Innholdsfortegnelse for 53.4 Winter 2020 i British Columbia History

The Washboard Legacy We were pleased to see the excellent article in the Fall issue of British Columbia History about Chinese laundries in BC. It is worth noting, however, that discriminatory legal measures against the Chinese were not confined to head taxes and labour restrictions but were intended to affect Chinese laundries as well. In 1885, BC’s provincial government amended its Municipal Act to authorize municipalities to regulate and licence laundries with fees that were calculated to force them to shut down. The City of Victoria quickly enacted a bylaw designed to have this effect. Of course, everyone knew that such laundries were almost exclusively owned and operated by Chinese. Once such operator, Mee Wah, was convicted under the bylaw because he had not paid the exorbitant licence fee. He…

In September 2016, a sign was unveiled just up the street from my home in Kamloops. It was the kind of familiar sign that dots Canada’s highways, meant for motorists to pull over and read, learn a thing or two about local history, and move on with a new appreciation for the landscape. The sign kicked off a campaign by the BC Ministry of Transportation to expand the province’s stock of public history and to invite new suggestions for stories. That renewal campaign signalled an awakening of sorts for public commemoration, as Canadians began to better understand how much of the public history attempted by Canada’s provinces, and indeed, the nation itself, reflects a very narrow, often idealized experience. The plaques, statues, and roadside displays that feed our collective understanding…

Photographs have a wonderful power to uncover long-buried memories. While scanning the Bulkley Valley Museum’s Collections Online portal I stumbled across a photo of the Smithers CNR train station that triggered an instant flashback. It’s where I stepped off the train in 1974 for my first broadcasting job as a frizzy-haired 19-year-old from Ontario toting one blue trunk and a guitar. I’d watched the Canadian landscape unfold from my seat thanks to a ticket purchased by my grandparents. Although my time in Smithers was brief —just six months—the town and surrounding valley have never left me. Indeed, the Bulkley Valley Museum’s digital collection allows me to return and learn more about this fascinating region near the geographic heart of our province. BVM Curator Kira Westby reports that visits to Collections…

Books are only one way to learn about the past. I visit heritage sites to feel transported back to a place in time, and I appreciate the flexibility museums have to interpret a multitude of stories. Every year I make dozens of visits to heritage sites and museums both near my home on Vancouver Island and in different areas of British Columbia and other provinces. Not surprisingly, 2020 has been an exception. Fortunately, many cultural organizations shifted to online programming or increased their virtual presence this year. I watched more author presentations and webinars online than I could have attended in-person—even if we weren’t in the midst of a pandemic—and had the opportunity to hear speakers from more diverse perspectives. This year more than ever I appreciated access to digital…

Completed in 1920, the Kinsol Trestle is the largest wooden railway bridge in the Commonwealth, offering a spectacular crossing of the Koksilah River. The trestle is notable for both its size and its unusual seven-degree curve. Also known as the Koksilah River Bridge, the trestle reminds us of the once powerful forest industry and the ambition and ingenuity required to overcome substantial geographical challenges in the construction of railways. The last train crossed the Kinsol Trestle in 1979, and by 2006 the deteriorating bridge was threatened with demolition. The regional government planned to replace it with a simpler, lower-cost structure in order to complete the Cowichan Valley section of the Trans Canada Trail. After initiating an independent analysis of the trestle, Gordon Macdonald of Macdonald & Lawrence Timber Framing presented…

Do you have an old photograph with a story to tell? Contribute the photograph to British Columbia History magazine’s back page feature. We would like to encourage you help bring a photograph of the past to the present. Anyone can contribute a photograph! Please send your photograph of the past in the present to: bcheditor@bchistory.ca and include information on who or what is in the photograph and why it is important to you or your community. It could appear here on the back page.…

The importance of community and local history is not lost on someone who rarely sees her history reflected in Canadian public discourse or correctly reflected in the Canadian record. My thoughts turn to the early 1900s when my first brethren came to BC’s shores from an India that was under colonial rule and where, in their own country, they were treated as second-class citizens. They came seeking a better economic life but quickly faced discrimination that cut to the very core of their identity. Today, as we are forced come to terms with our own culpability as settlers on this land through the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, I realize that much work needs to be done by all of us to create a better Canadian historic record…

Joanne Hammond’s article—in a previous form—appeared in Culturally Modified, a quarterly online publication edited by Delani Valin. Culturally Modified seeks to explore the tangible and intangible aspects of culture. Each issue delves into a resonant theme such as Power, Movement, or Water—and offers a diverse array of interdisciplinary perspectives including academic research, wisdom, and lived experiences. Located on the traditional territory of the Wet’suwet’en, Culturally Modified is British Columbia-based and internationally focused, offering a platform to contributors both local and global, and creating a community that’s passionate about cross-cultural understanding. Find out more at https://culturallymodified.org/…

Written by family insider Jinder Oujla-Chalmers, this book is both a biography of Asa Singh Johal and his family and an in-de pth look at BC’s lumber industry. Asa Johal was a toddler when he immigrated to Canada with his Sikh family in 1924. Johal got his start as a labourer in sawmills and established Terminal Forest Products in 1965, becoming a force among the typically White-owned and operated forest companies that dominated British Columbia. Read it for: Johal’s philanthropic work, an intimate look at his against-the-odds successes, and the story of a traditional Sik h family. ~ Aimee…

Chinatown Through a Wide Lens: The Hidden Photographs of Yucho Chow by Catherine B. Clement (Vancouver: Chinese Canadian Historical Society of BC, 2020) $70 Chop Suey Nation: The Legion Café and Other Stories from Canada’s Chinese Restaurants by Ann Hui (Madeira Park, BC: Douglas & McIntyre, 2019) $24.95 Food Floor: My Woodward’s Days by Margaret Cadwaladr (Langley, BC: Madrona Books & Publishing, 2020) $15.95 Landscapes of Injustice: A New Perspective on the Internment and Dispossession of Japanese Canadians by Jordan Stanger-Ross (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2020) $39.95 North Delta History and Heritage including Annieville, Upper and Lower Sunbury, Annacis Island, part of East Delta, and Burns Bog by North Delta Advisory Group, Delta Heritage Society, edited by John Macdonald (Delta, BC: Hemlock Harling Distribution Inc., 2020) Plants, People, and Places:…