$4.00 Volume 23, No. 3 Summer 1990 ISSN 0045-2963 British Columbia Historical News Journal of the B.C. Historical Federation "Grand Forks-Conference 1990" MEMBER SOCIETIES ***** ******** Member Societies and their secretaries are responsible for seeing that the correct address for their society is up-to-date. Please send any change to both the Treasurer and the Editor at the addresses inside the back cover. The Annual Return as at October 31st should include telephone numbers for contact. Members' dues for the year 1988/89 were paid by the following Members Societies: Alberni District Historical Society, Box 284, Port Alberni, B.C. V9Y 7M7 Atlin Historical Society, P.O. Box 111, Atlin, B.C. VOW 1A0 BCHF - Gulf Island Branch, c/o Marian Worrall, Mayne Island, VON 2J0 Burnaby Historical Society, 4521 Watling Street, Burnaby, B.C. V5J 1V7 Chemainus Valley Historical Society, P.O. Box 172, Chemainus, B.C. VOR 1K0 Cowichan Historical Society, P.O. Box 1014, Duncan, B.C. V9L 3Y2 District 69 Historical Society, P.O. Box 3014, Parksville, B.C. VOR 2S0 East Kootenay Historical Association, RO. Box 74, Cranbrook, B.C. V1C 4H6 Golden & District Historical Society, Box 992, Golden, B.C. VOA 1 HO Kootenay Lake Historical Society, Box 537, Kaslo, B.C. VOG 1 MO Kootenay Museum & Historical Society, 402 Anderson Street, Nelson, B.C. V1L 3Y3 Ladysmith Historical Society, Box 11, Ladysmith, B.C. VOR 2E0 Lantzville Historical Society, Box 501, Lantzville, B.C. VOR 2H0 M.S.A. Museum Society, 2313 Ware Street, Abbotsford, B.C. V2S 3C6 Nanaimo Historical Society, P.O. Box 933, Station 'A', Nanaimo, B.C. V9R 5N2 North Shore Historical Society, 623 East 10th Street, North Vancouver, B.C. V7L 2E9 North Shuswap Historical Society, P.O. Box 22, Celista, B.C. VOE 1L0 Princeton & District Pioneer Museum and Archives, Box 687, Princeton, B.C. VOX 1 WO Qualicum Beach Historical & Museum Society, c/o Mrs. Cora Skipsey, RO. Box 352, Qualicum Beach, B.C. 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V6M 4G5. A Charitable Society recognized under the Income Tax Act. Subscriptions: Institutional, $16.00 per year; Individual (non-members), $8.00; (to addresses outside Canada) $12.00. Financially assisted by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, Recreation and Culture, through the British Columbia Heritage Trust and British Columbia Lotteries. Back issues of the British Columbia Historical News are available in microform from Micromedia Ltd., 158 Pearl St., Toronto, Ontario M5H 1L3-Micromedia also publishes the Canadian Magazine Index and the Canadian Business Index. Indexed in the Canadian Periodical Index. BRITISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL NEWS Volume 23, No. 3 Journal of the B.C. Historical Federation Summer, 1990 Editorial The 1990 Conference is history! Grand Forks hosted a crowd of eager participants to a program i highlighting Doukhobor history as S well as some little known Boundary A District activities. The Boundary « Historical Society did an outstanding job of organizing this B.CH.F. Conference. Our thanks to the team of hosts and hostesses. We can promise a great variety of topics to be presented in future issues of the News. College students and other writers have submitted some top quality i manuscripts; local historians help j with their own special contributions. We ask you, the reader, to inspire others to subscribe to this magazine. An increase in the number of units printed results in a decrease in cost of production per unit. Help us minimize the pain of G.S.T. when it arrives — and introduce friends to some delightful tidbits of B.C.'s history! Naomi Miller Cover Credit Conference organizer Alice Glanville poses with guest speaker Eli Popoff and his wife Dorothy. The Popoffs were part of the choir which performed at Expo '86, and for delegates to the 1990 conference in Grand Forks. Photo by John Spittle- Contents Features Frank Wade: Journeyman Canadian Actor by Frank Wade Jr. Cattle Branding in the Cariboo by T.D. Sale The Capilano Suspension Bridge by Jean Leedale Hobson East Princeton - My School 1917-19 by Ruby Sidney Forteath PS.: by Margaret Stoneberg Giscome Portage and the Huble - Seebach Trading Post by June Chamberland Letter from Vancouver Island by Peggy Imredy Murder on the North Trail - Cariboo 1862 by Marie Elliott Writing Competition Guidlines Marl Brown's Spring Pelt by Gerri Young Intrepid in the Name of God by Pixie McGeachie Report of Conference 1990 News & Notes A Tribute to Dr. & Mrs. Blythe Eagles Book Shelf: Book Reviews A White Man's Province Reviewed by Yim Tse Atlas of the British Empire Reviewed by Angus Weiler The Field Naturalist John Macoun Geological Survey and Natural Science Reviewed by W Kaye Lamb B.C. Sugar; One Hundred Years, 1890-1990 Dr. Luke A. Port; Builder of Deepwood Page 2 8 10 11 14 17 21 24 25 26 28 30 32 33 34 35 35 35 36 36 Manuscripts and correspondence for the editor are to be sent to PO. Box 105, Wasa, B.C. VOB 2K0 Correspondence regarding subscriptions are to be directed to the subscription secretary (see inside back cover) BC. Historical News Frank Wade, Journeyman Canadian Actor by Frank Wade Jr. My father, Frank Wade, was a professional actor in Canada for fifty eight years, from 1922 to 1980, and took part in some of the major episodes in the history of the Canadian performing arts. There were good years for him and some lean ones, but he persevered in his chosen craft throughout his life and brought a lot of pleasure to thousands of people. He was born in Liverpool, England, in 1897 and later moved to Croydon, a suburb of London, where he went to Whitgift School. It was here that he was bitten by the theatre bug, playing the weaver Bottom in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. He was admonished by his teacher to cut down on the lion's roaring and all his life had to fight overacting. As he said you must hit it just right. It is perhaps acceptable in Sheridan, but one must be natural in Shakespeare and phraseology is the thing in Shaw. World War One started when he was seventeen and he was one of the lucky ones who lived through it. He went straight to the front when he left school; with the London Irish Rifles. He joined the Shamrock concert party which was a group put together to provide entertainment for the troops when they were out of the line. They were fighting men first and entertainers second. He worked with London stage professionals and learnt much from them. It was a way to keep his sanity and somehow he got through the terrible nightmare of trench warfare - he was wounded. After the war he got married and came to Canada, and, after a short period at a desk job, started work in the Winnipeg theatre. I suppose the first drama in Canada was the great tradition of the Indian tribes with their strong sense of mythology and pageantry. Many of them were putting on ritual spectacles with story lines, costumes, masks and music long before the white man came. The western theatre tradition started with the French settlers in the 1600's but really began to flourish when the English - the race with the greatest dramatic tradition - arrived. The British military were forever putting on amateur dramatics. Some were even written about Canadian life. One of a political nature caused a riot in Halifax. We were a more boisterous nation in those days. One was about a love affair between a naval officer and a merchant's daughter: along the lines of the affair that the young Nelson had with a girl in Quebec City and left behind. In the 1800's, the American professional theatre companies, following in the tradition of their forebears, began to come across the border and Canadians started to have the opportunity to see the great thespians of the day, despite the backwardness and remoteness of the country. Mrs. Fiske, Henry Irving, Mrs. Patrick Campbell, John Martin Harvey and many others toured Canada. The theatres were very makeshift at first but later proper ones were built in the major cities. The frontier audiences were very rough and took to throwing things at the actors they didn't like and sometimes even chasing them out onto the streets. Any mention of sex was definitely out and Shaw's Mrs. Warren's Profession was called an unwholesome repulsive play by the Winnipeg Free Press in 1907. The first professional company to perform in British Columbia was in Esquimalt on board H.M.S. Tricomalee in 1855. The Vancouver Opera House was built in 1891 by the CPR for $100,000; the 2000 seat Winnipeg Walker theatre in 1907. By the 1900's American, English and a few Canadian companies were touring the country on a regular basis bringing operas, operettas and dramas to smaller towns as well as the bigger cities. A touring opera company in 1910 gave four different operas in one week in Vancouver. In 1932 the English Stratford touring company performed sixteen Shakespeare plays in two weeks in Vancouver. When my father arrived, Canadian theatre was at its highest point. The twenties were heyday of the resident and touring stock companies of North America. Radio hadn't arrived and the silent movies were still something of a novelty. After the horrors of the war people were letting their hair down and wanted live entertainment and flocked to the theatres. "The roaring twenties" was an apt phrase. Any young man who had a mind to put on greasepaint and feel the excitement of the lowered houselights and the overture and who had some talent could get a job. My father was tall, good-looking and, what was more important, blessed with an excellent baritone voice. He had received some musical training at school and had sung with the Shamrocks during the war. He immediately got a job as a soloist in the Winnipeg Dominion theatre; hired by the orchestra director, Mr. McLasky, who liked his voice. Strange as it may seem to us today, this theatre put on nothing but operettas, musical revues and RC. Historical News "black face" shows. Vaudeville was on a separate circuit. The shows changed every week unless there was a hit, when they were kept on until the houses started to drop. This was exciting live theatre and the public lapped it up. As my dad said, We packed em in. Singers had their following like pop stars today, only on a city or provincial basis. All that was needed was talented singers, comics, dancers and musicians and a show could be quickly put together. He said that one of the biggest thrills that he got in his long career, was the applause that he received from those sympathetic Winnipeg crowds when he belted out a good song. One of his big hits was "West of the Great Divide". To supplement his income he sang in the legion halls and, after awhile, got into a some straight acting roles in local stock companies. My mother Audrey Wade - now in her nineties - danced in the chorus line and played piano in silent movie houses. He was in such plays as White Cargo, Madame X, Up In Mabel's Room and Charley's Aunt. In 1923, he formed a vaudeville act with Don Adams senior, who was working in Winnipeg at the time. He toured the States and was the juvenile lead with a touring U.S. musical show called Talk of the Town, out of Chicago. He toured the Mid West and the South for almost a year. He was paid $75 a week plus train transportation, which was a lot of money in those days; and out of this had to pay for his hotel room and meals and send money home for his family. They did one-night stands in cities or towns that had a theatre or an auditorium and were booked for longer in major centres. He went back to musical and stock company work in Winnipeg after the tour, until in 1926, when he was called to take one of the leading roles in a show called So This is Canada out of Vancouver. It had been written by a Vernon, B.C. man, W.S. Atkinson. He was also a British war veteran, then called "Imperials", and he wrote a farce on the problems of such veterans fruit ranching in the Okanagan. It was billed as funnier than Charley's Aunt; about the shenanigans of the ranchers - an Englishman, Irishman and Scotsman - when they tried to impress a visiting aunt from England. It had run for two months in the then very modern Empress Theatre in Vancouver; something unheard of for those days. Later going to Victoria, Duncan and Chemainus. After this, a touring company was organized and this was when my father joined the cast. From August to December 1926, it toured B.C. and western Canada going to Vancouver (Orpheum theatre - the old Opera House), Kamloops (Opera House), Vernon (Empress theatre), Revelstoke (Province theatre), Nelson (Opera House), Grand Forks (Empress theatre), Winnipeg (Walker and Grand theatres), Regina (Grand theatre), Prince Albert (Orpheum theatre) and finally finishing up in Spokane, Washington State. The family then moved to Vancouver where he joined the Vancouver United Players stock company in the Empress theatre working from January 1927 to May 1928. Here he continued to broaden his acting experience by being in a great range of plays from the classics to farces. In his career he acted in eight Shakespeare plays: Romeo and Juliet (Capulet), A Midsummer's Night Dream (Bottom), The Tempest (Caliban), Julius Caesar, Measure for Measure, Hamlet, Macbeth and Richard III; five Shaw plays: Candida, You Never Can Tell (Crampton), The Doctor's Dilemma, Arms and the Man, and Pygmalion; two Sheridan: School for Scandal and The Critic (Sir Fretful Plagiary). Two plays that stuck in his mind at this time were Bill of Divorcement and Ghost Train, both big hits in the twenties. He also acted in another production of So This is Canada and a new Atkinson play The Man from As Capulet in ROMEO and JULIET. Royal Alexandria Theatre, Toronto, 1946. Saskatchewan. Company members were the Australians Richard Bellairs, Frank Vyvyan, Millicent Hallatt, Allen Strickfaden and Iris Seldon. There was a new play every week and, what with rehearsing the new play, acting in the current one and singing on the radio, it was a busy time for him. He sang on radio station CKWX from the top of the Georgia Hotel and from the Orpheum theatre on Sundays and from CNRV in the CNR station on Main Street. By this time radio was starting to compete for the public's attention. In the early twenties stations started to broadcast live music for a few hours a day. The Canadian National Railway set up radio stations across the country to supply programmes to their trains which were fitted with radios. Initially it was a primitive experimental set-up with people listening in on home-made crystal sets. A private cross country network started in 1930. The first radio play in Canada, called The Rosary, was put on by the Moncton station CNRA in 1925. A series on Canadian History was directed by the famous Tyrone Guthrie from CNRM Montreal in 1931 and 32. The Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission CRBC network was established by the conservative government under R.B. Bennet in B.C. Historical News 1932 to offset American cultural influence. After this, a move was made to Regina because the director of the stock company at the Grand theatre there had seen my dad's work in So This is Canada. He worked there for three years, from May 1928 to January 1931. It was back to the weekly play and singing on radio station CHWC. He also did some work in Saskatoon. With the onset of the depression, theatre in Regina hit hard times and Major Graham, the owner of the Grand Theatre, to keep the company together, moved it to Winnipeg to the Playhouse theatre there. In the summer, when there was a recess, he joined a Chautauqua company, touring the prairies. The Chautauqua movement started in the States at the end of the nineteenth century to bring the performing arts into smaller communities. The Canadian circuit was organized out of Calgary in the thirties. Two shows were put on each day. In one tour that he went on, he recalled that an afternoon musical concert was performed followed by a light comedy called Applesauce in the evening. The cast included Rosie Jones, a soprano; Charlie Ross, a tenor and my father, a baritone. The company would stop at a small town each day with a break as circumstances permitted. He said it was very well organized and the pay wasn't too bad. Two capable young women managed the tour. One was the business manager who paid all the bills and arranged for accommodation and meals, whilst the other was the publicity girl who went on ahead of the company arranging for advertising and making contact with the local business people who would underwrite the venture and cover any losses. Where an auditorium was not available arrangements were made to have a tent transported to the town and assembled like a circus. It was tiring work, but the members of the company were young and energetic. They were well treated at each stop by the locals and well wined and dined on occasion. These shows were a welcome break to humdrum small town life. With the improvement in the economy and with movie houses being built in the smaller communities, the Chautauqua circuit, one of the most colourful chapters in the history of Canadian theatre, died in the late thirties. Theatre life in Winnipeg in the thirties was difficult. Times were hard and there wasn't the demand for live entertainment that there had been in the twenties. Trying to make a living as an actor, even for a seasoned veteran, was very difficult and there were times when the family was in straitened circumstances. Commercial theatre was in great trouble. There was some activity in the amateur field. The Little Theatre movement of amateur non-profit companies was started in the late twenties. The Vancouver Little Theatre, which was one of the best in Canada, started in 1921 and petered out in 1980. The Dominion Drama Festival was started in 1932 to provide competition and motivation for the many amateur groups across the country. My father was just about able to keep his head above water by doing a number of things. He worked in several stock companies that often didn't last a season, sometimes he never got paid. He got some singing work (live shows were put on in between films in the big movie houses). For a period he managed a radio station run by the Winnipeg Grain Exchange until it went bankrupt. He did some teaching and started performing in CBC radio dramas. Radio broadcasting was reorganized in 1936 and the CBC was formed and there was more money for radio. When the Second World War started in 1939, things improved somewhat. There were wartime radio dramas and live entertainment for the troops. In 1942 he went overseas to England as an auxiliary services officer. After the war he toured the Far East with a British ENSA concert party, from November 1945 to June 1946. The company was practically all-Canadian, consisting of my father; Kathleen Kidd, actress; Joan Ryan and Eric Tredwell, singers; Ross Pratt, a concert pianist and two female dancers from Australia. They entertained troops in Australia, Hong Kong, Indo-China, Thailand, Burma, the Malay States and Singapore. After this interesting trip around the world - he returned to Canada via Egypt and London, a move was made to Toronto where it was hoped that there would be more opportunities. Here he took part in one of Canada's greates artistic achievements: the famous radio Sunday night one hour "Stage" dramas and "Wednesday Night" two or three hour programmes covering symphony, opera and drama. They were broadcast initially only from CBC Toronto with some later programmes coming from Montreal and Vancouver, and ran from 1947 to 1960. In their day they were acknowledged as being as good as any in the world and won many international prizes. Initially they were directed by Andrew Allan and later Esse Jungh, with whom my father had worked in Winnipeg. These radio shows covered the gamut of western dramatic tradition; some were original pieces written by Canadian writers. Len Peterson, Lister Sinclair, Joseph Schull and Fletcher Markle were the top Canadian radio writers at this time. It was out of these radio dramas, and not the live theatre, that Canada first produced actors and actresses that became household names across the country; some of them later becoming international stars. The most well known were Lome Greene, William Shatner, Chris Plummer, Robert Christie, Don Harron, John Drainie, Francis B.C. Historical News Hyland, John Colicos, Kate Reid, Frank Peddie, Tommy Tweed, Jane Mallet, Bud Knapp, Austin Willis and many more. My father worked with many of them. Radio was particularly suited to his English dramatic training where the spoken word is stressed. He could change his voice, accent and manner to great effect from one role to the next. Probably some of the best work of his career occurred in radio. He was partricularly good in the lead roles as the erratic but endearing Toad in the Toad of Toad Hall, as the bumbling mayor in Gogol's The Inspector General and the lovable eccentric Doctor Doolittle - all CBC Wednesday Night radio dramas from Vancouver. They were adapted from the original books by Ian Thorne with music by Ricki Hyslop. Other radio shows, from both Toronto and Vancouver, that he was in were John Buchan's Tlie Thirty Nine Steps, Dorothy L. Sayers' The Zeal of Thy House, Macbeth adapted by Lister Sinclair, The Last Tycoon by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Moby Dick by Herman Melville and Justice by John Galsworthy and many more. In this post-war period he also worked at the Royal Alexandria Theatre in Toronto. Most of these productions had American stars in the lead roles backed up by a Canadian cast. He had supporting roles in light opera and plays. He was in The Merry Widow, The Desert Song Anything Goes, The Vagabond King, Richard III and Noel Coward's Hay Fever plus others; working with Estelle Winwood, Jose Ferrer, Eugenie Leontovich, James Mason, Claudette Colbert and American light opera stars. He was also in some plays put on by the New Play Society company, which performed in the Royal Ontario Museum. It was a non-profit group started by Mavore Moore in a valiant attempt get more live theatre going in Toronto. He was in Spring Thaw, a topical revue of skits and songs put on annually by the company. This show became a Toronto institution. In this company he acted in Sheridan's The Critic; Shaw's You Never Can Tell, Sophocles' Oedipus The King and Charley's Aunt. Here he acted with other well-known Canadian performers - Toby Robins, Frank Perry, Pegi Brown, Peter Mews, Mavor Moore, Eric Christmas and Lloyd Bochner. He also did a season of summer stock in Kingston putting on British and American comedies, working with Josephine Barrington, Arthur Sutherland, Drew Thompson and Barbara Hamilton. He was particularly good in comedy and farce which requires split second timing and team work. In the fifties it was back to Vancouver, where things theatrical were beginning to pick up. There was radio, TV and theatre work. TV had now become a major form of entertainment, even hurting the movies and preventing the THE REVIVAL OF THIS PLAY BT SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT WITH W. S. ATKINSON IS THE SEASON'S PREMIER COMEDY EVENT IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN SOTHISICANADA YOU WILL HAVE YOUR LAST CHANCE NOW Newspaper advertisment in the Vancouver Sun ■ SO THIS IS CANADA ■ 1927. n B.C. Historical News re-emergence of a vibrant Canadian live theatre. Some very successful CBC TV dramas were made but they never achieved the status of the radio dramas of the forties and fifties. With his singing experience there was work in the summer in the Theatre Under The Stars productions in Stanley Park. This is one of Canada's most successful summer theatre projects, and certainly the longest running. It started in 1940 and, except for a six-year break from 1963 to 1969, is still going strong today: starting long before the Stratford or Charlottetown summer festivals. It has always been a very professional organization with well mounted productions with excellent casts. My father performed in supporting roles in fourteen productions from 1952 to 1960 - Timber, Waltz in Old Vienna, The Red MiU, Maid of the Mountains, Carousel, Song of Norway, The Desert Song, Music in the Air, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, The Merry Widow, The Student Prince, The Great Waltz and Kismet. He did the older parts, often a comic, for instance he was the timber tycoon in Timber, General Birabeau in The Desert Song; and Lutz, the Prince's valet in The Student Prince Timber was an interesting show. The music was written by Dolores Clayman, then a talented young 24-year-old Vancouver-born pianist composer; David Savage and Doug Nixon did the libretto. It was quite a hit, particularly appropriate to Vancouver; about some young loggers and their romantic entanglements on a holiday in the big city. Some of the well-known west coast performers that he worked with in TUTS were Don Garrard, Barney Potts, Frank Vyvyan, Robert Clothier, Sam Payne, Betty Phillips, Lorraine McAllister, Thora Anders, Robert Goulet and Bruno Gerussi. For two years (1958 and 1959) he went to Hollywood. He did some directing, teaching, recording and produced his own work - A Galaxy of Dogs; an extravaganza of actors, dogs and music. He only acted in one movie, Cold Day in the Park directed by Robert Altman, which was shot in Vancouver. By 1970 when he was 73 when most men are retired and taking it easy, he took part in Canada's most successful TV venture, The Beachcombers. This TV series is still running; now in its eighteenth season, having started in 1971. It was originally planned as a Sunday night family half hour show about the adventures of some young people, two beachcombers and the local inhabitants of a small town on the British Columbia coast. It was to be very loosely based on English pantomime in a Canadian TV format. There was to be plenty of farce, adventure and humour showing the interplay of children and adults. Sometimes there was to be a moral or a serious aspect to the storyline. In addition to the two lead actors, who play the beachcombers, and the child actors there were to be older character actors based on the eccentric personalities that can be found in B.C. It far exceeded the hopes of its originators; very quickly becoming very popular, even outdrawing Hockey Night in Canada at one point. Later meeting with considerable international acceptance; being especially popular in Australia, England, French Canada and Germany. Why it has been so successful is difficult to say. Some say it is the mountains and waters of Howe Sound, where it is shot, which compares favourably with any of the great beauty spots of the world. It certainly started off with two solid Canadian lead actors; Bruno Gerussi and Robert Clothier; and both of them have stuck with it from its beginning. The series has a certain special indefinable Canadian quality and maybe this is one of the reasons that it has been so popular abroad. My father played the character of Colonel Spranklin until 1979, when at the age of 82 he had to quit because of his health. It is interesting that his first big role was a British officer in So This is Canada and he ended his career playing another one in The Beachcombers. Other well known B.C. actors who are or were in the series are Rae Brown (Molly), the Indian actor Pat John, Joe Galland, Joe Austin, Reg Romero, Ivor Harries, Jackson Davies and the many child stars. He took part in 23 episodes from 1971 to 1979. One of his major . parts in the series was in Boat in a Bottle, the first two-part episode. It was about the children and Nick, the beachcomber, wanting to drag a reclaimed Japanese fish boat through the colonel's property and he refusing, because of the ill treatment that he had received in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp. The first writers for the show were Marc and Susan Strange, and both continue to write along with other regulars Merv Campone, Allan Oman and Dennis Donovan. Phil Keatley and Len Lauk conceived the idea of the show, among others, and Phil was its first executive producer. It has probably brought in more money than any other Canadian artistic endeavour with the possible exception of the Stratford festival. One episode in the first year cost $36,000; by 1978 this had increased to $120,000. In 1978 $650,000 was put into the Gibsons economy. With 20 episodes per year for 18 years, the total approximate cost of the series to date is upwards of around 30 million. Foreign sales to September 1978 were to 42 countries: 15 to the Americas, 12 to Europe, 6 to Africa, 5 to the Middle East, 2 to Micronesia and 2 to the Far East. Presumably a fair proportion, if not all or more, of the costs have been recovered by national advertising and foreign sales. My father also did quite a bit of other TV work at this time. Being very fond of animals, he did a segment about dogs on the TV series Bazaar and the BobSwitzer B.C. Historical News Show and also, for a time, had his own show. He published a book of verse on dogs called A Galaxy of Dogs. He was the lead in Len Lauk's TV drama The Clubman, which won the Wilderness Award in 1968 as the best TV drama for the year. It was written especially with my father in mind. It is about an aging man and his difficulties in facing change. Politics came into the dialogue and "Wacky" Bennett, then Premier of B.C., enjoyed the piece and asked to meet my father. He was still active in radio and, during this later period, appeared in over a hundred dramas; in such series as C.S. Forester's The General (General Leigh), Commander Hornblower (Admiral Cornwallis) and Cervantes' Don Quixote, along with many others including the school drama series. Canada's man of letters George Woodcock who wrote the script for the Don Quixote series, remembers him fondly as a man of great charm and a fine actor. He did a daily spot on CKNW called Brush Up Your English and later The World Around Us and a delightful CBC radio spot called Told in Rhyme; reading dramatic and humorous poetry and monologues, some written by himself. In 1967 he did Crumpets and Crackers, a collection of Christmas reminiscences with original poetry. My father's life occurred during a period of extreme change in the performing arts; what with the introduction of radio, films and TV It is a tribute to his flexibility and skills that he was able to cope with the switch from live theatre to the other new media and make a living. Before he died in 1982, he was amazed at the increase in the number of successful live commercial theatres across the country in the last years of his life. Whereas, after the demise of theatre at the end of twenties, he had to cope with working for companies that were forever going broke through lack of public support, now there are at least six successful full-time theatre companies in Vancouver putting on productions, with Canadian lead actors, that are as good as anything one can see in London or New York. The same is true across the country, and this despite the fact that TV, radio and the movies are still flourishing. B.C. now has a New Play Society which looks at over a hundred new plays written by B.C. playwrights every year and some of them are put into production. Quite a change from his day. No doubt there are still problems but it is a great improvement. My father was one of those who kept on with his acting career throughout his life despite the difficulties and, I think it is fair to say, that he had some small part in paving the way for the success that we have today. The author is president of the Vancouver branch of the Canadian Authors Association. He is currently publishing A Midshipman's War based on the life of a naval veteran, Bill Brown of Chemainus. BIBUOGRAPHY E. Benson and L. W. Connolly, Egnlish - Canadian Tteatre, Toronto, Oxford University Press, 1987. Tlie Canadian Encyclopedia Edmonton, M.Hurtig, 1988. Theatre, English; Radio, Drams; TV Drama; Allan. Andrew. Alice Frick, Image of the Mind, CBC Drama 1944 to 1954, Toronto, Canadian Stage and Arts Publishers, 1987. D.J. Duffy, Imagine Please, Earty Radio Broadcasting in British Columbia, 1983, B.C. Government Provincial Archives. Conversations with Len Lauk, CBC; Phil Keightly, CBC: Robert Clothier, actor TheBrachcctnbersCBC TV Series; CBC, Vancouver, CBC radio Stage and Wednesday Night series; CBC Radio Archives, Toronto; CBC Times 1944 to 1960, CBC. Vancouver. Theatre Under The Stars, Vancouver, programmes 1940 to 1962, Vancouver Public Library; files on Vancouver theatre, City of Vancouver Archives. Papers of Frank Wade, actor, including theatre programmes, scripts, tapes, records, photographs, newspaper clippings, letters, manuscripts, poetry and writings, covering the period 1917 to 1980. As the valet Lutz, with MUdred Franklin (The Grand Duchess) and Robert Clothier (his valet) in the TUTS production of THE STUDENT PRINCE June 1967. RC. Historical News Cattle Branding in the Cariboo Undoubtedly the cattle are the most important animals in the Cariboo District of British Columbia since they are the main source of beef, milk, and dairy products such as butter and cheese. In addition to bones, hoofs and hides find a ready market. Thus all parts of the animal are put to good use. One way the Cariboo ranchers protect their investment in the cattle industry is by the use of brands. The dictionary defines branding as marking cattle with a hot iron. Throughout history branding has been well known even to the point of wife branding, slave branding, and the branding of criminals. The oldest brand without a doubt is 'X' (x marks the spot or the ownership). Cattle were first brought to North America by Christopher Columbus and the subsequent early explorers. Over the next five hundred years North American cattle breeders have developed such "meaty" strains of cattle as the Texas long horns, the Aberdeen Angus, and of course the white faced Hereford which is so common throughout the vast Cariboo area of British Columbia. To care for these numerous herds of range beef cattle the cowboys are of great importance along with their faithful saddle horses. The quarter horses possess the dependability and endurance required for cattle branding. Prior to branding the calves during the fall roundup the cowboys are frequently called upon the rope the young animals and apply two wraps and a half hitch. While restrained in this way or within a chute a red hot branding iron is applied to a designated area of the animal's body. Care is taken to make the newly applied brand visible and placed in such a way as to not spoil the leather. An acrid odour of burning hair and flesh permeates the air during a branding session. When released the calf hurriedly exits from the corral to the holding area or to B.C. Historical News by T.D. Sale the pasture sometimes at the urging of the cowboys. The enormous Cariboo area stretches from 70 Mile House north to Prince George and west towards the coast. Sources of water are not that plentiful in the Cariboo so branding is the accepted way of sorting out intermingling herds of cattle that populate the wide open spaces of the area. The brands were found to be especially useful when the old trail drives were employed to take the cattle to market. Strays which became scattered across the range- land could easily be sorted out and by means of their brand could be returned to their rightful owner. Even today when cattle are driven to market by mechanical means the brand plays an important part in identifying proper ownership of cattle offered for sale by the rancher. All brands must be carefully checked by the government branding inspector prior to shipping from the loading station. Ranchers who graze cattle on the large tracts of available Crown Land are required to observe certain regulations which limit the number of head allowed to the acre. By checking the brands an inspector can ascertain whether a rancher has violated the regulation. Range cattle wander extensively where there are broken fences, open gates or possibly no fences at all. In the winter especially straying cattle tend to gravitate to a "feeding lot" and remain undetected until they are culled out in the spring as a result of their individual brand. Among the oldest in the Cariboo and adjacent areas are the following brands: St. Joseph's Mission, Ashcroft's Hugh Cornwall registered in 1862, and the Gang Ranch registered in 1884. Nine of the historic Cariboo-Chilcotin brands are shown in the accompanying illustrations. It must be noted that there could be 8 a difference between the time when a ranch started using a brand and when the brand was officially registered (in some cases years). For example St. Joseph's Mission was established in the 1860's but their brand was not registered until 1914. The brand for the Mission stands for O.M.I. (Oblates of Mary Immaculate). There are close to 9000 registered brands in use in British Columbia with over one third of that number in use in the Cariboo area. Brands must be registered with the provincial brands branch in Victoria accompanied by the necessary branding fee. The Recorder of Brands determines where on the animal the brand is to be placed. It could be on the right hip or left hip, right shoulder, left shoulder or on the ribs. A registered brand must be novel and have a minimum of two characters which may be letters, numbers, symbols, rafters, bars, slashes, boxes, triangles or diamonds. Curves are better than sharp corners which tend to cause infection. Connected characters are forbidden as they become to hard to distinguish as the cattle grow. Picture brands cannot be computerized. Similar characters such as "B" and "8" can be easily confused and are therefore forbidden. A minimum and maximum size of brands are enforced. Picture brands blotch too easily and thus are not allowed. Brands within brands (an S within a diamond) are unacceptable. The simpler the brand the better is the existing rule. Old brands in use prior to the newer regulations have been permitted present day use. The brands branch keeps a record of all the brands it has registered since 1914. Brands in use and registered prior to 1914 are stored in the Provincial archives. In some cases the branding irons were forged in the blacksmith shops of the local ranches. The blacksmith starts with a four foot long piece of iron which is approximately half an inch in width and a quarter of an inch in thickness. It is heated red hot and beaten down to an eighth of an inch in thickness then shaped to the chosen design of the brand. The handle is usually rounded. To supplement branding, one or both ears are marked. These ear cuts act as a double check and often eliminate the necessity of a rider having to locate the brand mark which might have been partially grown over or otherwise hidden from view. Ear-cuts in the Cariboo tend to be on the way out. Unfortunately to prove the changing of a brand by cattle rustlers it is first necessary to kill the animal in question. A burned over brand shows plainly on the inside of the hide. The old scar tissue leaves a different colour and texture from the new one on the under side of the hide. To cross out a brand legally the new owner of an animal might burn a straight line through the old brand and place a new brand directly under the old one or the discarded brand might be repeated under itself to show that it is in-operative and the new brand can then be burned alongside. Branding inspectors have a great responsibility and are usually very knowledgeable in regard to brands. In Williams Lake an early and well known branding inspector was Billie Pinchbeck. Probably the branding inspector who became best known and highly respected in the area was Joe Smith who passed away in 1954 shortly after his retirement. Other large cattle spreads in the Cariboo deserving brief mention are those of R.C. Cotton, C. Moon, T. Bayliff (Brand is Bar two-II) and Bridge Lake Estates (Brand is Quarter circle S - S). For over a century and a quarter the cattle brand has performed a very important task in assisting the ranchers to do business. Don Sale taught in the Cariboo for severed years prior to enlisting in the army in W.WJI. He has been a citizen of Nanaimo for many years, where he is very active in numerous organizations. He is currently Corresponding Secretary for the B.C. Historical Federation. SOURCES CONSULTED 1. William Lake Tribune Newspaper 2. Mrs Irene Stangoe - Cariboo Historian. Historic Ccuiboo-ChUcxtin brands The region has a number of cattle brands either in use for much of the past century or linked to historical figures. Top row are: the brands first used by Ashcroft s Hugh Cornwall in 1862 (left); a brand used at Alkali Lake and dating to the 1880s; and the Gang Ranch brand registered 100 years ago by Jerome and Thaddeus Harper. Middle row (left) is the brand registered in 1914 by St. Joseph's Mission and now used by the Onward Ranch; an Alkali Lake brand registered in 1914; and the Hance family brand (right) registered in 1914 and used at Hanceville s TH ranch ever since. At bottom (left) is a brand registered by a Fosberry in 1920; Franki Johnson and Charles Spahan 's brand used on their Alkali ranch since 1918; cmd (right) Loyd West and Dan Dorrell 's brand registered pr their Clinton ranch in 1937. Illustrations by Brad Ward RC. Historical News The Capilano Suspension Bridge A Century Old and Still Swinging! by Jean Leedale Hobson Visitors on the bridge Circa 1918. Eons ago, as if smiling too broadly at such a beautiful spot, the earth's face split. The crack was wide and deep. Rains spilling down the mountains trickled and ran along the gorge until they became a river running toward the sea. Indians roamed the forests nearby and, when they came to the canyon, they also were moved by its awesome grandeur. More than that, the thick firs that had grown up its rock walls, interspersed with cedars, gave them materials for canoes and baskets. Salmon and trout in the river meant food. This was a good summer place. They named it Capilano Canyon after their beloved great Chief Ki-ap-a-la-no. Then, one day a century ago, a white man came and he, too, fell in love with the rugged, wild beauty of the area we now know as North Vancouver. George Grant Mackay was a Scotsman who was lured by the potential for land development in the young port of Vancouver, so in 1888 at the age of 62, he and his family emigrated and began a new life in Canada. On one of his land searches he crossed the Burrard Inlet, followed dirt trails and found himself gazing down and across the canyon which hemmed in the Capilano River. Its wild beauty captured him, resulting in the purchase of several hundred acres on both sides of the river. Here, he decided, would be a perfect spot for a retreat, a home in the forest, far from the fast-growing city In the spring of 1889 he took on the arduous task of getting building supplies to the isolated site and his dream home - a four-room log cabin on the very rim of the canyon - became a reality But another challenge wouldn't let him rest: how was he to even see the inaccessible land he owned on the other bank? Defying all logic, he did the impossible - slung a suspension bridge over the gap! Two Indians helped him fling hemp ropes down the rocky, treed wall below his cabin's verandah; horses dragged it through the 450-foot-wide river, then the men hauled it up the far side. Even though the ropes were anchored under piles of huge logs, the makeshift bridge swayed terrifying- ly 230 feet above the water. Small wonder that Mackay's family and summer guests dubbed it the "Nervous Bridge" as they inched precariously along on the cedar footboards! Visitors at that time had to be ardent nature lovers to make the long, slow trek from Vancouver. The only steamer, the S.S. Senator, carried horses and buggies along with about twenty passengers across the Burrard Inlet. On the north shore the only dirt road to the Mackay home gave families a jolting ride for six miles; those without buggies trudged with hampers of food, the ladies in their restrictive long dresses and the gentlemen uncomfortable in the formal attire of that period. Their obvious enjoyment of the outings, though, gave Mackay a dream of turning his lands into a public park. His vision only became reality after his death, but a series of owners over the years kept his unselfish legacy alive and none has allowed the march of progress to spoil the natural wildness and age-old beauty of the spot. Naturally, with the influx of visitors increasing constantly, the bridge had to be strengthened. Today, tons of concrete anchor the steel cables which will stand up to 100,000 pounds' pressure. It even withstood the devastating hurricane of 1962! The scary, exhilarating thrill of crossing over the wide canyon seemingly in mid-air has lost none of its excitement for modern visitors, though, as they come in hundreds of thousands every year. The virgin forest is as hushed and as beautiful as it was when Mackay first laid eyes on it. And the region's history is treasured, its heritage kept alive in the symbolic totem poles which depict the ancient beliefs of the earliest inhabitants of Capilano Canyon. Thanks to the aesthetic dream of the Scotsman more than a century ago, millions of people have been able to enjoy, appreciate and learn about this uniquely beautiful parkland where the busy world outside its gates seem so far away. The world's longest suspension bridge is alive and well as it swings into its second century! %%%%%: jr. % % jr. %. Mrs. Hobson is a freelance writer now living in Vancouver's West End Your editor was told the story of honeymoon- ers visiting the "nervous bridge" in 1925. The bride haltingly asked, "Are you sure it is safe for Presbyterians?" (she meant "pedestrians.") The groom promptly assured her that it was safe for Presbyterians, and Anglicans, . . .and Roman Catholics, too. B.C. Historical News 10 East Princeton - My School 1917-19 by Ruby Sidney Forteath The dusty road stretched on - no sound. On either side scattered young pines. Nailed on one near the road, a sign, "Beware of wild range cattle crossing the road." How did one beware? A magic rabbit hole? On I went, my lunch in a neat, little lard pail (so handy). No houses. No people. Suddenly a change! Along came a fine-looking one horse buggy which stopped beside me on the road. The man with the reins had a pulled- down hat and a wealth of red whiskers. If it hadn't been for the lovely, smiling girl beside him, I'd have wondered about being beware of him as well. He looked me up and down and finally barked, "You're so little, do you think you can walk away out here every day?" I replied stoutly, "I'm a good walker," and we carried on (I thought of the 5 years I had walked to Sr. schools in Vancouver to earn my 1st Class Teaching Certificate - from near Kitsilano Beach to 12th Avenue near City Hall now). Yes, I could walk. (Later, I learned about those people. Mr. Hugh Hunter, a veteran mining man and now Gold Commissioner with an office in Princeton. Margaret was having a ride to school in town.) When pupils graduated from Normal School (Teacher Training now) they generally wrote letters (maybe a dozen or so), trying for jobs somewhere. Some girls went up North - places not on the maps, and some stayed and helped to make a better place - men needing wives - often a happening with teachers. Well. I guess I was lucky, for in good time I received a letter of appointment and an offer of a place to stay. Such beautiful copper-plate style hand writing from Mr. King, head of the School Board of Princeton. My school would be the one-room one at East Princeton. (Not on the map). So, as Dad would say, "I made haste to send an acceptance." Most people at the Coast at that time knew about communities as far as Hope, but not much farther afield. Not too many roads, or travellers in cars. So get on the train and it will take you! My sister had gone through Normal and was teaching in the Fraser Valley. Now it was holidays and she was home sitting talking with Mother in the Kitchen. When I was at home going to school, I always had a few small jobs on a Saturday. I was out front sweeping the big front porch and wide steps when a telegram came for me. I left the broom and rushed in to see what it was. It was an offer for a rural school in the Fraser Valley, near to my sister and near to Vancouver. My folks thought it would be wonderful. What was I to do - ethics and all. I said that I would go out and finish my sweeping and I'd know when I came back in. Didn't take long at all. I went in shouting, "Princeton it is!" Nothing altered, and I wasn't sorry, tho' it was a totally new life. I didn't know what a grape-vine was till a girl teacher we'd known at church began to phone around and tell that Ruby Sidney was going to Princeton where she herself had been. So when Mother and Dad took me to the 7:30 p.m. Kettle Valley train, they were less doubtful upon seeing my good company - Beth and sister Mildred Beattie and Sibyl Hardwick. (No berth for we'd arrive in the morning.) We could turn the seat around and be sociable. I was 18 years and first time away from home, but all were friendly. It was said that the CPR. made 11 sure that the most chilling sights were hidden by darkness on the way. After the long night in the train we were glad to arrive at the Princeton station. Such a fine sunny early morning and the air so invigorating and unlike Vancouver. I had read once a poets "blurb" - "the air like new wine," but I knew nothing of wine, new or old. I had had, "tea-kettle tea." Nothing but tea in our house! And there was Mr. King to meet me so early. An English gentleman, slim and erect with white hair and a small white goatee and very pleasant. He took my suitcase (trunk later) and led me from the station yard, across the road - not far - to a cream-coloured bungalow behind a white picket fence - Looked nice. Up to the veranda and there was Mrs. King! She opened the screen door and gave me a big hug. I had a new Grandma! So nice and kind in her English way. Short and rounded - very blue eyes and smooth white hair. We went to the kitchen to locate my room. The small upstairs was divided into 2 rooms with a narrow stair leading up. Mrs. King said she never went up there but would leave clean sheets at the bottom for us to pick up, make the bed and clean the room. Seemed O.K. The front room was held by a Miss Pearl Murray who had been there before. At supper time (dinner really) in the dining room, a big table, white table cloth and napkins and many hot dishes of good food. (We were always well fed) and Miss Murray to meet me. Mr. King, at the head of the table said Grace (as Dad always did) first. As we were eating, I heard him say to Mrs. King, "She hasn't got red hair," and looked at me. "Our girls always had red hair," he RC. Historical Newrs said, "And one always had to wash her hair before a dance to have lots >of ringlets." Miss Murray had red hair as did the Beattie sisters, but I didn't see the others. Mr. King pointed to a framed portrait on the wall. That was their dear daughter, Rose, long-lost and much lamented, so beautiful! They did have another daughter, Rhoda, married to a store-keeper in town, but the family was living out of town and not often mentioned. Next day was Sunday and Mildred B. offered to take me out to East Princeton to see my school, which had been hers last year. We put on our Sunday clothes and, silly me, I wore my new and cherished footwear - black kid, high-heeled little boot. (They got put away and I soon had low-heeled comfortable walking boots.) As we went further along, I could see several long avenues cut through the trees and ready for building lots for the East Princeton town to come. Already a store and a few houses. A friend at the Coast was so curious about what kind of school I'd get so far away, even sent me a snap - was this it? - Small and square, painted blue and yellow and in a flat meadow. How wrong could she be! My school was the Store! Large, brown and unpainted. Several steps led up to the front door with large, glassed, store-front windows on each side. Mildred unlocked the door and we entered. - Not too long since she'd left in June, so she must have felt quite at home in showing me around. Very large room, very large heater in the middle, with maybe a dozen or so desks, various sized, arranged not far from it - Along one side and over a side window, a long, green blackboard with lots of room for the many classes. There was one shelf with books called Readers, which would run up to what's now Grade 6. Another shelf with a few other books in other subjects. Mildred showed me the teacher's desk and chair and the neat drawer she'd left with the precious register and all the teacher's needs, including a hand bell. A door at the back led into another room but narrower. Maybe storeroom? It was now used for pupils' wraps etc. - a cloakroom. Out from that an outside door leading to a Boys and Girls building. There was no regular playground, but lots of room to run around away from the trees. Well! ! Time to walk back; Mildred would be teaching at the big school in town with Beth and Pearl Murray. Rhoda's boys, not far from the school, were in turn, the caretakers. I met my young janitor on the first day of school. He was a nice youngster, good-natured and a good worker, tho' at first, the broom looked too big for him to wield. He had brought in a pail of fresh water, with dipper and put at the back of the room for free use. (One took all in one's stride). After school the floor was to be swept and kindling and wood put ready for when fires were needed. There were maybe 10 or 12 pupils at times and such good kids. Three from one English family, Hilda, John and wee Mary. Their father was watchman on the East Princeton machinery building. There was Freddie, so fair and with chestnut coloured hair - and the cutest wee Welsh maiden and so it went. I divided up that big blackboard so that every class had a space and in that, I wrote the work of the day, so that everyone knew what to do, if I were busy. This was put to the test one day when I had to go to the Doctor for an ear syringe (thought he'd taken my head off!) and when I walked back to school there they all were, the dears, busy and quiet. Imagine! One new, sturdy little boy was brought to school - a beginner all by himself and very well behaved. I remembered that at Normal, we were taught to get the child to say the new sound needed, (f). I said, "If your cat wasn't thin, what would you say of it?" "Thick," he said, so instead of fat I had gone on to "th". There was also a lovely girl, Gladys Allison, but she was called for and taken home before winter, as not being strong. I had thought that all that family would be very able and I was sorry to see her go. One day Mrs. King spoke to me in the kitchen alone. She told me to be sure not to teach too long, for teachers got too bossy and well she knew! Also she didn't like anyone, maybe visitors, men or women, to argue with her husband, to upset him. One afternoon Miss Murray asked me to go with her to a "sometimes" show. We sat on rough benches and paid a whole 25(2. (I felt guilty, for I wanted to send some money home from the PO. in town.) Once when the lovely, Fall colouring was all around, the sisters and I went to a sheltered spot by the River for Mildred to do some water-colour painting. Of course, in Victoria there is much of that done. I learned from Mildred of the struggle of Emily Carr to have her great work given its due. I also attended morning Anglican Four School Marms: (left to right) Pearl Murray, Mildred Beattie, Ruby Sidney & Beth Beattie. RC. Historical News 12 Church when I could. The other one was Catholic. When I was walking to school one day, a couple of cowboys rode along quietly behind me and until they came to a cross-road they galloped off. (If I had been different, I might have turned and waved for a jolly word.) It was pleasant to be with Mildred but she was called home to Victoria to tend to her special Aunt who'd brought her up. The Huston's became firm friends and I sometimes walked across town to visit. I heard many great records there, for Bill was a collector of good music. He was tall and loved to tease his little wife and she also loved his good-natured fun. They were happy with their toddler, Margie. They also had a treasure they shared - a Bath Tub. Bring your own towels. One Friday when I got out of the tub and starting to clean it, I bent and twisted in such a way as to put my knee out. What a sudden pain! I spent the weekend with bandages and liniment. On Monday morning I borrowed a cane to walk to school, but soon was overtaken by a car full of men, offering a ride. I stood on the running board and hung on. You'd think I wouldn't be inveigled into trying "something new, so good - Fruitatives - Take 2" - Never again with no inside plumbing! Mother sent me a fine winter coat she'd made beautifully for me, and a soft, fluffy set of tam and scarf in bright orange - all really right for cold weather walking. Miss Murray often walked out to see her friends, the Hunters, and once she asked me to go with her - a little past the E.P school down a hill to a large piece of flat, fertile land beside the River. Hunters had a large house with a large garden (and a man to look after it.) The visit was very enjoyable and I mentioned on the walk back that it would be a lovely place to stay. "Think no more of that," said Pearl, and I didn't. For Christmas holidays, Beth and I sat on the back platform of the K.V train to go to Vancouver. When it came to a slide we had to get out and walk over a great jumble of rocks to a train brought up to the other side. Freight also had to be moved. A man carrying a box higher than himself, stumbled and fell down. Dried cod fish from the thin white box fell on him and skittered all over. A line of men appeared, each one carrying one heavy-looking brick up high in his right hand. What was that, I wondered? We were late into Vancouver and Dad, punctual as usual, had a long, difficult wait. Back at school it was cold, and my young caretakers had to work hard to keep a good fire going. The lunches froze in the "cloak room" and all of them and coats etc. had to be in by the heater, and the lunches eaten there too. Quite a diversion in schooling, but we managed. Sometimes we enjoyed singing and all was flexible. I was warm walking with my new coat and scarf set, but also with "leg warmers" buttoned up to my knee, warm boots and mitts. No loitering with after school work for I liked to get in town before dark's early coming. In Spring we sometimes found wild flowers in the bush. Some I hadn't seen before, and I urged the pupils not to pull them up. Sadly now, Mr. and Mrs. King were not able to keep anyone, thus ending a happy time there for Pearl and me. We must find other quarters. Pearl and Beth settled together well and "bothered" each other. I got a bed in town with a retired teacher and her 12 year old son, who was a big help to her. I had my meals in 3 different places - Several kind ladies offered great help to me for an evening meal, and gave me wonderful meals and family life style. Mrs. King was devastated on losing her dear husband, and went to live with Rhoda and family in East Princeton. Before June, Mrs. King was much recovered and asked if I would go back next year to stay with her in a good small house with her and she'd board me (in East Princeton). I agreed ... No long walk. So once again my parents took me to the 7:30 p.m. Kettle Valley Train, but with none of those former companions or a kind School Board head, like Mr. King to meet me at the Princeton Station. (I was now an old timer!) It was quite pleasant in the cottage and Mrs. King and I spent quiet evenings doing much hand work. Rhoda wanted to show me how to ride and fixed me up on her"staid pony". We got on fine and went some distance, when "we" decided to turn back home. Sometimes on the railroad track and sometimes beside it and I just simply stayed on, tho' my hair fell down around from the braids around my head. (The pony knew, not I, that it was time to feed her baby!) Another time Sibyl Hardwick asked me to ride with her to Hedley. On that mount, I felt a mile above the ground, but we got on fine except for once he shied at some moving paper - Sibyl was a good horse man. At that time, Hedley was in full swing and the gold mine ore cars were going up and down the steep incline to the top. I met a young teacher who told me she lived up top and taught a small school there. She said it was pretty scary coming down in an ore car with only a partition between passengers and the load of ore. Sibyl and I were both tired and stiff after riding 25 miles each way, but it had been a very interesting outing. On the 24th of May holiday Mr. & Mrs. Huston asked me to go with them to Merritt. It was very hot so we paused at a wayside pond to "give the car a drink." This was my first ride down the big hill into town, and up, up again next day. We all enjoyed the trip in their touring car. Sibyl Hardwick accompanied me to Vancouver once. The Coquihalla Pass was closed with a slide so the train had to go to the mainline and 13 RC. Historical News transfer passengers. A dance was held for the train load of delayed travellers at Spence's Bridge. We did not reach Vancouver till late next morning. My parents had very little sleep, but Dad still agreed to deliver Miss Hardwick to an address across town from our home. In October 1918 I had to find a new place as Mrs. King was ill and returned to Rhoda's home. A surprise visitor arrived mid-morning during lesson time. Mrs Hunter insisted I move to her house immediately. She declared she couldn't let me go to town to look for a place when the flu epidemic was raging. The Princeton Schools closed, but East Princeton stayed open till year end. Mrs. Hunter, very tall and erect, had been a teacher in Nova Scotia. She liked law and order in all things. The white table cloth and napkins were clean and crisp even at breakfast time. She served me cracked wheat cereal which had been slowly cooking all night on the big black range in the kitchen, with creamy milk from her own cow, Agnes. We had lots of fresh vegetables from her garden. Once, when eating spinach, I bit on a hard object - a beetle. This I quickly put into my pocket so as not to embarrass my hostess. Mrs. Hunter mothered me as she did her own daughter Margaret. She would put a "pig" in my bed, close my window and open the door to the hall where she stoked the heater for the night. I was well fed, and welcome to the living room with its piano, gramaphone, large table, bookshelves full of good reading, and a quiet corner where Mr. Hunter could concentrate on his mining records and other papers. About this time there were many young English clergy sent to the "Colonies". They were grateful for an invitation to a good home. One day Mrs. Hunter invited the Anglican clergyman for lunch at which she served a delicious meat pie. (We thought it was chicken but were told it was a rabbit raised by Mrs. Hunter.) The Reverend asked me to go for a walk with him. When RC. Historical News down by the river he showed me how to reckon its speed. On later outings we drove to the mine and town- site of Copper Mountain where we met the teachers and a young singer. He gave me driving lessons on the road above the river, always with a "Be very careful" at a bend where someone had gone over the bank. One evening when he delivered me to Hunter's gate he asked for some light so he could see to fix something. I walked into the house, took the lamp from my room, lit it and held it till the adjustment was made, then quickly and quietly returned to my room. He was my boyfriend till school was out. He moved to Vancouver and I transferred to Ladysmith. I rode the Kettle Valley Railway often during my two years in Princeton. This line had snowsheds, tunnels, and bridges that looked as if made from matchsticks. Wooden trestles were used for 12 years then replaced by steel structures. The workers on that line were very safety conscious, and did their best in that difficult and dangerous stretch of line. The KVR was my connection with new experiences, kind friends and happy memories. The author taught in Ladysmith, Vancouver and Trail. She married in 1925 and has lived in Trail ever since. Previous writing has included two books of poetry. In July 1989 she was a delegate at the 1st Annual Convention of the American Poetry Association in San Francisco. The Hunter family at home. 14 P.S. by Margaret Stoneberg. The charming story of Ruby Sidney's adventures while she was teaching in the interior community of Princeton caused me to read through the 1917 and 1918 issues of the Princeton Star newspaper. I have had the sensation of opening a door and passing into the landscape brightly lit by the sun of long ago. I could see the little schoolteacher jumping down from the Kettle Valley train at 5:30 in the morning, the sky already lightening in the dawn, met by Mr. King and escorted across the street to his home. Very soon, perhaps next morning, she would step out the front door to explore. On her right she would see, opposite the station, the big, white building which was the Princeton Brewery. Turning left she would walk past the Similkameen hotel, then the Courthouse, some stores, one of which was the post office. Turning the corner she was on Bridge Street, the shopping centre of Princeton. In her cozy, upstairs bedroom, through the open window she could listen to the street sounds. She could hear the shouts of the cowboys and the bawling of the cattle as they were driven to the station for loading on the train carrying them to Vancouver stockyards. The sound of harness bells would tell her the big horses were pulling the wagons from Garrison's barns, perhaps slowing up to a stop the automobiles that would otherwise be whizzing along with horns sounding at the dizzying speed of 30 mph. SCHOOL AND TEACHERS On August 31, 1917 it was noted that "The public school (located almost opposite Mr. King's house on Vermilion Avenue), and the East Princeton school will reopen Sept. 4. Miss Elizabeth Beattie will take up her duties as Principal of Princeton School. Miss Murray will again have charge of the Intermediate room and Miss Mildred Beattie the primary classes. Miss Ruby Sidney of Vancouver has been engaged to teach East Princeton school." Both the schools mentioned had been enlarged and greatly improved during the previous spring. The one-room school at Copper Mountain opened that year to serve the children of the mining community of the Canada Copper Corporation. Sadly the mine was to close in 1918 for a time due to labour troubles and the low return for copper. Mr. T.C. King, the secretary of the school board, was English and had moved to the United States as a young man. Starting as a teacher, he later became an architect and drew the plans for some of the most prominent buildings in Des Moines, Iowa. Later he moved to Lacombe, Alberta and then to Princeton. His last professional work was the enlarging of the Princeton school and duties as government building inspector. As Miss Sidney has told he died March 26, 1918, leaving his widow, one daughter, Mrs. S.R. Gibson (Rhoda) and two sons. EAST PRINCETON. PIONEER COMMUNITY At one time the Allison family owned land downriver from the forks and Mrs. Allison at this period was "Grandma", her husband long buried at the foot of Castle Rock and her family grown up and scattered. She had come to the Similkameen in the 1860's as the first white woman to settle with her husband, John Fall Allison. She now had the time and the opportunity to write her memoirs and add to her collection of Indian legends and lore. Mrs. Allison could remember the exciting days around the turn of the century when she laid out what was expected to become the metropolis of East Princeton. She was assisted by her brother-in-law, Edgar Dewdney, the Lieutenant-Governor of the Province (but still involved in sundry real-estate deals). He was confident that the coming railroad would terminate there, locating the station. So East Princeton was planned with streets and boulevards, stores, a log hotel, and a school which Mrs. Allison indeed taught for a short time. Unfortunately their plans came to naught. The town of Princeton grew rapidly between the forks of the river in the area which is now Princeton. By an irony of fate, Allisons had given over the plot to their son-in-law, Sands, and he immediately sold it to the Vermilion Forks Coal and Land Company. The company sold it in lots and in no time at all there were at least three hotels serving the hundreds of miners swarming in to prospect at Copper Mountain. Stores and the post office and houses mushroomed. The railway came in and built the station at the west end of town. East Princeton faded away along with Mrs. Allison's prospects for material success. Then came the exciting years of 1911-12. The Portland Cement Company of Vancouver appeared on the scene and built a huge stone-walled plant, installed massive machinery and employed hundreds of men to make cement. This was to be shipped out on the railway spur just built. A Methodist church was built. But disaster struck in 1913 at the time of a world-wide slump which killed the market for cement. The local material proved insufficient, men went to war. The cement plant closed, the machinery was sold and the building became and remains to this day a haunted shell. So it was when Miss Ruby Sidney taught at E. Princeton. FRIENDS Leaving Mrs. Allison with her memories, we can go a short distance from the school to the home of her long-time friends Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Hunter, on the river road. Hugh Hunter was mining recorder at Granite Creek in 1889. He had married the young school-teacher at Nicola and, when the gold rush was over and the government office was moved to Princeton (located in the Courthouse), the Hunters moved into town. Here Mr. Hunter was justice of the Peace, tax collector, etc. No doubt, when Ruby stayed with the Hunters, their daughter Margaret played on the piano the sentimental songs of the period. However, it is Mrs. Hunter's cottage organ that is a legend. When church services were held in barrooms, sometimes in houses (usually Irwin's or Cook's), Mrs. Hunter would play the organ. This was later given to the St. Paul's Presbyterian church when it opened in 1920. When a different organ was se- 15 cured the 'old' organ was given back to Margaret Hunter (now Mrs. F. Mitchell). I believe it is still in her possession at her home in Olalla. (Incidentally, the Courthouse was moved across the street to be used as the first High School and later, lamentably, demolished.) Another among Miss Sidney's friends was the Hardwick family. E.E. Hardwick was a Methodist minister who moved to Princeton from Nicola in 1899. His daughter, Patsey was the first white child born in Princeton town. He was overseas during all of W.W.I. Hardwick descendants still live on the One-Mile. The Hustons had a store in town, Mrs. Lovina Huston sold millinery and he had a rig which he drove to Copper Mountain. Mr. Gibson had a hardware store where he sold also coal, cement, lime and plaster and was also a blacksmith. Mr. TC. King is credited with having the first garage in town in 1911 and he had other commercial interests as well. WOMEN'S YEAR OF EMANCIPATION A two inch item in the Star of April 20. 1917 was headed "Women May Register" and stated: "Hugh Hunter, government agent, has all the necessary papers enabling the women to have their names placed upon the voters list. Under the bill just passed in Victoria women can register at once and have till may 14th to get their names on the list. Affidavits can be made before a justice of the peace, provincial constable, postmaster and some other people. Applications are to be forwarded to the Registrar of Voters at Fairview. Note: She must be a British subject or married to one." The editor who wrote the articles and the editorials maintained a lofty indifference. Nowhere else in the any of the issues of 1917 or 1918 is any reference made to the subject. Conscription, too, was not important, it seems. There was a paid government advertisement advising men to register for service in the armed forces. And again this did not merit any special coverage other than to have it stated that the recruiting officer had little to do here as practically all of the men of military age had already vol- RC. Historical News unteered. So great was the patriotic fervor at the start of the war that there was a serious shortage of marriageable men in the valley. The ladies of the town worked hard to knit and raise money for 'comforts'. I did not find any reference to any income tax, still a gleam in the government eye. This was the time of Prohibition and here, so close to the U.S. border there were many violations. The road over the Richter pass was well used. In spite of a customs office here freight sometimes was not what it seemed. A load of hay was sometimes worth much more than a silver spoon, and a load of logs was sometimes hollow. 1918 was the year of the Spanish flu' when it was said there were 400 cases and many died. It is very interesting to read Mrs. Forteath's stories about this time in her life and what it was like to be a school teacher when pupils were graded on the Honour Roll for "Deportment", "Punctuality and Regularity" and "Proficiency" As I close my imaginary door to the past I hope to have some more from her. ********** Our B.C. Historical Federation Archivist prepared a post script to tell us more of Princeton and East Princeton. THE LITTLE RED TRIANGLE ON VINTAGE CARS E.A. Harris delighted readers with his article "Memories of Motoring in the 1930's." In it he declared that his 1928 Chev. had 'a small red triangle on the left rear mudguard indicating the car had hydraulic brakes." Car buffs promptly notified me that the red triangle indicated FOUR WHEEL BRAKES. Obviously a vehicle with brakes on 4 wheels could stop in a shorter distance than one with 2 wheel brakes. Further details from Don S. Robb of Sidney, B.C. give us an explanation of early braking systems: A two wheel and the successor, the four wheel braking system, were operated by a series of levers put into play when the pedal was depressed. These levers tautened the cables, wires extending to a cantilever mechanism that opened or closed a shoe embracing a brake drum surrounding the centre of the rim of the wheel. These were a system comprising what was known as "mechanical" brakes. Early models were applied and fitted only to the rear wheels. The cables often become slack, rendering the brake less efficient. Gadgets called Tensioners were sold as accessories to be used (like clothes line tighteners) to snug up the cables to improve stopping power. When the first four wheel brakes were introduced a home mechanic occasionally overtightened the cables for the front set causing the vehicle to go "arse over teakettle" when braking. Hydraulic systems were quite different. Hydraulic cylinders delivered fluid through tubes to other cylinders on the wheel. The wheel cylinder engaged a cam that depressed the brake shoe to effect a pressure, thus arresting the progress of the vehicle. Hydraulic systems were tried on expensive vehicles in the 1920's and were adopted by Chevrolet in 1934 and Ford in 1938. At first hydraulic systems were on rear wheels only with mechanical brakes on the front wheels.. During that era cars were stopping mainly with rear brakes as the task of tightening the front brake was such a dirty job. RC. Historical News 16 Giscome Portage and the Huble - Seebach Trading Post In the fall of 1862, two colored men, John Robert Giscome, who was born in Jamaica in 1832, and Henry McDame, who was born in the Bahamas in 1862, after meeting in Quesnel, decided to go into the Peace River area to look for gold after hearing gold had been found in the Finlay and Parsnip rivers in the Peace River water-shed. However, they got caught in a freeze-up so wintered in Fort George and not at Fort St. James as planned. From Fort St. James, they would take the overland route to the McLeod Lake post. During their stay in Fort George, they met up with Indians trading at the Hudson's Bay post who told them of an alternate route to McLeod Lake via the Salmon River, which is a tributary of the Fraser, 18 miles north of Fort George. This route involved a short portage from the upper Salmon to Summit Lake, where they'd reach the Crooked River, a tributary of the Peace River. Consequently, in the spring of 1863, they set out for this portage with an Indian guide. They headed down the Fraser River and upon coming to the Salmon River, found it badly swollen with the spring run-off. The guide told them there was another trail about 12 miles further up the Fraser. This trail began at the present day Huble homestead site and cut across through the bush to Summit Lake, a distance of nine miles. It was Peter Dun levy who established a trading post at the south end of the portage around 1873, who named the Giscome Portage after John Robert Giscome, when Giscome was cooking for him. There was another more popular route to reach the Peace River involving the Telegraph Trail from Quesnel to Fraser Lake, then taking the fur trade trail to Fort St. James and thence on to McLeod Lake. When the Omineca gold rush began by June Chamberland in 1870, people in Quesnel went after the Government to build a wagon road across the portage. In 1871 John Trutch took the contract to build this road, with G.B. Wright and Mr. John Grant in charge of building it. With mosquitoes, black flies, and the swampy land, they had a hard time keeping men on the job and could not totally rely on the Indians either. This short distance required 2000 feet of corduroy and thirty-seven culverts. This portage trail was used for many years but it became overgrown with brush by the 1890's when Dunlevy's trading ceased. No community was established at the Giscome Portage until the arrival of Huble and Seebach. Albert J. Huble was born at Oak Lake, Ontario in 1872. Coming West and being a very adventurous soul, he had tried fishing off the coast of B.C. Huble, along with three other men, had purchased a fishing schooner. However the first time out on the water, a violent storm came up and all being inexperienced, were glad to get back on shore. At this point, Huble said "I'll never go out there again." 1 He also went to the Yukon to try his luck on the gold-fields. However, when he got there he found that all claims on the Klondike had been staked. It was the winter of 1899 and people were starving, there was no food in the country. So he took off from Dawson City in December, an almost unheard of and unparalleled feat of endurance, going across the headwaters of the Pelly, down the Stikine and came to Telegraph Creek where he stayed for awhile.2 In 1900, Albert Huble came to the Fort George area where he trapped on the upper Fraser River. Edward Seebach, born also in Ontario, in Perth County in 1880, was trapping that area too. In 1904 Huble and Seebach formed a partnership and started up a trading post which 17 really did a flourishing business. Albert Huble pre-empted D.L. 848 where the Huble house now stands. (He later pre-empted D.L. 762 - Sunnybrook Ranch.) They re-cut and rebuilt the old Portage trail and many, many loads of freight passed over this road on it's way to Summit and McLeod Lakes. Edward Seebach pre-empted land near Huble's homestead around 1909. Huble staked out many sections and quarter sections of land, there being, around 1911, twenty-seven settlers in the vicinity. This settlement became known as the Giscome Portage. In 1911, Albert Huble brought a wife, the former Annie Hart, back with him from Ontario. In 1912 he started building a large two-storey squared log house. Each corner was dove-tailed and carefully fitted. Moss was gathered and clay dug to be used for chinking. He went upriv- er and cut cedar blocks to be made into shingles later. It was very appropriate for him to build such a big house as they had a large family. Annie had brought with her, one child, Ada, from a previous marriage in Ontario. Albert and Annie had seven other children - Bertha, Martha, Patricia, Gladys May, Al Junior, Samuel, and Dean (who drowned in Summit Lake while just a young man). Another building moved over to the big house was joined to it with a breeze-way. This served as a kitchen and was used both summer and winter. At one time, in later years, they had a Chinese cook who would sit in this kitchen and churn butter while rocking the baby in the cradle. The rest of the house consisted of five bedrooms (four of these being upstairs), an office, and a big living-room, where they ate, with a pantry. Along with freighting of goods over the Portage, summers were spent picking wild berries - huckleberries, RC. Historical News raspberries, and strawberries. Clover, oats, and barley was grown and harvested. Days were spent haying, at home and at the neighbours. Huge gardens were planted - potatoes, turnips, carrots, cabbage, beets, onions, and peas. These vegetables, as well as for their own use, were sold to the boats that stopped on their way to Tete Jaune Cache. Huble and Seebach guided scows through the Giscome Rapids which were seven miles in length. Sometimes a boat would get stuck on the rocks there and they would have to get it loose. Black-smithing and shoeing horses also took up some time, as horses, as many as four to a wagon, would be used in freighting. As well as horses, they had cows, pigs, chickens, ducks, and geese. They also tended store and bought furs from the Indians and white men alike. In the winter season, they themselves would trap. Al Junior, who is now 71, remembers as a young lad, going out with his father in later years, to check traps. At the cabin Mr. Huble cooked up a big pot of oatmeal. Next day he sliced up some of this cold porridge, fried bacon and the porridge and "it was good" Al said. One time, while out at Avril Lake, Albert Huble came upon some grizzly bears. He killed four grizzlies in all, but one that was wounded, mauled him. As the bear attacked him, Huble's gun flew out of bis hands. The bear was biting at both of his arms. He was saved by his dog who started worrying the bear's tail. With this the bear released his hold on Huble who was able to retrieve his gun and kill the bear.3 A trapper's life can be quite adventurous. Huble built a freight warehouse on the banks of the Fraser at a spot where the water was deep enough for the boats to tie up at the wharf. At one time, in the early 1900's, there were many stern-wheelers on the Fraser plying their way to Tete Jaune Cache - the Chilcotin, the Nechacco, later named the Chilco, S.S.B.C., the BX Express, Charlotte, Conveyor, and Operator were some of the boats that stopped at the Portage. Here they would load up with horses, oats, hay, and vegetables and would unload tons of goods. This warehouse was a sort of clearance station for much freight besides their own, freight that would be hauled North to the Hudson's Bay stores at Summit Lake, McLeod Lake, and to the various survey parties for the railroad - Bledsoe's, Harvey's, Holland's, Corell's, Burden's, Freeman's, Bower's, Morrow's, and Weber's, to mention a few, using four horses and a large wagon per load. Huble later had a frame store built with a big sign "SEEBACH & HUBLE - GENERAL MERCHANDISE". This store had a false front, large windows, a varnished office and a home-made fur press which was used to bale Group out on lake, 1924 - left to right; Albert Huble (holding Sam Huble), Directly behind him Mrs. Huble. Girl in front/Pat Huble, directly behind her girl with spotted bow on dress is Bertha Huble. Young Al, at the extreme right sitting on edge of boat. Photo courtesy ofAl Huble. furs. He had many items for sale here, one order consisting of a barrel of mixed cookies, as well as ginger snaps, cream sodas, Edam cheese, Beecham's pills, fruit salts, Spearmint gum, one dozen can openers, two dozen cigarette holders, a 5-gallon keg of vinegar, flour, a dozen playing cards, stove polish, a box of hammers, and cigarettes, 2 dozen Lacrosse chocolate, one-half dozen fruit jars, 100 cigars, 100 cork cigars and a box of Mogul cigarettes. Missing on the weigh bill were a case of Climax jam and a case of plum pudding. Another time he ordered one-half dozen men's suits - black, blue and one-half dozen women's dresses - serge - black, blue.4 So we can see from this that the store was a busy place, supplying the settlers with food and other goods. In 1915 they opened up a post office at the Giscome Portage but it closed down after two short months of service. British Columbia became a province in the Dominion of Canada in 1871. Because of this union, a railway was to be built to the Pacific coast. This would increase business for the stern-wheelers with activity equal almost to the gold-rush days.8 However this also meant the end for stern-wheelers because once the railway was built, the need for them ceased, as transportation shifted from river to road. Two routes were decided on. One went down the North Thompson River to Kamloops, through the lower Fraser canyons and on the Pacific Ocean. The other was to go from the Yellowhead Pass to Fort George, following the upper Fraser River, then southward across the Chilcotin country. The second route never went through as the Chilcotin Indians became troublesome, having killed some men. However, the decision to put a railroad through Central British Columbia became a reality and by October 1st, 1913 trains began running between Prince Rupert and Smithers. On January 27th, 1914, the first train reached Prince George.6 Meanwhile, the Pacific Great Eastern railway was completed as far as Soda Creek from RC. Historical News IB ta Peace Rwe Urc\\C Lake Pacific Lake. fraitr Lake for! fro-ttr j/eiv Caledonia Historic features OKm 20 40 60 BO 19 RC. Historical News the South. When World War I broke out in 1914, work ceased on the P.G.E. and steamboat business wavered. It was the last season for the S.S. Operator, Conveyor, and the Hammond but the B X Express continued on it's run. However, even the BX was not used in 1916, thus bringing an end to steamboats on the Fraser. With the construction of a road between Prince George and Summit Lake in 1919, and the Giscome Portage being by-passed, trading there became a thing of the past. The place was rented for a while as a guest ranch and in 1929 it was sold to Mrs. Josephine E. Walker Mitchell, who also brought up the surrounding homesteads. Together, with Les Woods, the WM. Ranch was established. In 1978 the B.C. Government purchased the property and it became a Community pasture. In 1983, after news seeped out that the old Huble house was to be moved into Prince George and restored as a heritage house at the Brewery site, a group of concerned citizens from Summit Lake and Salmon Valley met and declared it to be part of the history of their area and a decision was made to leave the house where it stood and not to move it. Thus the Giscome Portage Historical Society was formed, plans for restoration made, the land (25 hectares) purchased by the Regional District of Fraser-Fort George, and it was designated as an historic park, later to be named the Giscome Portage Regional Park. This park is a very pretty place with the spruce and poplar-covered hill-sides, and the Fraser River flowing by, the huge cottonwood trees lining its banks. The old square-log house, white-washed and trimmed in green, has been restored and made ready for public viewing, each room being equipped with period furnishings. The freight ware-house down by the river's edge, will, in all probability, be open to the public this summer, 1990, along with the big barn. Plans to build a black-smith shop, meat cache, frame store, and to fix up two other old cabins - one as a trapper's cabin, the other to be used as a gold, Indian and Chinese display with a bit on Father Coccola, who had at one time stayed there, are in the making. The Giscome Portage trail has been re-cut, using old trail blazes and following the old wagon ruts, which are still very deep. You can now walk, snow-shoe, or ski down this trail out to the highway, just south of Summit Lake, a distance of 7.5 kilometers. The Giscome Portage Historical Society and the Regional District are working hand-in-hand at this project and hope to have a truly workable homestead, farm, and trading post established in the years to come. Summer hours are from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. and we will be open from May 24th till September 30th. We hope to have many visitors in the future to learn of the colorful history surrounding the area. I********* June Chamberland is the President of the Giscome Portage Historical Society. BIBUOGRAPHY 1.-2. From conversation with Al Huble Jr. 3. From Huble diaries and conversation with Al Huble Jr. 4. From the diaries. 5. Raddlewheels on the Frontier-Art Downs. 6. AHhtayofPrinceGewgebyRev. F.E. Runnals. Martha Huble by Fraser river with the blacksmith shop in back. Circa 1917-18 Courtesy of Barbara Munk. CERTIFICATE OF APPRECIATION RC. Harris R.C. Harris, long time contributor to the News, received the first Certificate of Appreciation prepared as a "Thank You" from the editorial staff. Harris hikes for history - and shares his findings with readers of this magazine. (He is coauthor of a book on trails soon to come off the press.) His knowledge of early routes in British Columbia starts with the study of many maps filed in the Provincial Archives. When he is out tracing a trail he takes many photos, altimeter readings and observations. He insists on walking the trail both ways, then spends many hours preparing a map to illustrate his article. Harris was born and educated in England. He served as a Captain in the Royal Engineers in WW. II. R.C. "Bob" and his bride came to Ontario in 1948, and to B.C. in 1950. He was Chief Engineer for Dominion Bridge for most of his 25 years with that company. Latterly he works, supposedly part time, as a consultant engineer in an office fairly close to hi? home in West Vancouver. J.C. Historical News 20 Letter From Vancouver's Island by Peggy Imredy Pre-1900 publications are a gold mine of information if someone has access to the issues. Special Collections of the University of British Columbia library has some of these early Canadian magazines. Recently, Margaret Waddington, CIHM i researcher and volunteer in the library found a juvenile magazine, The Snowdrop, published out of Montreal in the 1850's.2 One of the items was a letter written from Vancouver's Island by a young girl to her grandfather. Careful reading of the communication revealed the young writer was Cecelia Douglas, daughter of James Douglas. The letter gives us, 140 years later, a glimpse of James Douglas' character and events of that time. Grandfather was William Connollys, who had entered the North West Company's service in 1801. He left the fur trade after 30 years service and returned to Lower Canada (Quebec) with Suzanne *, his Cree wife and unmarried children. Within a year he had left Suzanne and married in a Catholic ceremony, his cousin Julia Woolrich. Unknown to the Douglas family when the letter was written Connolly had died the previous June. After his death, his will leaving the estate to Julia, triggered a landmark court case which had repercussions throughout the fur trade. We know James Douglas as an "accomplished business-man and shrewd diplomat, deeply religious and tolerant" through McKelvie's, Douglas: A New Portrait °. That article states . . . but even within his own home he could not altogether free himself from the mask he wore before the world . . . This recently found letter reveals a father who would lead his children on hands and knees through rose bushes to the top of a cliff to have the exhilarating experience of watching waves dash against the rocks below. The journey from Fort Vancouver was not easy. Rebecca, the Douglas' newest child was about a month old when the arduous trip began. Five wagons carried the household goods, gold dust, and bales of fur and also Mrs. Douglas and the two younger children. Douglas and the three eldest girls rode ahead on horseback. Thus they arrived at Fort Nisqually e. At the Fort all the goods and family boarded the Hudson's Bay Company's schooner, Cadboro, 7 bound for a new home at the recently established Fort Victoria. Captain James Sangster 8 was in command at that time. James Douglas, who had found the site for the New Fort was sent to be the interim Governor of Vancouver's Island and New Caledonia. Richard Blanshard arrived on March 11, 1850 to be the Governor but left September 1851 9 when Douglas again took over the reins of governing the colony. One book in the Hudson's Bay Library was Vancouver's Voyages. We can picture Douglas, reading aloud the sections on Puget Sound where the Cadboro was wending its way through the islands. The description of their haven by Cecelia matches Vancouver's version 10. Port Discovery, named for Vancouver's ship, was not a habitation but a safe anchorage from storms. Cecelia, born in 1834, was the fifth child born to Amelia and James Douglas. The first four had all died within a few years of birth. The other children on the journey to Fort Victoria were, Jane, born 1839; Agnes, 1841; Alice, 1844; Rebecca born as stated above; two more children were to be born after their arrival in Fort Victoria n. Alfred Robson Benson, M.D. was the first Doctor at Fort Victoria. For a short period, Dr. Helmcken worked with Benson. When Richard Blanshard arrived at the Fort as Governor and became ill within a year, Dr. Tolmie was called in from Fort Nisqually. In the meantime Benson was sent to Fort Vancouver, from there he was transferred to Colville (changed to Nanaimo, 1860). He worked with the Hudson's Bay Company until 1862 then took over the same duties for the Vancouver Coal Company until 1864. He retired to his home town in England where he died after the turn of the century ^. Rev. Robert John Staines became a controversial figure after he arrived at Fort Victoria. His first profession was a school teacher but when the Hudson's Bay Company required the teacher to be a Priest he acquired the necessary diploma. Although he and his wife thought their destination was Fort Vancouver, it was Fort Victoria where they were put ashore, a few months before the arrival of the Douglas family. In the beginning Rev. Staines was amiable to Douglas. Mrs. Staines trained the girls and Rev. Staines taught the boys. Previously Douglas had taught his own children, as the HBC advised their employees 13, and, as the editor wrote . . . only instructor . . . been her good papa . . . 14. As early as 1784 the education of the trader's children was a concern of the London Committee. Primer reading books and spelling books were part of the freight sent to the posts. Books for post libraries were also sent and circulated through the system. In the larger posts schools were set up, children from the age of five were to attend for seven years 21 RC. Historical News 15. The boys would then be useful to the Service and a perpetual source of employees. Rev. Staines had many problems in the new Colony. He was on his way to London to take his case before the House of Commons when the barque Duchess of San Lorenzo sank and all were lost including Staines. Mrs. Staines sold their property later in the next year (1855) and left for London is. Cecelia did not address Connolly's wife as grandmother but as Mrs. C, Suzanne died in 1862. It appears, at that time, there was no animosity between the families, At this time I have been unable to find the names of all the Connolly children. Suzanne's children were John, the oldest son and the person who instigated the court case; William; Amelia, Lady Douglas and oldest daughter; Julia; and two unknown . . Julia had two daughters 17, names unknown. If anyone has knowledge of the names of Connolly's children I would appreciate your writing me to complete my file. The letter leaves us with the impression, that members of the Douglas family corresponded with William Connolly. Perhaps sometime in the future further letters will be found written by members of this important British Columbia family ********!):* Peggy Imredy is a Past President of the Vancouver Historical Society. She is currently researching material for a book on early church leaders. THE SNOW DROP; or, Juvenile Magazine, Vol 1, No. 10 (April 1851) p. 299 - 301. LETTER FROM VANCOUVER'S ISLAND We insert with much pleasure the following letter from Vancouver's Island written by a young girl "whose only instructor," as the note received with it, informs us, "except for a very short period, has been her good papa." The writer of the note goes on to say very justly, that "to most of the readers of the SNOWDROP, Vancouver's Island, in the great Pacific Ocean, is known barely by name, and it will assuredly interest and gratify them to learn, that little girls there as well as here, are taught not only to foster the "household" affections, but, to cultivate the mind and refine the task to a true sense and practice of the religious, the beautiful, and the GOOD." We should be much gratified by receiving further communications from the writer of the very artless and interesting letter which we give below. Fort Victoria, 17th Feb., 1850 MY DEAR GRANDFATHER. - As Mr. Colville will take this, next week, to join the express at Vancouver, I take advantage of his kindness to write to you. We were very much distressed at hearing of the bad state of your health, and our frequent prayers are daily offered to heaven for your recovery. I long for the period which will bring us the intelligence of your restoration to health. We have had our own afflictions, during the past year, and the thoughts of your illness, have added to their weight. Papa having been appointed Governor of Vancouver's Island, we removed from the Columbia to this place, in the month of May last. The journey partly in boats, on horseback, and from Nesqully by sea, was very pleasant; we had but one stormy day, on entering the straits of DeFuca, which alarmed us greatly and made us all sea-sick; but the good, kind Captain, on witnessing our distress, ran into Port Discovery, where we remained until the weather became more moderate. We landed on Protection Island, which is so beautifully and truly described in Vancouver's voyages. The weather was delightful and I was never tired of wandering about the lovely spot, picking flowers and enjoying the charming prospect on every side. There is a tall beetling cliff which overhangs the ocean, at the west end of the Island. The summit was covered with rose bushes, In full flower, papa made us creep on our hands and knees to the very verge of the precipice, to see the surf dashing wildly against it. What a sight! my head yet reels at the recollection. I would certainly have fallen headlong into the sea, had I not been firmly held. We arrived here in the beginning of the month of June, and we like the place very much. The early part of summer was rather cool; from the middle of July, the temperature was delightful. There was scarcely any rain from the time of our arrival to the middle of October, yet vegetation was fresh and luxuriant owing to the heavy dews of night. The fort is situated on an inlet about one mile from the straits of DeFuca, and ships anchor within 50 yards of the gate. To the north and east there is a beautiful open country, swelling here and there, into gentle undulations, with groves of shady oaks, dispersed by the hand of nature in the most perfect order. During the fine weather, we used to ride out into the country every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon. I have a beautiful mouse-colored pony, which I dearly love; he is so gentle and tractable that a child may guide him. Jane and Agnes have a grey pony between them; they go out only every other day, as we have only two side saddles between us three; but papa says he will get another one, when my sisters are a little older. This is a far healthier place than Vancouver. There being no sickness, either among the whites or Indians, except an occasional attack of cold. Death must have his victims every-where, and we have not escaped the common lot of suffering mortals. It has pleased Heaven to take from us our darling sister Rebecca, in her eight month. She suffered from some unknown complaint for several weeks, notwithstanding all Dr. Benson's care and attention. We sat up with her night and day, but our cares were of no avail. She died on Sunday evening the 11th of RC. Historical News 22 November about 5 minutes to 6, and her happy spirit fled to that happy home where sin and sorrow shall never enter. She was buried by the Rev. Mr. Staines, on the 14th following, and he was so much affected, that he could hardly read the service through. Imagine what our feelings were, particularly poor mama's who was quite heart-broken, and has hardly yet recovered the shock; but the hopes and consolations of our blessed faith supported us in our affliction. Papa was absent from home at the time, or we would have felt the trial less severly. I am attending school with my sisters, at the Rev. Mr. Staines', a Church of England clergyman, who is also the Company's Chaplain, at this place. He is an excellent teacher, and takes a great deal of pains with the children who are placed under his care. I am happy to inform you that mama is quite well, as are my three sisters, Jane, Agnes, and Alice. They all unite with me in love to yourself, and Mrs. C. Louisa and William. I love Louisa very dearly. *********** FOOTNOTES 1. OHM. Canadian Institute for Historical Microproduction 2. SnowDroRof Juvenile Magazine. Montreal. 9. 10. 12. 13. 16. 17. Robert W. Lay, ed., 1850 -1852. Vol 1, No.l tApril 1847 - Vol. 4, No. 3. (June 18501. At UBC Library, Special Collections. Halpenny, Francess. G., ed. DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY, Vol. VII 1836 -1850, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1988. p. 204 - 6. Halpenny, Francess G. ed. DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY, Vol. IX, 1861 -1870, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1976. p. 149 - 50. McKelvie, B.A. Douglas: a New Portrait, BRITISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Vol. VII, April 1943, p. 93 -101. Farrar, Victor J. The Nisqually Journal, WASHINGTON STATE HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Vol. 10, 1925, p. 218. and Ormsby, Margaret A. BRITISH COLUMBIA! A HISTORY, Toronto, The Macmillans in Canada. 1959, p. 93. Wright, E. W, ed. LEWIS & DRYDENS MARINE HISTORY OF THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST, New York, Antiquarian Press, Ltd., 1961, p. 3. Walbran, Captain John T. BRITISH COLUMBIA COAST NAMES, 1592 -1908, Vancouver, The Vancouver Public Library, 1971, p. 437. Ormsby, p. 95-6'105. Lamb, W Kaye, ed. THE VOYAGE OF GEORGE VANCOUVER, 1791 -1795, Vol. II, London, Hakluyt Society, 1984. p. 514. Pethick, Derek. JAMES DOUGLAS, SERVANT OF TWO EMPIRES, Vancouver, Mitchell Press Limited, 1969, p. 48. Walbran, p. 48. Van Kirk, Sylvia. MANY TENDER TIES, WOMEN IN THE FUR - TRADE SOCIETY, 1670-1870, Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 1980, p. 103. Brown, Jennifer, S.H. STRANGERS IN BLOOD, FUR TRADE FAMILIES IN INDIAN COUNTRY, Vancouver, University of British Columbia Press, 1980, p. 106 both Brown and Van Kirk have many references to the education of the trader's children. Slater, G. Hollis. Rev. Robert John Staines, BRITISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Vol. XIV October 1950, p. 187 - 240. Collard, Edgar Andrew, MONTREAL YESTERDAYS, Toronto, Longmans Canada Limited, 1962, p. 74-81. BIBUOGRAPHY Bowsfield, Hart well, Ph. D. FORT VICTORIA LETTERS 1846-1851, Winnipeg, Hudson's Bay Record Society, 1979. Brown, Jennifer, S.H. STRANGER IN BLOOD, FUR TRADE COMPANY FAMILIES IN INDIAN COUNTRY, Vancouver, University of British Columbia Press, 1980. Collard, Edgar Andrew. MONTREAL YEATERDAYS, Toronto, Longmans Canada Limited, 1962. Farrar, Victor J. The Nisqually Journal, WASHINGTON STATE HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Vol. 10, 1925, p. 218. Halpenny, Francess G. ed. DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY Vol. DC, 1861 -1870, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1976. Halpenny, Francess G. ed. DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY, Vol. VII, 1836 -1850, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1988. Lamb, W Kaye, ed. TOE VOYAGE OF GEORGE VANCOUVER, 1791 -1795, Vol. II. London, Hakluyt Society, 1984. Lamb, W Kaye, ed. Some Notes on the Douglas Family, BRITISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Vol. XVII, Jan. - Apr. 1953, p. 41 - 51. La Terreur, Marc, ed. DICTIONARY OF CANADIAN BIOGRAPHY, Vol. X, 1871 to 1880, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1988. McKelvie, B.A. Douglas: a New Portrait, BRTTISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL QUAKreRIY, Vol. VIH, April 1943, p. 93-101. Ormsby, Margaret A. BRTTISH COLUMBIA: A HISTORY, Toronto, The Macmillans in Canada, 1959. Pethick, Derek. JAMES DOUGLAS, SERVANT OF TWO EMPIRES, Vancouver, Mitchell Press Limited, 1969 Slater, G. Hollis. Rev. Robert John Staines, BRTTISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY, Vol. XIV October 1950, p. 187 - 240 Van Kirk, Sylvia. MANY TENDER TIES, WOMEN IN FUR-TRADE SOCIETY, 1670-1870, Norman, University of Oklahoma Press, 1980. Walbran, Captian John T BRTTISH COLUMBIA COAST NAMES, 1592 -1906, Vancouver, The \&ncouver Public Library, 1971. Wright, E. W, ed. LEWIS & DRYDENS MARINE HISTORY OF THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST, New York, Antiquarian Press, Ltd., 1961 Winston Shilvock of Kelowna receives a "Thank You" for the Okanagan Special from Editor, Naomi Miller. Participants listening to Anne Yandles 's words of wisdom. 23 RC. Historical News Murder on the North TraU Jewish Merchants in the Cariboo -1862 by Marie Elliott When hordes of gold seekers made their way up the creeks and canyons of the Cariboo in 1860, 1861 and 1862, seeking the mother lode, there were Jewish merchants in the vanguard. On his way to Antler Creek in July 1862, British traveller W. Champness noted that the small community of Forks of Quesnelle consisted of "general stores (mostly kept by Jews), and drinking shops." Many of these merchants had begun their careers in San Francisco during the California gold rush. They knew how to cater to the rough and ready prospectors, and they were excellent businessmen. In addition to these pioneer storekeepers, Jewish merchants in Victoria and New Westminster undertook the difficult journey north to sell merchandise, perhaps completing several return trips during the favourable months from June to October. Two such men were Harris (a.k.a. Herman, Dutchy) Lewin of Lewin and Braverman, Victoria, and David Sokolowsky of Sokolowsky and Lewin, New Westminster. In mid-July 1862, having disposed of their merchandise, Lewin and Sokolowsky left Antler Creek on their journey south. Their packer Charles Rouchier (Bouchier), formerly a trader at Nanaimo, was reported to be carrying $5,000, Lewin $12,000, and Sokolowsky $1,000. Lewin is supposed to have made a handsome profit selling long rubber boots at $60.00 a pair. On July 26th they reached Cap Mitchell's bridge over the North Fork of Quesnel River at 5:00 p.m., en route to the village of Forks of Quesnelle. A waiter at the stopping house suggested that they take the north trail over the mountain to the Forks because the south trail was still wet and muddy. He noticed that three strangers left ahead of the merchants and their packer. Two days later, when other travellers reached the Forks and inquired after Lewin and Sokolowsky, suspicions were aroused. John Boas, of Levi and Boas, set out by the south trail to find them. At Mitchell's bridge he asked a party of miners heading south to take the mountainous trail and keep a lookout for the missing men. The miners found the bodies of Sokolowsky, Lewin and Rouchier beside the north trail, five miles from the Forks. The three men had put up a struggle before being murdered, their gold was missing, and even their watches, jewel- ery, and hats. A party of twenty- five to thirty horsemen brought the bodies into the Forks; tin coffins were ordered for Sokolowsky and Lewin in the event that their relatives wished to remove their bodies to a cemetery at New Westminster or Victoria. The murders required immediate investigation, but the small community had been without a magistrate since October 1861. Thomas Elwyn, Gold Commissioner and magistrate for the Cariboo, had relocated further north at Williams Creek. Reverend Arthur Browning, a Wesleyan minister, recalled: There was no magistrate, nor coroner, and the solitary constable was drunk, and if he had been sober was no use in an emergency like this. A mass meeting was called and I was elected coroner, and after the verdict of wilful murder was returned I was elected magistrate, having a young Jew as magistrate's clerk. The court was formally constituted, and one or two suspicious men arrested, examined, and then let go, for everybody said the murderer was Boone Helm. Browning's clerk, Samuel Goldstone, of Sporborg and Goldstone, Victoria, had been on a selling expedition to the Cariboo, also. He brought back safely $15,000 in gold to Victoria, and at the same time delivered a description of the public meeting at the Forks to the British Columbian Newspaper in New Westminster, and to the British Colonist in Victoria. The citizens at the Forks had passed a resolution stating that a reward of $3,000 would be paid by the government, or if they refused, by the citizens of the Cariboo. The residents at the Forks raised $750 immediately to send four men in pursuit of the assassins. Victoria police reacted to the news of the murders by making several arrests. There were two suspects, Henry Diekker and David Darling. Diekker had deposited over $2,000 in a hotel safe while awaiting a steamer to California, and Darling was reported to have accompanied the victims for part of their journey south. But both men were released for lack of evidence. Lewin's brother Hieman, and Isadore Braverman offered a $1,000 reward for information about the murderer(s). A column in the British Colonist on August 11, 1862, described Lewin thus: Most of our old residents will remember the young Prussian "Dutchy" who, two or three years ago, peddled apples and peanuts in the theatres and on race days occupied an extensive booth at the course. This "Dutchy" and Harris Lewin, mentioned elsewhere as one of the unfortunate three lately murdered and robbed at Cariboo are the same. . . . Commencing his business career here in 1858 with fifty cents in his pocket and a box of cigars under his RC. Historical News 24 arm, in four years, by patient industry and correct business habits he had become a partner in the firm of Braverman and Lewin, and had been to Cariboo, where, by the sale of a large stock of goods he had acquired a considerable amount of money . . . Not a man in Victoria who knew him well, but liked poor "Dutchy". The suspected murderer, Boone Helm, has become the "Jesse James of the Pacific Northwest" because of his exploits on both sides of the Canadian/United States border. He is reputed to have been involved in numerous murders, robberies, and even cannibalism (on a winter trek over the mountains from Oregon to Salt Lake City). How much of this information is true and how much is exaggeration is difficult to determine at this late date. Several old timers insisted that they had met up with Boone at the time that he was in the Cariboo. For example, William "Tom" Collinson claimed that Helm and a partner held him up near Cook's Ferry (Spence's Bridge) shortly after the murders took place, yet Helm does not appear to have been on the "Most Wanted" list when he was arrested in Victoria in October 1862 for refusing to pay for drinks at a saloon. He reputedly returned to the United States and joined the Henry Plummer Gang in Idaho. He was hung by vigilantes at Bannock Mines in January 1864. The legend maintains that Boone buried the gold stolen from Lewin and Sokolowsky somewhere in the Cariboo, and that its whereabouts has never been discovered. The murder of the three men caused the editors of both the British Columbian and the British Colonist to demand more law enforcement in the Cariboo. John Robson, of the former paper, wrote: This terrible crime, though it appalls, does not take us altogether by surprise . . . We have every reason to fear it is but the first of a series of robberies and murders, which, unless the most energetic and thorough means be promptly adopted by the government, will equal if not surpass anything recorded in the history of either California or Australia. But the Cariboo did not turn into a lawless region. James Douglas's unique system of justice, which relied on Gold Commissioners to act as local magistrates, handled most problems that arose. Gold escorts, implemented by Douglas in 1861, and again unsuccessfully, in 1863, did not gain the trust of the miners or the patronage of the banks. Other young men died anony mously during the Cariboo gold rush, taking their stories with them. The sad fate of Sokolowsky, Lewin, and Rouchier is one of the few incidents that we can document. It is a poignant reminder that to be young and ambitious was not enough during that tumultuous era. A good measure of luck was needed, too. $: ^c j): :jc :£ The writer is the former editor of the B.C. Historical News. She lives and works in Victoria, but spends many hours serving as a Director of Island Trust. Writing Competition - 1990 The B.C. Historical Federation invites submissions of books or articles for the eighth annual Competition for Writers of British Columbia History. Any book presenting any facet of B.C. history, published in 1990, is eligible. This may be a community history, biography, record of a project or an organization, or personal recollections giving a glimpse of the past. Names, dates and places with relevant maps or pictures turn a story into "history." The judges are looking for fresh presentations of historical information, (especially if prepared by amateur historians) with appropriate illustrations, careful proof reading, an adequate index, table of contents, and bibliography. Winners will be chosen in the following categories: 1) Best History Book by an individual Writer (Lieutenant-Governor's Medal for Historical Writing.) 2) Best Anthology (i.e. Best History prepared by a group.) 3) Best History for Junior Readers. Awards are given where entries warrant, (i.e. a lone entry in group 2 or 3 will not automatically be given a prize.) Submissions are requested as soon as possible after publication. Please state name, address and telephone of sender, the selling price of the book, and an address from which the book may be purchased if the reader has to shop by mail. Send to: B.C. Historical Writing Competition • PO. Box 933 • Nanaimo, B.C. V9R 5N2 Deadline: January 5, 1991. LATE ENTRIES WILL BE ACCEPTED WITH POSTMARK UP TO JANUARY 31, 1991 BUT MUST CONTAIN TWO COPIES OF EACH BOOK. All entries receive considerable publicity. Winners will receive a Certificate of Merit, a monetary award, and an invitation to the B.C. Historical Federation's Annual Conference in Duncan in May 1991. ******* ******** The Best Article award is given annually to the writer of an article published in the B.C. Historical News magazine with the aim of encouraging amateur historians and/or students. Articles should be no more than 2,500 words, typed double spaced, accompanied by photographs if available, and substantiated with footnotes if possible. (Photos will be returned.) Deadlines for quarterly issues are February 15, May 15, August 15, and November 15. Please send articles directly to: The Editor • B.C. Historical News • P.O. Box 105 • Wasa, B.C. • VOB 2K0 *************** 25 RC. Historical News Marl Brown fs Spring Pelt by Gerrie Young Marl Brown's beard is a community monument. Marl had always hated shaving. He figured if God gave a man whiskers, it was for a purpose. On April 17, 1982 it was fourteen inches long, and accompanied by long hair, rather like Santa Claus, or the town patriarch, because Marl had not shaved for twelve years. And a man and his beard are not to be parted lightly, which is why the beard auction was alive with fear and excitement. The beard auction idea originated from Cliff Prouse, or Ron Ried, or maybe Wayne Fell at the Fort Nelson Historical Society Old Timer's Dance on April 17, 1982. At that year's popular dance, Kay Dolan had come up with an idea to raise additional money for the museum fund. She suggested that tickets for the dance cost $100.00 and with that amount the purchaser would be buying a log to help build the museum and have their name enshrined on an honour role at the museum. An ambitious scheme for a small town, but after some reluctance the idea caught on and many logs were "bought". The dance was packed that night. The museum had been talked about, and worked towards, for years by Marl, and everyone knew he was determined to get what he wanted. Because of the respect in which he was held, people believed it would happen and were excited to participate, and were in a happy mood at the Old Timer's Dance. Sometime later in the evening a yell was heard, was it Cliff, or Ron, or Wayne, "Hey Brown, how about auctioning off your beard?" Marl was startled, but only momentarily. "Sure, why not," he said with hardly a quiver. "If you can get enough money!" Galvanized by the prospect of RC. Historical News seeing that famous beard removed, the crowd took off and bids came tumbling in. $50.00! $100.00! People hollered across the room. Kay Dolan had been worried that asking $100.00 for a log was expecting too much and here people were spending even more money to see Marl without a beard. Mavis Brown, Marl's wife, started worrying as the bidding got louder and louder. Marl had always had a beard and she wondered about the trauma he'd feel seeing himself without one. She got so upset she couldn't watch and went to the other end of the room, turned her back and busied herself with some chores to shut out the noise. The crowd's momentum began to concern Marl. All that boisterous one-upmanship might begin to go astray. So at $3800 he told them it was enough. In the dying clamor Wayne Fell shouted out something about Brown not having to shave. "That's asking too much!" and he started bidding to keep Marl's beard intact. The energy level flared back up, and spurred by by philanthropic good will and a lot of wild jesting, the bids flew in, for and against, until some people didn't know what they were bidding for. The bidding fever went on, neighbour against neighbour, until Marl again sensed a hint of frenzy, and wanting no disaster, he called a definite halt. "Stop!" Marl Brown offered himself to the crowd ready to be shaved. No one had a razor! Or a pair of scissors! Marl, the sacrifice, sat there, a bemused smile in his soon to disappear gray whiskers, and waited until the search turned up a pair of nail scissors from someone's purse. The chipping and snipping away of Marl's massive beard began with the tiny scissors until he looked like a 26 cartoon character. His smile broadened as they cut and soon turned into a laugh of triumph when it was announced that he'd help raise the whopping sum of $10,143.00 Over ten thousand dollars was astounding and unmatched. And it was worth it. All involved were pleased that their money was going to a good local cause, and the Historical Society knew that the museum was ten thousand dollars closer to being real. In 1987 the Fort Nelson Museum became a reality when the 2700 square foot log building was officially opened. It was the culmination of a habit of Marl Brown's to collect everything, despite Mavis's complaints that their yard looked like a junk heap. Marl's artistic vision and persistence have filled the museum with artifacts and displays that transport the visitor to the early times of the Fort Nelson area. The emphasis is on trapping and the building of the Alaska Highway which are the two original forces behind the community's presence in the wilderness of northern British Columbia. Marl has always been a collector. His specialty is old vehicles. Before the museum provided the space the Brown's front yard was occupied by a 1938 GMC fire truck, a 1954 3/4 ton Dodge truck, a 1937 Caterpillar tractor, a 1927 Graham Bros, truck, a 1928 farm tractor and a 1957 crankshaft from a B.C. Hydro engine. He came by his mania naturally. His father, Donald Brown, could never resist buying old vehicles either, and from an early age Marl went hunting with his father around their home in Delburne, Alberta. During the Depression Marl's dad bought a Mercer for $15.00 and in 1948 sold it for $1250.00. It later became one of the highest priced antique cars be- cause it turned out to be Barney Oldfield's dirt track racer. But Donald Brown was always buying cars, engines, trucks and not bringing them home. He always meant to, but never got around to it. He was too busy with the first truck he bought, for $1.00, with which he hauled freight between Delburne and Calgary. One of Marl's proudest possessions is a tiny 1908 Brush. His father bought it 50 years ago, and Marl brought it to Fort Nelson in 1988. He refurbished and rebuilt it and now it runs so well he wants to drive to Inuvik in it. Marl noticed that everyone who left Fort Nelson in the early days had a souvenir and he felt something had to be done about the drain of valuable artifacts from the area, so he began collecting everything he could get his hands on. This ran from ashtrays from early businesses to Alaska Highway signs, to World War II quonset huts and the old Hudson's Bay factor's house. Over the years the idea of a museum began to grow in Marl's mind. A museum that would preserve the history of the place and of the people who had once lived here. In 1977 the Fort Nelson Historical Society was formed with a bank balance of $1100. This money came from the sale of some light fixtures the schools were getting rid of and which Marl bought and resold. Now Marl was unstoppable. He was insistent that the museum be built from locally earned money, and not with any government grants. So with the dedicated help of his family and others including Kay Dolan, Jack Sime, Betty Gustafson, Wayne and Connie Fell, Donna and Bill Gault, Ken Jenkins, Jim Khober, Bill Hardy, and many Katimavik groups, he began holding huge and profitable garage sales. They were held in the local Arena at first, and then they moved to the wartime quonset hut the Historical Society had purchased. Then Marl built a little, mobile fast food 'wagon' and began selling hamburgers, hot dogs, pop and coffee at every dog sled race, rodeo, July 1st parade, and tournament that was hosted in Fort Nelson. Whether it was freezing cold, and the workers wore parkas or sweltering hot, and the workers gushed sweat, the 'Hamburger Wagon' was in business. To show townspeople what they were working towards, he constructed a model of the log museum to help encourage the locals to believe in it. They did believe it because they could see that Marl's whole life was dedicated to it. He even dedicated his beard to the cause. A contribution he questioned the morning after being shorn. He went out the next day, going in and out of stores on errands for his job as Water & Sewer Treatment Plant Operator for the Town, and going for coffee, and no one talked to him. They did not know who he was. Marl said, "You may as well have sent me to Siberia". He felt very strange in a town where no one knew him. He knew he didn't look the way people always expected him to, and he kept hoping someone would recognize him and ease his loneliness. Mavis was right; it was a shock. However, Marl was game, and by the end of the week people were greeting him, and teasing him, again. He stayed shaved until after the first snowfall in October. The next week the local paper, The Fort Nelson News, didn't write up the event, but somehow Don Hunter of the Vancouver Province got hold of the story and wrote about "200 happy drunks" putting up the money. This annoyed a number of people in Fort Nelson, like Shannon Soucie who wrote to the local paper saying the event "came out sounding like a thoughtless act by a bunch of drunks". And Trudy Bennett who wrote that "Fort Nelson's history is worth preserving, and that the large amount of money raised from the beard sale could happen only to Marl." Marl wrote to the local paper thanking people for supporting the dance and funding the museum so generously. He wrote, "The money collected for the beard - a cool $10,000 - is probably a record price for a spring pelt." The author and her husband moved to Fort Nelson in 1963. She published the 200page Fort Nelson Story in 1980, then earned her BA, from U&.C. in 1986. (Mainly by correspondence courses). MARL BROWN'S $10,000.00 BEARD April 19,1982 27 April 17,1982 RC. Historical News Intrepid in the Name of God by Pixie McGeachie The opening up of the Pacific Colonies provided fertile ground for English missionaries eager to sow seeds of Christianity. Both men and women of Anglican faith were among the first to arrive in this untamed land. These intrepid souls were pioneers in the true sense of the word. They came from comfortable homes and secure social positions to primitive and often harsh conditions and yet they coped - even thrived - on the challenge to survive and eagerly spread The Word. In the spring of 1858, the peaceful course of British Columbia's history was abruptly shaken by the cry that went around the world - "Gold in the Fraser River." "Never in the history of the migrations of man has been seen a 'rush' so sudden and so vast" marvelled Anglican missionary Reverend R.C. Lunden Brown of Lillooet. The native Indians were swept along into a new mode of life for which they were unprepared. They saw the white man at his greedy, destructive worst and many of them succumbed to the two curses he brought with him - alcohol and disease. It was a sad and difficult time for the men of the cloth who had braved much to come to the wilds of British Columbia to 'convert the heathen'. They must have wondered at times who was the most heathenish, the white men or the Indians. It was certainly no easy task to try to convince the Indians to accept the white man's God, in the face of the white man's ungodly behavior. Mindful of the need to keep the bright light of Christianity burning in the midst of all the people pouring into the gold-fevered colony, the Anglican Church recruited the services of Reverend James Gammage. He was selected by the Society for RC. Historical News the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts as the first chaplain of the Church of England specially sent to minister to the gold hunters. Rev. Gammage arrived in Lytton on June 4, 1859. Getting immediately down to business, he conducted two services the very next day. He wrote: "Twelve attended in the morning and nine in the afternoon. I do not think I should have had even that number if I had not gone to each house half-an-hour before the service and invited people to attend." Gammage's immediate superior in the new land was George Hills, Bishop of British Columbia, who has left for posterity 39 descriptive - but exceedingly hard-to-read diaries. In the latter half of 1862 a great disaster overtook the Indian population. White man's disease, smallpox, to which the Indians had no resistance, struck with devastating effect. Sweeping from Victoria northward and inland, the dreaded disease is estimated to have reduced the native population of the province by almost one-third. Bishop Hills lamented, "It is mowing them down without mercy. The readiness with which these tribes trust us and yield to our advice is a great proof of their confidence in us It is of importance to give the Indians the benefit of vaccination." Despite the upheavals caused by the white man in their way of life, the Indians continued to seek more knowledge of Christianity. They did not wait for the clergy to come to them but often travelled en masse and sometimes in the most trying weather to hear the words of the Gospel. Reverend John Booth Good, a successor to Rev. Gammage, wrote, "An Indian messenger came on March 2, 1867 to announce the approach of a large body of natives from Lytton and Yale. Headed by 28 Sashiatan, a chief of great repute and influence and a warrior noted for his prowess and cruelty. It was a bitter cold day but their anxiety to be taught a better way than any they have yet known seemed to render them oblivious of external discomfort." The Indians had come to ask for teachers of the Anglican faith to live among them but the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel had no one to send at that time. Initially stationed at Yale, Rev. Good was given the task of setting up a Mission at Lytton. He moved his family there on June 10, 1867 and proceeded to transform some old buildings into a chapel, a schoolroom and a mission house. Spreading Christianity was no easy task. Tribal beliefs and customs were an integral part of the Indian's way of life and language was a barrier to communication. Six days after John Good arrived in Lytton, he officiated at the first Anglican service ever held there. Two hundred people crammed into an old building formerly used as a store and kindly donated for the occasion by the Thompson Indians. On August 5, 1867 another first took place in Lytton with the arrival of "lads with intelligent countenances" to attend the newly established Indian Boy's School. Good must have been delighted when, on February 9, 1868 he officiated at the first Indian baptism in Lytton. Here was visible proof that his teachings were bearing fruit. But while Good was pleased at the size and state of his Indian flock, he was less than ecstatic about the condition of the souls of the white population. He referred to Lytton as". . a town which cannot be surpassed. . as far, at least, as the whites are concerned - ungodliness, profanity and vice." In 1868, an event took place in Lytton that greatly upset Rev. Good and sent him on a tirade of protestation. A brothel was established almost under his nose. But his life was much too full for him to brood over such a trying development. In his diaries, he tells of walking from one Indian station to the next administering to the sick, receiving groups from distant points and often sleeping overnight in Indian homes. As the Indian congregation swelled, a larger church became necessary. A site was chosen, construction begun and by September, 1871 Good was happy to report the move into the new St. Paul's Mission Home "which has a view of the river, valley and mountain, unsurpassed even in the neighbourhood". One year later on October 1, 1872, tragedy struck at the home of Rev. and Mrs. Good. Their beloved daughter, Lillian Booth Good, died. John Good poured out his anguish in a letter to a friend: " to me she was so precious that perhaps nothing could have been taken from me that would have been harder to surrender than this holy and blessed child We buried her within the fence of our Indian Church, just opposite the east window and can see her little grave from the Parsonage." Gathering strength from his faith, John Good continued his dedicated work in and around Lytton until 1882 when he was re-appointed to his former church, St. Paul's in Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. Except for the occasional services held by Reverends Robert Chesshyre Whiteway, George Ditcham and D.H.W Horlock (who all had their own postings to attend to) no work was done at the Lytton Mission by the Church of England until May 1884 when Richard Small answered his call to missionary service. Reverend Richard Small became a legend, beloved by whites and Indians alike. He was 35 years of age when he received his long- awaited call to leave a comfortable ministry in England for missionary work. He did not need to think twice about the invitation from Right Reverend Acton Wendeyer Sillitoe, first Bishop of New Westminster, asking if he would like to take charge of the Mission to the Thompson River Indians in British Columbia. In May, 1884 he arrived at the Mission which, at that time, was centered at Forty-two Mile House on the Yale and Cariboo Road. For two years, he shared accomodation there with Rev. Henry Edwardes and then moved to a more convenient spot in Lytton. He made friends of all - both white and Indian - and won great respect with his completely unselfish way of life. He had to cover a lot of ground to minister to his wide-spread flock. He was an excellent horseman and for a number of years a stalwart horse, answering to the imposing name of Jupitor, was his main means of locomotion. So many miles did they travel together that it became almost impossible to imagine one without the other. Many times, horse and rider were forced to swim through a swirling current in order to reach their destinations. Once on dry land again, Small would light a huge fire so that limbs could be warmed and soaking clothes dried before the journey was continued. Richard Small brought new life to the Anglican mission work in British Columbia's Interior. Bishop Sillitoe declared, "A prosperous day has broken upon the long-neglected Indian Mission in the diocese." One of the first changes to take place after Small's arrival in Lytton was the pulling down of the dilapidated Indian church and the erection of a new one which was consecrated on October 19, 1885. The consecration ceremony was conducted by Bishop Sillitoe who was assisted by Small and Rev. Henry G. Fiennes- Clinton. Small's work took him to Ashcroft, Lillooet, Lower Nicola and various camps in between. A diocese publication paid tribute to his dedication: "For indomitable courage, perserver- ence and zeal, no one has or will 29 Archdeacon Small in his earUer days. likely excel Reverend Mr. Small. Many a tale is known of how, in the face of the most extraordinary difficulties, he has trudged on foot or ridden to keep his appointments, and nothing, even when the hardiest of old timers would have given in, could be allowed to stand between Small and Duty." The mission itself was supported mainly by the English Society for the Propagation of the Gospel which supplied annual grants of $1440 for the salaries of two missionaries plus $240 each for two native catechists. In 1890, Small reported on the state of his parish, "Our Indian Mission has made progress. The number of communicants has increased from 332 to 448, and baptized from 108 to 122. The Confirmation numbered 103, precisely the same as the previous year." After six successful years spent looking after his flock, Small decided to take his missionary zeal to even further lands. He volunteered for service in Corea (Korea) and was appointed to St. Edwards Mission, Fairview, in Seoul. Almost a year after Small left Canada, Bishop Sillitoe's efforts to fill his place was still proving fruitless. Consequently, all the good work that had been done at the Mission in Lytton began to suffer. It was suggested that Small return to RC. Historical News the Mission and he landed back in Canada in November, 1891 to pick up where he left off. The following year, he set up a dispensary in the back room of the Mission House. It was from this humble beginning that St. Bartholomew's Hospital in Lytton grew. The hospital was officially opened on August 26, 1893. Small became a patient some time later when his feet were badly frostbitten and blood poisoning affected one of his toes which had to be amputated. During the construction of St. Bartholomew's, Sister Francis of St. Luke's Home of St. James' Church, Vancouver travelled to Lytton in order to assess the needs of the hospital. She was well qualified for the job having founded the first Training School for Nurses in Vancouver. She was asked to take charge of the administration of St. Bartholomew's and did so by making periodic trips from Vancouver. Small's duties often took him to the parishes of St. John the Divine, Yale and St. Mary the Virgin, Lillooet. The mission centre at Yale received an energetic boost in October, 1884 with the arrival of three Sisters from the Community of all Hallows, Ditchingham, Norfolk, England, who came to set up a school (All Hallows) at Yale. Only women such as these with strong religious convictions and unlimited courage could have survived the rigors of early missionary life in B.C. In February 1909, Richard Small celebrated his 60th birthday and 25 years of unstinted devotion to missionary service. Sadly, his role on earth was cut short by a dreadful fire that swept through the Indian Reservation at Lytton. Small, oblivious of personal safety, dashed through the smoke and flames to retrieve the life savings of an old Indian woman who was lamenting her loss. He paid dearly for his selfless act. The cold winds fanned him, hot and tired as he was, bringing on a severe attack of pneumonia and pleurisy. He was moved to Vancouver where, despite the tender care of Sister Francis and her staff, he fell peacefully asleep one night and was granted "a portion of His Kingdom". Tributes were many but one from an unknown writer said it best, "New Westminster and the Cariboo has lost its saint and the Indian people their real father." In his memory, a stained glass window depicting him astride his faithful mount, Jupiter, was installed in Lytton's St. Mary and St. Paul's Indian Church. This beautiful stained-glass window still serves not only as a tribute of love to one man, Richard Small, but also as a reminder of all the other brave and dedicated men and women who answered the challenge to propagate their faith in an untamed land. Researched by Canon C.EJI. Williams and written by Pixie McGeachie of Burnaby. Memorial Window at St. Mary's and St. Paul '8 Indian Church, Lytton, B.C HISTORIANS GATHER FOR 1990 CONVENTION Nearly 100 history-minded people descended on Grand Forks to attend the 1990 B.C. Historical Federation Conference hosted by the Boundary Historical Society from May 10-13. Warm hospitality, enlightening talks, interesting tours and delicious food combined to make the event a memorable one. Attendees arriving on May 10 were able to register and then enjoy a wine and cheese social evening renewing acquaintances and finding out from where other people hailed. Everyone received a kit full of helpful local information, At 8:30 the next morning, wake-up cups of coffee and muffins awaited at the Yale Hotel to help attendees start a day full of events. Alice Glanville opened the day's sessions. President of the Boundary Historical Society, Rose Gobeil and Mayor Sugimoto of Grand Forks greeted the assembly and exhorted everyone to have an enjoyable time. The group then split up, some going to the Fire Hall to hear Anne Yandle give a talk on historical research, and the others remaining at the hotel to learn about the Cascade Powerhouse from Eric Coleman and the history of local sawmills from Leo Mills. Eric, who worked for the West Kootenay Power Company for 20 years, stressed the importance of protecting the Cascade Powerhouse as a heritage site. The Cascade Power Restoration Society has been formed and a study is underway to establish the feasibility of restoring the powerhouse and setting it up as a working museum. The talk was followed by a slide presentation. Leo, who has spent all but 20 months of his 82 years in the Grand Forks area, presented a glimpse into the history of the wood industry in the Boundary district. The first sawmill in the valley was built in 1900 after the railway came in. The principal wood logged in the early days was pon- derosa pine. Leo recalled when he delivered slab wood for $1.50 a load and sawdust at $2.50 a load right into the customers' sheds. He earned 35 cents an hour working nine-hour days and 54 hours a week - with no unemployment benefits during layoffs. After a coffee break, the assembly was RC. Historical News 30 treated to a presentation by Eli Popoff who drew from his outstanding knowledge of Doukhobor history. He went back to the coming of Christianity to Russia in 988 A.D., explaining the origin and concept of the Doukhobor Christian faith, the persecution of the sect in Russia for refusing military service and the emigration of the first 7,500 Doukhobors to Canada in 1899. He explained the difference between the radical Sons of Freedom and the Orthodox Doukhobors who believe in non-violence and peaceful co-existance that strives for common good. After lunch, two buses filled with eager sightseers set out on a tour of historic sites. First stop was "Frog Pond" where several old houses stand as reminders of the former red light district. Then it was on to the meeting hall of the Union of Spiritual Communities of Christ, or Orthodox Doukhobors. Both spiritual and social occasions are celebrated in this hall. Several ladies in the large kitchen were baking pies for a wedding that was to take place the next day. The aroma from the baking set collective mouths watering. The next stop was the small flour mill run by'the Grand Forks Milling Cooperative Association which supplied enthusiastic guides on tours through the site, The mill produces white, whole wheat and rye flours-all without additives, - which are sold under the name "Pride of the Valley" in surrounding communities. Next stopping place was the Fructova Doukhobor Heritage Centre which was, until 1949, Fructova School, built in 1929. Now a historic site, this building is recognized by the Conservation Branch of the B.C. Heritage Trust as one of the finest living examples of Doukhobor architecture in B.C. Currently, the Doukhobor Historical Society of B.C. is planning a broad program of development for the site. The group toured the building, which contains a library and craft display, and then were treated to tea, tasty homemade tarts and an informative slide presentation. Leaving the Heritage Centre, the buses wound their way to the old Granby Smelter site with its towering black mounds of smelter waste that is finally being put to good use in the making of abrasives and insulating products. The evening found everyone gathered at the Granby House restaurant for a typical Doukhobor vegetarian meal that will be long remembered with pleasure. John Verigin, leader of the Doukhobor community, gave a welcoming address and the Doukhobor choir brought the evening to a close with splendid acappella renditions of old Doukhobor hymns which are passed down through the generations without the aid of any written music. ANNUAL MEETING Saturday started out with more coffee and muffins at the Yale Hotel before the commencement of the annual meeting. Presided over by John Spittle, BCHF president, the agenda moved along in good order. The treasurer reported an excess of revenue over expenses of $1994.23 as of March 31,1990. It was announced that the BCHF now has 24 member societies, five affiliates and fourteen associates. Sixteen historical groups from Atlin to Victoria gave oral reports of their activities both past and planned for the future. It was heartwarming to hear about the various ways in which enthusiastic volunteers are preserving and promoting the history of their communities. Naomi Miller, editor of the British Columbia Historical News, reported that subscriptions now total 1150. The cost of printing and mailing (in Canada) four issues per year now amounts to $6.92. Nancy Peter, subscription secretary, requested that the money for subscriptions be sent directly to her and the dues for membership in the BCHF sent directly to the BCHF treasurer, in order to simplify bookkeeping. The membership dues structure was tabled for study by the BCHF council. Two minutes of silence was called for in tribute to the late Barbara Stannard, a past president of the BCHF who "believed actively in the presentation of our history". All those nominated by the nominating committee to fill BCHF offices for 1990-91 were elected by acclamation: John Spittle - President Myrtle Haslam -1 st Vice President Alice Glanville - 2nd Vice President Members at Large - Mary Rawson and Daphne Paterson Recording Secretary - Shirley Cuthbertson Corresponding Secretary - Don Sale Treasurer - Francis Sleigh Invitations from the Cowichan Historical Society to host the 1991 BCHF annual meeting in Duncan and from the Burnaby Historical Society to host the 1992 annual meeting in Burnaby were accepted, Lunch, hosted by the Boundary Historical Society, was followed by two speakers who gave well-researched talks: Jim Glanville on the agricultural development and George Stewart on the mining exploration and production in the Boundary 31 area. After that, a walking tour of The Grand Forks Museum, Court House and City Hall provided both exercise and further insight into the community's history. In the evening, the Awards Dinner gave everyone further opportunity to meet fellow historians, exchange ideas and enjoy another hearty meal. There was a noticeable feeling of comradeship in the air. The dinner was followed by the announcement and presentation of writing awards, by Naomi Miller. The Lieutenant-Governor's Medal was awarded to Professor John Hayman of the University of Victoria for his book Robert Brown and the Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition. Jack Green was chosen as the author of the best article in the B.C. Historical News in 1989. Triple Certificates of Merit were awarded for Widow Smith of Spences Bridge which was judged the Best History for Juniors, Recipients of the certificates were: Audrey Ward and Meryl Campbell, who put together their grandmother's memoirs, and Murphy Shewchuk who, recognizing a good story, edited and published the book, Milton Parent of Nakusp received a Certificate of Merit for Best Anthology, Faces of the Past, published by the Arrow Lakes Historical Society. Special awards went to R.C. Harris for his extensive research and plotting of historic trails and maps, and to Winston Shilvock for compiling the contents of the "Okanagan Special". The winner of the 1989 BCHF scholarship of $500 was David McCrady of Penticton. The evening ended on a high note with a spirited talk by Bill Barlee who recounted many anecdotes about his endeavors to preserve the history of old B.C. ghost towns and mining sites and his quest for artifacts. John Spittle thanked Bill Barlee for his much-enjoyed talk and presented him with a copy of the first map to be printed of the gold fields on the Fraser River, People left the convention not only with a greater knowledge of the Boundary area and the Doukhobor culture but also with a strong sense of having shared a common interest with those who value and strive for the preservation of history. The 1990 convention was an occasion to remember. President Rose Gobeil, Sue Thompson, Alice and Jim Glanville, Pat Gasston, Ada Clapper and other members of the Boundary Historical Society are to be thanked and congratulated for all the thought, endeavor and hospitality that went into an event enjoyed by all who attended. by Pixie McGeachie RC. Historical News NEWS & NOTES KOOTENAY HOME MOVIES ANYONE? Terry Halleran of Kaslo is seeking old movies of Kootenay sternwheelers, and pictures of orchards and settlements these ships served. If you have any material that will help him prepare footage for the film being made through the Westland series which airs on B.C.'s Knowledge Network, please contact: Terry Halleran, Box 684, Kaslo, B.C. VOG 1M0 or Phone (604) 366-4310 ********** WHERE ARE THEY NO W? An older member of the B.C. Historical Federation recently asked about some friends she had met at many Annual Conferences in the past. We were able to help her reestablish contact with these friends. If any of our readers wish to find former colleagues we will help as long as the lost friend is a subscriber to the B.C. Historical News. Contact the Editor or Subscription Secretary to request an address. ********** B.C. WORDS Tom Parkin sends thanks to readers who contributed to his dictionary WestCoast Words. Now he is preparing a revised, expanded collection. He is seeking more words, and requesting help from those willing to complete a questionnaire on a short list of B.C. words. If you are in a position to help please write to: Tom Parkin, Box 629, Nanaimo, B.C. V9R5L9or Phone (604) 756-7944 and leave a message. ********** WINNING BOOK NOW IN SCHOOLS The Medal winning book (1988) Stoney Creek Woman by Bridget Moran is now on the recommended reading list for Grade 9 English in B.C. schools. RC. Historical News ALBERNI DISTRICT HISTORICAL SOCffiTY The R.B. McLean Lumber Mill has been declared a National Heritage site. The Building is being restored and members are currently taking inventory of all records pertaining to this Mill. NANAIMO HISTORICAL SOCIETY Daphne Paterson has been working closely with several heritage/museum societies to obtain a professional archivist to serve the city and volunteer organizations in Nanaimo. Each November the society has a Princess Royal day ceremony to commemorate the arrival of the earliest citizens. ********** VICTORIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY Victoria no longer lists itself as "BCHF-Victoria Branch." They have chartered themselves as a separate entity. This group has also separated from the Victoria Heritage Cemetery Society (formerly a committee within the Branch.) Note the new title and new mailing address inside the front cover of the Historical News. BURNABY HISTORICAL SOCIETY The Burnaby Historical Society has chalked up another year of accomplishment in its mandate to preserve and present the history of Burnaby. Under the direction of Mary Forsyth, special projects coordinator, 10 large frames of photos were collected and professionally mounted with identification. This is a travelling display which has already hung for public viewing in two credit unions and at several community events. Mary, with the help of several other BHS members, also organized the research and production of biographies of the four Burnaby citizens who were presented with gold keeper key pins in honour of their service to the Municipality. 32 Altogether, six people were presented with these pins before 1965 when the Municipal Act was changed to allow Burnaby to honour citizens and others by conferring on them the title of Freeman: Queen Elizebeth, Princess Margaret, Charles Boyer Brown, George A. Grant, Richard Bolton and George Green. While photos of all Burnaby's Freemen hang in the Municipal Hall, the recipients of the gold keeper key pins were not represented. The biographies were presented to the Mayor and Council by the BHS with the request that the photos of the key pin recipients be installed in conjunction with those of the Freemen. Council agreed to install the additional photos. In December, an exciting presentation was made to the Burnaby Historical Society by long-time members, Dr. Blythe and Mrs. Violet Eagles who donated $10,000, in honour of BHS past President Evelyn Salisbury, to be set up in perpetuity as a scholarship of approximately $500 to be awarded each year to a fourth-year under-graduate student enrolled in a major or an honours program that specializes in the history of British Columbia. Evelyn Salisbury was recognized further for her contribution to preserving Burnaby's history when she was named Burnaby's Citizen of the Year for 1989 and was presented with the Kushiro Cup. (Kushiro is Burnaby's Japanese sister city.) Submitted by: Pixie McGeachie Vice-President Burnaby Historical Society CEMETERY BUFFS Tombstones can tell a story. Graves and graveyards are historic sites. The B.C. Historical Association/Federation has always encouraged locals to become acquainted with pioneer cemeteries. We ask those who have researched, investigated or cleaned up an old cemetery to drop us a few lines telling us of their project. Please send your comments to: The Editor, B.C. H. News Box 105 Wasa, B.C. VOB 2K0 Tribute to Dr. and Mrs. Blythe Eagles by Evelyn Salisbury Blythe Alfred Eagles was born in New Westminster in 1902 and grew up there. As early as 1885 his parents settled in B.C., his father Jack Eagles arriving from England via Manitoba and meeting and marrying his mother Amelia Johnston who came from Ontario. The Johnston family gave their name to Johnston Road, Surrey, now 152nd Street. Both families were actively engaged in agricultural or horticultural pursuits. Young Blythe and his peers were known as children of the Fraser. They caught oolichans and watched the streamers and sternwheelers. He remembers reaching their Boundary Bay summer camp by steamer or by horse and buggy. In 1918 as World War I was drawing to a close, Eagles enrolled in a double Honours program in Biology and Chemistry at UBC, studing agriculture as a minor. He graduated in 1922, winning the Governor General's Gold Medal as top student. In June 1914, 150 acres of the Point Grey site had been cleared, but World War I was declared and the only bids accepted for the construction of the Science building were for the concrete and steel frame. In July 1915 authority was given for the construction of temporary univer- sity buildings on the grounds of Vancouver General Hospital. Between 1916 and 1922, 1176 students received university education in the 'temporary' Fairview shacks, in tents, attics and church basements. Eagles was active with fellow students in gathering signatures to induce the provincial government to build the university campus at Point Grey. With 56,000 signatures the students began the Great Trek from the Georgia Street Viaduct to Point Grey - the 'Promised Land". Trekkers climbed the skeleton of girders of the Science building and movie cameras captured speeches, songs, and the erection of the cairn, a milestone and symbol of the effort to obtain a university of which all could be proud. At the Legislature in Victoria, it required six pages to carry a pile of the petitions of 50,000 signatures before the Speaker's chair. Premier John Oliver's government voted $1,500,000 for immediate construction of university buildings at Point Grey. Eagles could not take part in the actual Great Trek of 1922 due to a fellowship to pursue graduate studies at the University of Toronto. However, since 1950, a Great Trekker award has been given in honour of outstanding persons in the life of the University and in 1966 Dean Blythe Eagles was honoured with a Great Trekker award. Eagles obtained his M.A. in 1924 and Ph.D. in 1926 after which he became a Research Fellow at Yale University (1926-1928) with time spent at the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture in Washington, D.C. He then did post-doctoral study at the National Institute for Medical Research in London, England. In 1929 Blythe Eagles returned to UBC in a program of teaching and research. Shortage of funds, with a 40% reduction to UBC's operating grant caused a lay-off of 40 faculty members, Eagles being among them. He found employment as an industrial chemist with the Powell River Pulp and Paper Co. until March 1933. Following the death of Professor W. Sadler in 1933, Eagles assumed heavy teaching responsibilities and became Head of the Dept. of Dairying (1936-1955), Chairman of the Division of Animal Science (1955-1967) and Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture in 1949, until his retirement in 1967. In 1968 he received an Honourary Doctor of Science award from UBC. Eagles served on the UBC Senate from 1947-1967 and was President of the B.C. Academy of Science 1946-1947. He is a fellow of the Agricultural Institute of Canada, Royal Society of Canada and the Chemical Institute of Canada. Eagles made a valuable contribution in preserving the history of UBC by serving on the Alumni Association's Heritage Committee. Dr. Eagles tells of enrolling in a Physiology class during his latter student days. In the class there were seven men and one woman, Violet Dunbar. Violet and Blythe became campus sweethearts and married in 1930. By then Violet had her B.A. from UBC in 1921, her M.A. from UBC in 1922 and her Ph. D. from University of Toronto in 1929. Her graduate studies at University of Toronto entailed research in pure proteins and enzymes and she was recognized as one of the leading enzyme chemists in the country. At UBC in 1929 she participated in research funded by the Powell River Co. Violet Evelyn Dunbar was born September 29, 1899 in Stratford, 33 Ontario, Downing Country. Her early education was in Mitchell, Ontario before the family moved to Vancouver in 1912. She is a graduate of the 1916 class from King Edward High School. The Eagles built their home (their Eagle's Nest) in 1930 in Burnaby on seven acres of terraced land that included the shoreline of Deer Lake. Dr. Eagles used his Model T Ford to commute to UBC and he recalls that there were no stop lights between his Burnaby home and UBC. The Eagles entertained a great deal with teas, dinners and garden parties, their home being a second home for UBC students. Mrs. Eagles was President of the Faculty women's Club UBC 1944 and 1946, Member of the University Women's Club, Member of the International Council of Women, President of the Burnaby Council of Women, Member of the Burnaby Historical Society, and Member of the Valley View Health Club. The acquisition of Dr. Blythe Eagles papers for the UBC archinves is a valuable addition in that the collection contains information about the history of the Faculty of Agriculture, the University and his distinguished career. Dr. and Mrs. Eagles have been active supporters of the Burnaby Historical Society since its founding in 1957 and are Life Members. It is their belief that by preserving the best of our history and heritage we maintain and strengthen our inheritance, thus serving ourselves, our municipality and our province. They are also firm believers in helping students to help themselves in enriching their lives. It is significant that the BHS Scholarship award is in recognition of academic excellence. It is worth noting as well that the scholarship award is in perpetuity and in the event that the Burnaby Historical Society disbands, then the principal and the interest accumulated at the time of dissolution shall be transferred to the Director, Financial Aid and Awards, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C. ********* BIBUOGRAPHY 1. Dr. and Mrs. Blythe Eagles 2. Christopher L. Hives - UBC Archivist 3. Jonathan Mercer from Tlie Great Trek book. RC. Historical News Book Shelf Books for review and book reviews should be sent directly to the book review editor; Anne Yandle, 3450 West 20th Ave., Vancouver, B.C. V6S 1E4 A White Man's Province; British Columbia's Politicians and Chinese and Japanese Immigrants, 1858-1914: Patricia Roy. Vancouver, B.C., University of British Columbia Press, 1989. Pp. 327. $37.95 The first Chinese arrived in British Columbia in 1858, soon after gold was discovered in the Fraser River. Nineteen years later, in 1877, came the Japanese. Thus the history of Asian immigration in British Columbia began. The aim of the author of this book is to examine the reasons why white British Columbians wanted to make a "white man's province" and how they achieved their ends. The book covers the period from 1858 to 1914. Chapters 1,3,4,5,7 and 9 deal with specific periods. Chapter 2 discusses the paradox of laws and regulations legislated to ensure that Asians lived up to "white standards". It was by means of such legislation that Asians were kept to a separate and inferior environment. The infamous Vancouver Riot of 1907 and its repercussions are described in Chapter 7. The Asian immigrants were tolerated at first when employment opportunities were plentiful, but hostility developed when there was a recession in the economy. The antipathy often appeared as a conflict between capital and labour. Throughout this period capitalists needed cheap labour for the development of British Columbia, while white workers objected to the presence of Asian immigrants on the basis of their low living standards, willingness to accept cheap wages and increased job competition. The history of the Canadian Pacific Railway, the Vancouver Island coal mines and the Fraser River fisheries provides many examples of the division between capital and labour. No politician disputed the necessity of controlling the numbers of Asian immigrants entering Canada B.C. Historical News or restricting their activities while they were in the country. However, a major source of federal and provincial conflict developed over the question of who had the ultimate authority over Asian immigration. For example, an "Act to Regulate Immigration into British Columbia" was the first in a series of similar statutes the British Columbia legislature would pass and the Federal Government would disallow over the next decade. Sometimes British Columbia legislators anticipated that an act would be disallowed, yet they would legislate it just to attract Ottawa's attention. In 1884, three anti-Chinese acts were passed by the province, but they were disallowed by Ottawa, creating a seesaw battle between the Provincial and Federal Governments. The strategy employed by the province was to play the political game of "fighting Ottawa". All Asian immigrants were subjected to injustice, such as disenfran- chisement and restriction of employment. Yet the Chinese and Japanese were treated quite differently. A fifty dollar head tax was first introduced in 1885. Eventually it was raised to five hundred dollars in 1904 in order to deter Chinese immigrants. The restriction of Japanese immigrants was dependent upon a gentlemen's agreement between Canada and Japan, whereby the Japanese government limited emigration. The different treatment of these two groups of immigrants reflected the different attitudes towards them. Japanese immigrants were looked upon as a "different class", since Japan was considered a military power and an ally of the British Empire. Japan also took a paternalistic interest towards its nationals. The Canadian Government, on the other hand, showed little respect for China and its nationals. How compensation was carried out after the Vancouver Riot in 1907 reveals different attitudes toward the 34 two groups and, as a consequence, different treatments. Soon after the Vancouver Riot in order to ensure continuing good relations with Japan, the Canadian Federal Government acted immediately to compensate loss of Japanese property. Compensation for Chinese losses was not even considered until the British Government, who were trying to strengthen their position in China, pressed Ottawa to act. Asian immigration was always a political game. Much attention is paid in this book to the players who were capitalists, labourers, and politicians. However, personal accounts of the suffering of Asian immigrants are generally overlooked. Nevertheless, sieving through massive resources of information, gleaned from newspapers, pre-1914 British Columbia magazines, government records and private manuscripts, Roy presents a coherent picture of how economic, racial and political factors interplay. Roy concludes that "the campaign for a 'white man's province', though blatantly racist in appearance, was, in fact, a catch phrase that covered a wide variety of concerns, and transcended particular economic interests", (p 267) Patricia Roy has produced a book of scholarship with copious footnotes. Anyone seriously interested in the early history of Chinese and Japanese immigrants in British Columbia, should read this book. YimTse Yim Tse is a librarian at the Asian Library, University of British Columbia. ********** Atlas of the British Empire: The Rise and FaU of the Greatest Empire the World has ever Known. Ed. Dr. Christopher Bayly. New York, Facts On File, Inc. 39 maps, 200 photographs and 80 sidebars. $40. As a cartographer, I feel compelled to review this book in a positive light. Time after time, I have found myself in projects that are underfunded or faced by deadlines that force the work to be terribly incomplete. The book I have been asked to review here is incomplete. The first major problem is whether the title of this book is appropriate. Do we in fact have an atlas here? I would suggest we do not. An atlas is a book of maps. The atlas here has 39 maps in a book of some 256 pages. Personally, I can conceive of an atlas with this few maps but such an atlas would require the text to be tightly tied to the maps. (Open the book to any page and choose a topic discussed and attempt to locate it on the map.) As I am writing this review, I have opened the book to page 115 to find written, "In 1827, Captain James Sterling returned from an anti- piracy voyage in the Timor Sea via the western coast of Australia". The next thing I do is flip to the relevant map. The map has no body of water labelled on it anywhere. It also has no scale, north arrow or latitude or longitude lines or any other means of orientation. O.K. lets flip to the index for some help. The index is totally inadequate; in this instance there is no listing for the Timor Sea. Is the failure to show any water bodies really a problem? In my opinion, it is very serious, as the British Empire was the empire of a seafaring people. If you are landlocked and carry out your culture without the sea then you do not need to know about oceans, but if you are an island you need to know where you are and generations of British navigators did gather enough information to round out these maps. The Canadian maps are flawed. On page 34, the Continental Divide does not conform to the hydrology, showing the Finlay River to join the Kechika River in northern British Columbia, thus making its waters appear to flow north by an inappropriate route. Williston Lake is shown even though it is a recent man-made feature. On page 76, the map shows the main settlement on the British Columbia mainland, New Westminster, to be some 50 kilometres up the coast, not on the Fraser River. There are a great many other concerns that I have noticed and have refrained from writing about. The point is, that although I am not extremely well acquainted with the facts presented in this volume, yet I have found enough general errors to make me concerned about the whole book. I would not recommend this book to anyone seeking ac general reference to the British Empire, or an atlas. It might be a useful book for a person with an extensive knowledge of the facts about the Empire, but for most of us it will not be useful. I recommend saving your money until a better book of general data turns up on the British Empire. Angus Weiler Angus Weiler, a member of the Vancouver Historical Society, is the cartographer for the Society's Atlas of Vancouver Project. The Field Naturalist: John Macoun, The Geological Survey, and Natural Science. WA. Waiser. Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1989. Pp. 253. Illustrated. $30.00 This interesting biography is essentially an account of the extraordinary way in which John Macoun's life became entwined with the development of Canada., Natural history had fascinated him during his boyhood in Ireland and it became a consuming passion when he emigrated to Ontario in 1850 and found a whole new world awaiting exploration. To collect, describe and catalogue its flora became his life-work. He turned from farming to school teaching because it gave him more time for collecting, and in 1868 his appointment to the new chair of natural history in Albert College, at Belleville, gave him still greater opportunity for field work. By that time Macoun had become known internationally. He was not a trained 35 botanist, and although he was a tireless collector and describer of plants, he was aware of his inability to identify many of them accurately. He had therefore taken to sending specimens to authorities in Great Britain and the United States for identification, and they in turn had recognized his skill and usefulness as a collector. As early as 1863 they had named the first of several dozen new species that would honour him. Meanwhile events were on the march in Canada. Confederation in 1867 had been followed in 1870 by the aquisition of Rupert's Land, which included the vast prairie region between Lake Superior and the Rockies. In 1871 British Columbia joined the youthful Dominion, one condition being the building of a railway to the Pacific Coast. Over both the prairies and the railway project hung the heavy shadow of the adverse views expressed in the report of the Palliser expedition, which had surveyed what became the Canadian West for the British Government in 1857-60. Palliser considered the geographical obstacles made an all-British route for a transcontenental railway impracticable, and he pictured the prairie region as consisting of a huge semi- arid triangle, unpromising for settlement, topped by a narrow woodland strip that had been dubbed the Fertile Belt. But Sir John Macdonald, the Dominion's first Prime Minister, refused to be discouraged. He was determined to build a railway by an all-Canadian route, and engaged Sandford Fleming, as engineer-in- chief, to find it. And the Geological Survey was instructed to take a look at the prairies and see if they were as forbidding as Palliser had suggested. By sheer accident Macoun became involved in the railway surveys and he was soon appraising the prairies as well. In 1872, bound for Thunder Bay on a collecting expedition, he overslept, missed his train, decided to sail from Collingwood instead of from Sarnia, as intended, and found that Sandford Fleming was a fellow RC. Historical News passenger on shipboard. Fleming was setting out to take a personal look at the projected route for the railway that would run through the Fertile Belt and continue on to the Yellowhead Pass. Prompted by Macoun's enthusiasm he invited him to come along. From Edmonton Fleming continued on westward, but he sent Macoun north on a sidetrip to visit the Peace River country. Macoun believed that the natural vegetation of a region provided an infallible indication of its climate and agricultural capabilities, and, based on his collections, he returned from the West convinced that it was a land of immense promise. The report he wrote at Fleming's request caught the attention of Dr. Selwyn, Director of the Geological Survey, with the result that Macoun paid a second visit to the West in 1875, this time in Selwyn's company. Once again he branched off on his own to descend the Peace River valley and returned in triumph with 20,000 specimens, including sheaves of wheat and barley from a mission farm near Fort Chipewyan that had created a sensation in Winnipeg and would win a silver medal at the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. He told a Parliamentary Committee that the Peace River country was "the garden of the Dominion." Alexander Mackenzie, Macdonald's cautious Liberal successor, distrusted Macoun's enthusiasm and his contention that millions of acres awaited settlement. But when the Conservatives returned to power in 1878 they recognized the value of the support his reports and opinions could give to their efforts to settle the West and find a syndicate that would build a railway. Sir Charles Tupper, Canada's first Minister of Railways, realized that knowledge of the southern prairies - Palliser's triangle - was still scanty, and in 1879 and again in 1880 he sent Macoun westward to investigate. Macoun confesses in his autobiography that Tupper cautioned him "in plain words, not to draw upon my imagination", but he returned more enthusiastic than ever. RC. Historical News Exaggerated or not, as Waiser remarks, Macoun's findings "perfectly suited the needs of the Canadian government." He had rendered a signal propaganda service and had effectively demolished the arid triangle theory. This biography supplements and at times corrects the autobiography that Mecoun wrote in his old age. One moot point has long been his account of a visit to St. Paul in the spring of 1881, supposedly at the invitation of James J. Hill, to meet members of the board of the recently incorporated Canadian Pacific Railway. Macoun states that the decision to abandon the route through the Fertile Belt and to move the line to its present location much further south, was made at this meeting, and (by implication) in part on his evidence. Waiser rejects the story, and in a convincing separate study in Prairie Forum goes so far as to suggest that "there is reason to doubt whether this crucial gathering actually took place." Throughout the 1870's Macoun's employment had been precarious and usually temporary, but late in 1881 he was at last given the full- time (but not at first permanent) position of Dominion Botanist. Waiser describes the painfully slow rise in his status and that of official botanical activity over the next thirty years, which culminate in the organization of a Natural History Division adequately housed in the Victoria Memorial Museum building, completed in 1910. It is a story replete with both internal and partisan politics, for the administrative history of the Geological Survey is at some points turbulent. Over the years Macoun continued his collecting activities. Darwin's Origin of Species had been published in 1869, the year the Hudson's Bay Company surrendered Rupert's Land, but its implications passed Macoun by, as they did most Canadian scientists in early years; he could never admit that we live in an evolving world and face up to its implications. His ambition continued to be simply to collect, describe and catalogue, and he was reward- 36 ed over the years by the publication in parts of his Catalogue of Canadian Plants, which was followed by the first edition of a Catalogue of Canadian Birds. He retired to the West Coast in 1912, , and lived onto his 90th year in 1920. This well-made book, printed on acid-free paper and carefully proofread, is a credit to its publisher. Dr. Waiser tells us that the text originated in a doctoral dissertation, but the transition has been most successful. The only evidence of its origin is 35 pages of notes. This reader would have welcomed the convenience of a bibliography as well. W Kaye Lamb Vancouver, B.C. Dr. Lamb is the former Honorary President of the B.C. Historical Federation. ********** B.C. Sugar; One Hundred Years, 1890-1990. Vancouver, B.C. Sugar, 1990. Pp. 24. No price. A handsome, well illustrated capsule history of B.C. Sugar, Vancouver's first industry not based on forestry or fishing. ********** Dr. Luke A. Port; Builder of Deepwood. An Urban Report from England to Salem, Oregon and San Diego, CaUfornia, Salem, Marion County Historical Society and the Friends of Deepwood. 1989. Pp. 94 (260 - 12th St. S.E., Salem, Oregon 97301. $9.50 U.S. An excellent history of a historic house in Salem, Oregon, and its builder, Dr. Luke A. Port. Dr. Port, trader, soldier, doctor, speculator, builder and resident of Salem, first came to Vancouver, B.C. in 1886, shortly after the fire; over a period of years, he acquired "large interests" in the city. ********** THE BRITISH COLUMBIA HISTORICAL FEDERATION Honorary Patron: Honorary President: Officers President 1st Vice President 2nd Vice President Secretary Recording Secretary Treasurer Members-at-Large Past President His Honour, the Honourable David C. Lam, CM, LL.D., Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia Mrs. Clare McAllister John D. Spittle, 1241 Mount Crown Road, North Vancouver, B.C. V7R 1R9 988-4565 Myrtle Haslam, P.O. Box 10, Cowichan Bay, B.C. VOR 1N0 748-8397 Alice Glanville, P.O. Box 746, Grand Forks, B.C. VOH 1H0 442-3865 T. Don Sale, 262 Juniper Street, Nanaimo, B.C. V9S 1X4 753-2067 Shirley Cuthbertson, 306 - 225 Belleville Street, Victoria, B.C. V8V 4T9 387-2486 (business), 382-0288 (residence) Francis Sleigh, Box 29, Deroche, B.C. VOM 1G0 826-0451 Mary Rawson, 1406 Woodland Drive, Vancouver, B.C. V5L 3S6 251-2908 Daphne Paterson, 2650 Randle Road, Nanaimo, B.C. V9S 3X2 758-5757 Naomi Miller, Box 105, Wasa, B.C. VOB 2K0 422-3594 Committee Officers Archivist B.C. Historical News Publishing Committee Book Review Editor Editor Subscription Secretary Heritage Cemeteries Historic Trails & Markers Publications Assistance (not Involved with B.C. Historical News) Scholarship Committee Writing Competition (Lieutenant - Governor's Award) Margaret Stoneberg, RO. Box 687, Princeton, B.C. VOX 1W0 295-3362 Anne Yandle, 3450 West 20th Avenue, Vancouver, B.C. V6S 1E4 228-4879 (business) 733-6484 (residence) Naomi Miller, Box 105, Wasa, B.C. VOB 2K0 422-3594 Nancy Peter, 5928 Baffin Place, Burnaby, B.C. V5H 3S8 437-6115 John D. Adams, 628 Battery Street, Victoria, B.C. V8V 1E5 342-2895 John D. Spittle, 1241 Mount Crown Road, North Vancouver, B.C. V7R 1R9 988-4565 Helen Akrigg, 8-2575 Tolmie Street, Vancouver, B.C. V6R 4M1 228-8606 or 955-2963 Contact Helen Akrigg for advice and details to apply for a loan toward the cost of publishing. Evelyn Salisbury, 5406 Manor Street, Burnaby, B.C. V5G 1B7 298-5777 Pamela Mar, P.O. Box 933, Nanaimo, B.C. V9R 5N2 758-2828 The British Columbia Historical News PO. Box 35326 Stn. E. Vancouver, B.C. V6M 4G5 Cr ADDRESS LABEL HERE Second Class Mail Registration No. 4447 ^ J ■J Al «, n «; *v*^« KiL^A^tejUr^^^i^Bfc » ** • J 1 It« - *' ffefen Brown, Burnaby; Lloyd Forsyth, Burnaby; Margaret Stoneberg, Princton. John Spittle, N. Vancouver; Helen Akrigg, Vancouver; Peter Miller, Wasa. Choir from the Union of Spiritual Communities of Christ ■ singing for guests at theB.CJHJR Conference. Alderman Sue Thomson teUs a bit of Grand Forks history to a group on a walking tour downtown.
British Columbia History
British Columbia Historical News 1990
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