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The Canadian Mountain Named After a Tyrant: Why 'Mount Stalin' Lasted Until 1987
From 1944 to 1987, a peak in British Columbia was named Mount Stalin to honor a WWII ally. This article explores why the name was given and why, despite the Cold War and knowledge of his tyranny, bureaucratic inertia and the mountain's remoteness caused the name to persist for decades.
In the remote Cassiar Mountains of British Columbia, a rugged peak stands as a quiet testament to the shifting tides of 20th-century geopolitics. Today, it is known as Mount Peck, honoring a decorated Canadian war hero. But for 43 years, from the height of World War II until the twilight of the Cold War, it bore a much more sinister name: Mount Stalin. The story of its naming is a product of its time, but the real question is, why did it take until 1987 to change it back?
A Wartime Alliance and a Controversial Honour
In 1944, the world was engulfed in war. The Allied powers, including Canada and the Soviet Union, were united against a common enemy in Nazi Germany. On the brutal Eastern Front, the Soviet army was playing a pivotal role in pushing back German forces. To recognize the contribution of the Soviet leader, the Alpine Club of Canada suggested a grand gesture: renaming a prominent, unclimbed peak in British Columbia after Joseph Stalin.
On July 6, 1944, the Canadian government made it official. Mount Peck, a mountain originally named in 1924 for Lieutenant-Colonel Cyril W. Peck—a Victoria Cross recipient and Member of Parliament—was officially redesignated as Mount Stalin. At the time, this was seen as a symbolic tribute to a crucial, if difficult, ally. It was a name born from the desperate pragmatism of a world at war.
The Cold War Chill and Decades of Inertia
The alliance that named Mount Stalin was short-lived. Almost as soon as WWII ended, the Iron Curtain descended across Europe, and the Cold War began. The West’s perception of Stalin shifted dramatically from that of a powerful ally to a ruthless tyrant. Revelations of his purges, the gulags, and the staggering human cost of his regime became widely known, particularly after Nikita Khrushchev's "Secret Speech" in 1956 denounced Stalin's cult of personality.
Yet, the name on the map remained. For decades, as Canada stood with NATO in opposition to the Soviet Union, a mountain on its own soil continued to honour the dictator. Why? The answer lies in a combination of geography and bureaucracy.
Mount Stalin was, and Mount Peck remains, an incredibly remote and isolated peak. It's not a place people live near or a landmark the average person would ever see. It existed primarily as a name on a topographical map, out of sight and out of mind. Without a nearby community to protest or a high-profile reason to act, there was little public pressure to change it. Changing an official geographical name is a slow process that requires a formal proposal and justification. For years, no one with the ability to start that process seemed to make it a priority.
A Hero's Name Restored
It wasn't until the 1980s, as Mikhail Gorbachev's policies of glasnost (openness) began to thaw the Cold War, that the world started to re-examine Soviet history more critically. This global shift likely provided the final push needed for Canadian officials to address the awkward anomaly in the Cassiar range.
In 1987, the name was officially changed back. The official record from the BC Geographical Names office offers a simple, yet powerful, explanation for the reversion:
Reverted to its original name, Mount Peck, because of Joseph Stalin's subsequent history.
The change restored the honour of Cyril W. Peck, a genuine Canadian hero whose legacy had been inadvertently overshadowed for decades. The story of Mount Peck is a fascinating footnote in history, a reminder of how political alliances can etch themselves onto the very landscape, and how long it can take for the map to catch up with morality.