In a dinner conversation with Oyama pioneer, Arnold Trewhitt, he mentioned that an early Oyama settler, Mrs. Townsend, had a badly scarred face because a bottle of Waterglass had exploded after she had placed it on a hot stove. This led me to question Arnold about Waterglass. He recalled that in...
Chain saws are so plentiful today that it is difficult to think of forestry or home gardening without the use of this lightweight portable saw. Chain saws are a twentieth century development, the first being developed in 1918 by a Canadian millwright, James Shand. It wasn’t until 1926 that the...
The first flour mill in the Central Okanagan: excerpts from the Oblates of Mary Immaculate (OMI) letters concerning the flour mill built on Mission Creek.1 Father Pierre Richard,2 OMI, accompanied by Father Charles John Felix Adolf Pandosy,3 OMI, arrived in the Okanagan in the autumn of 1859 and...
These days Canada Day celebrations are heavily promoted and generally well attended and we can expect some large crowds at celebrations at Canada’s 150th birthday. However, British Columbia has not always had a harmonious relationship within Canada. Confederation is 1867 was an arrangement between...
We read in the newspaper that the current flood conditions are a “once in two hundred year” event. How would we know that? We have no written records for Lake Country before settlement, which began with Tom Wood’s pre-emption of 160 acres at the south end of Pelmewash (later Wood) Lake in 1871. It...
Reminiscences of Clara Hallam (née Bailey) continued Hallam reminiscences 2 (pp. 27-30) Some stylistic changes have been made in the text to reflect modern usage. 1907 – 1909 “… There was to be a big skating party on Duck Lake one night so brother Bill, Phoebe and I were going down...
Reminiscences of Clara Hallam (née Bailey) The John A. Bailey family, John and Emma, who resided in Summerville, Oregon, followed friends to settle in Westbank, where they lived from 1895 until 1901. Clara was the fifth Bailey child, born on April 1, 1896. The Baileys relocated and lived for two...
At the turn of the century Johnston & Carswell operated a sawmill at the north end of Long (Kalamalka) Lake. When the canal was completed in 1908 the Winfield Flats were logged and the logs hauled to the shore of Wood Lake along what became Bottom Wood Lake Road. The logs were piled on to the...
During some particularly cold winters Kalamalka Lake freezes over. Harold Thomson, who was raised in Oyama, said that in his experience Kalamalka Lake froze once every ten years and the adjoining Wood Lake froze nine out of ten years. Hauling freight on the lake was not very common. However, the...
Tom Carney was a colourful character. He was born on the Simpson Ranch in Rutland and in 1900 his family moved to the Carney Ranch on Highway 97 just north of the University of British Columbia Okanagan. The capital letters TC are still found on the side of a roadside building. My father (Harold...
Curling became popular in Eastern Canada in the early nineteenth century and as the West opened up, the game found a natural home – long cold winters and idle time for prairie farmers. Clubs were formed in Winnipeg, Calgary and other western cites in the 1880s. The game became popular in the...
Occasionally local residents bring scrapbooks containing non-family items of local interest to the Lake Country Museum and Archives and such was the case when Dick Heddle delivered his mother’s collection. Among the papers was a page entitled “Rural Preliminary List of Electors” for Rural Polling...