freight.

==References==
*This article incorporates text from Evans's obituary in the ''[Vancouver Sun](/source/Vancouver_Sun)'' newspaper, June 16, 1945, quoted in:
**''Short Portage to Lillooet'', Irene Edwards, self-publ. Lillooet BC, June 1978

{{DEFAULTSORT:Evans, Neal}}
Category:Businesspeople from British Columbia
Category:Lillooet Country
Category:Bridge River Country
Category:American emigrants to Canada
Category:1880s births
Category:1945 deaths

Category:Year of birth uncertain
Category:People from Lillooet

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