The name Ohin, pronounced OO(kh)win meaning "frostbite", is a reminder of the bitter cold of the Seton valley in winter.

[citation needed] During the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, the Seton lake ferries on the Douglas Road bypassed Shalalth.

On reaching the Bridge River, equipment and heavy supplies bound for the mines were rafted upstream in summer or hauled over the ice in winter.

He recognized the hydropower potential of the significant difference in elevation between the Bridge River and Seton Lake, which are only narrowly separated by Mission Ridge.

[13] A "model village" was erected at Bridge River (South Shalalth) and work began on the 4.0-kilometre (2.5 mi) tunnel in 1927, with an expected completion date of 1930.

In 1938, a superior road was built down the ridge to Shalalth station, and the western terminus was moved 1.4 kilometres (0.9 mi) eastward.

During World War II, the semi-abandoned village built for the hydro project at South Shalalth was one of four relocation centres in the Lillooet area for Japanese-Canadians from the coast.

One of the relocatees at Shalalth was Dr. Masajiro Miyazaki, a US-trained osteopathic physician who remained after the war and became one of Lillooet's two Companions of the Order of Canada.

[citation needed] After the war, the Bridge River Power Project resumption and a new boom in mining created a surge in traffic.

Adjacent to the managers' houses and the semicircle of employee barracks, a large hotel was built above the hydro townsite train station.

[citation needed] During the 1950s, the population of the townsite and the Seton Portage area mushroomed into the thousands and boosted the school enrolments into the hundreds.

This leads to D'Arcy (N'quatqua) at the far end of that lake, which connects by regular road to Highway 99 at Mount Currie, and from there to Pemberton, Whistler, Squamish and Vancouver.

Mountain goats and sheep remain common on the slopes above Shalalth, and especially along the bluffs around Retaskit and at Seton Beach, at the Lillooet end of the lake.