The Village of Pouce Coupe (/ˌpuːs ˈkuːpi/; French for "cut thumb") is a small town in northeastern British Columbia, Canada, and a member municipality of the Peace River Regional District.

Popular recreational activities in the area include cross-country skiing, snowmobiling, fishing, hiking, and hunting.

Permanent settlement began after the French-Canadian voyageurs Hector Tremblay and Joe Bissette left their group of prospectors from Kamloops during the Klondike Gold Rush and became the first settlers in the Pouce Coupe Prairie.

Tremblay, joined by his wife and children in 1908, built his cabin at the confluence of Dawson Creek and Pouce Coupé River.

Tremblay used his cabin as a trading post for local aboriginal tribe and resting place for the trickle of travellers that passed through.

He also tried ranching cattle and helped cut trails south to Grande Prairie and north to Fort St. John.

When the Dominion Government opened the Peace River Block for homesteading, the trails created an influx of settlers between 1912 and 1914.

[7] After World War I homestead grants to returning soldiers created another wave of settlers and the community center moved to its present location in the early 1920s when the post office and other businesses moved to a newly subdivided townsite on Charlie LeRoy's homestead.

[10] However, as land prices rose and speculation increased, the company made a deal to build the next station near the smaller community of Dawson Creek.

In 1942 the population swelled, as the US Army unloaded thousands of men and construction material in nearby Dawson Creek to build the Alaska Highway.

[16] In the following decades the village would remain in the shadow of Dawson Creek as the provincial and federal government offices moved there in the 1970s.

[17] In 2007, a large boundary extension northward over agricultural land neary doubled the area of the village and brought its borders within metres of the City of Dawson Creek's.

While not counted as visible minorities during the census, 145 people considered themselves to have an Aboriginal identity, five times the provincial 4% average.

The next place the train stops, after leaving Dawson Creek and going south through Pouce Coupe, is in Hythe, Alberta.

The Village's sewage is collected by 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) of sanitary sewers and processed through a two-cell lagoon system.

[23] The summers are warm and dry resulting from Pacific air masses that lose much of their moisture going through a number of mountain ranges.

The winters are frigid from exposure to the Arctic air masses, however, the village experiences heavy winds year round.

The 2001 Canadian census recorded 315 income-earners over the age of 15 residing in Pouce Coupe; of these, 110 worked full-time throughout the year.

The low participation rate reflects the relatively old population which consists of retired rural farmers and residents.

[24] Being only about 10 km from Dawson Creek's downtown and industrial park, residents commute to the larger city for employment, shopping and services.

[25][26] A study by the Fraser Institute found that the elementary school had one of the worst academic performances in the province in 2004.

No newspapers or television/radio stations operate within the village but the Peace River Block Daily News and CJDC-TV include Pouce Coupe in their coverage.

Bear Mountain, to the west, has a downhill ski complex and an extensive trail system used for motorized and non-motorized recreation.

The Village of Pouce Coupe's council-manager form of municipal government is headed by a mayor (who also represents Pouce Coupe on the Peace River Regional District's governing board) and a four-member council; these positions are subject to at-large elections every three years.

The mayor's chair is currently vacant due to the resignation in September 2013 of Larry Fynn for health reasons.

Smith had defeated Sandy Hull, who was acting-mayor since the death of mayor Doyle McNabb in April 2005.

[30] The village funds and administers a sewerage system, a volunteer fire department, a library, parks, a cemetery, street lights, and roads except the highway.

[31] Pouce Coupe is part of the Peace River South provincial electoral district, represented by Blair Lekstrom in the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia.

[34] Federally, Pouce Coupe is located in the Prince George—Peace River riding, represented in the House of Commons of Canada by Conservative Party Member of Parliament Bob Zimmer.

Prior to Zimmer, the village was represented by Conservative Party member Jay Hill, who was first elected in 1993.