Kate Rice

Kate Rice (December 22, 1882 – January 3, 1963) was a Canadian prospector, adventurer, and writer from Ontario who homesteaded, prospected and mined in northern Manitoba. She garnered widespread attention for her adventurous life, brilliant mind, statuesque beauty, and for succeeding in the mineral industry, which very few women were engaged with at the time.

Early life and family

Kathleen Creighton Starr Rice was born in 1882 to Henry Lincoln Rice (1857–1933) and Charlotte "Lottie" Carter Rice (1862–1941), an upper-middle-class family in St. Marys, Ontario. Her father struggled with the changing business climate as a grain merchant who had inherited full shares in Carter Milling Co. after the death of his father-in-law, founder George Carter (1826–1899), who was a native of Tipperary, Ireland.

Her paternal grandfather, Rev. Dr. Samuel Dwight Rice (1815–1884), was a progressive Methodist Minister who had founded a college for women in Hamilton. H.L. Rice taught his daughter to canoe and to camp along the St. Mary's River, at the age of six, regaled her with tales of Daniel Boone, and imparted a life-long taste for adventure and the outdoors.

In 1908, Rice moved west to Tees, Alberta, where she taught at a summer school. She then took a position as a Professor of Mathematics at Albert College, in Belleville, Ontario, then taught in Yorkton, Saskatchewan during 1911 and 1912. She there began to explore the Canadian Rockies, and took up mountaineering, mainly in the Cascade Mountains. This became her passion, and she later joined the Alpine Club Of Canada. and so were prevented from owning property or holding legal title to homesteads, Rice enlisted her brother, Lincoln, to purchase for her, in his name, north of The Pas, Manitoba.

Prospecting Soon after Rice moved to The Pas, there was word of gold being discovered north on Beaver Lake. Rice began studying prospecting and read everything she found on geology. She befriended local Cree, learned their language, and learned to hunt and trap animals. In 1914, Rice borrowed money, a "grubstake", from an old college friend,

In 1915, she took her own dog team to explore the Beaver Lake area where she went on to stake her first claims. Woosey was a veteran of the British 18th Royal Hussars Regiment who had fought in the Boer War, in India and along the Afghan border. Rice and Woosey were later sued by C. E. Hermann, a former associate, for breach of contract involving another claim that was valued (for a time) at $5 million. She wrote several articles in scientific journals about meteorological and astronomical observations she had made in her travels through Canada's north. She became well known, as well, for her ability to raise and train sled dogs, and for her skill in mushing them without resorting to the use of a whip.

After so many years living in isolation on her island, Rice became worried for her own sanity. She left the wilderness in 1960 at the age of 77 to check into the Brandon Mental Institution. After examination, the doctors assured her she was not crazy, but rather was "just a prospector". In 2013, a plaque was installed on the island that read: "In Memory of Kathleen 'Kate' Rice. With the aurora borealis illuminating her pioneering trail, her courage and ethics spoke volumes, while her deeds and prospecting helped define the North we know."

In 2009, the Snow Lake newspaper, Underground Press, spearheaded a fundraising campaign to erect a headstone on Rice's grave in Minnedosa which read "Prospector and Pioneer of the North, Extraordinary Woman of the Wilds".

A relative donated Rice's papers, including an unpublished memoir and drawings, to the University of Manitoba Archives.