Amberty, John “Johnny/Johnnie”
None
John Amberty was born in Italy around 1844. He died January 8, 1939 in Port Coquitlam, BC.
He was a prospector, miner (placer claims), and trapper in the Granite Creek area. According to J.J. Malone, John Amberty was the eighteenth man to arrive at Granite Creek.
He attended the May 24th celebrations at the Hotel Granite at Granite Creek in 1900, gave $2.00 to the machine gun fund in August 1915, and $2.00 to the Canadian Patriotic Fund in August 1917.
In early 1923, he was assaulted at his cabin at Granite Creek by Pete Hestwick of Coalmont. Hestwick was sentenced to two months’ imprisonment.
He lived in a cabin built in 1888 (likely built around the time he arrived at Granite Creek) and when it burned down in 1935, with it went his collection of newspapers “five foot high and about as long.”
The Princeton Star ran an article (with a photo) about John Amberty in June 1925 which noted that after leaving Italy, he settled in Venezuela and then made his way to Granite Creek in the 1880s. At that time, Granite Creek had a population of around 3,000. In 1925, he was still working his claim eight hours a day, six days a week. He worked on the “Dead Horse” claim before platinum was discovered by Garnet Sootheran in June 1926.
Death registration (BC Archives); Similkameen Star, May 26, 1900, page 1; August 20, 1915, page 1; August 3, 1917, page 1; Princeton Star, March 30, 1923, page 1; June 4, 1925, page 4; June 10, 1926, pages 1, 2; December 25, 1930, page 4; Similkameen Star, September 26, page 1; February 4, 1937, pages 3, 6