History Helps Volume Two, Number 4, March 2002
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• Happy Easter
• A Delta Olympian
• Early Publications About British Columbia
• Map Resources on the Internet
• Architects and Buildings
• The Read Family
• Found Items
• Food, Glorious Food
• Archive of "History Helps"
• Something to Think About
• Subscription, Privacy Policy
  

HAPPY EASTER!

You might assume, not unreasonably, that because I have mentioned postcards occasionally in this newsletter and I display them sometimes on my website, I'm a collector. Not so -- except for one tiny area of interest: postcards of Ladner and Delta for the period prior to World War Two. As a consequence, I confess to hanging out at e-Bay more than is good for me. But, that can't be all bad, as I found the postcard that is now on my home page http://www.ladnerslanding.com/home.html as a result of that "hanging out."

A Delta Olympian

Before the glow of the 2002 Winter Olympics leaves us, I wanted to share the following item, especially with those subscribers interested in Delta history. The source is The Daily Columbian, Monday, 07 June 1920, page six, under "Sporting News."

"DELTA TRAPSHOT FOR OLYMPIC TEAM

True Oliver, the crack trapshot of the Ladner district, has been selected as the coast representative of the Canadian Olympic team which will compete at Antwerp in the trap-shooting tournament. Oliver is well known among coast trapshots and has been a consistent scorer at the leading shoots during the past few years."

Early Publications About British Columbia

Sometimes we come across these in libraries, or in the Special Collections of universities. I've located one of these publications, and I'm hopeful that copies of the other works referenced in the following news items still exist somewhere:

1. From The Vancouver Daily World, Friday, 13 May 1898, page five, under "LOCAL ITEMS":
"The first issue of the Vancouver Guide, to be published by A. F. Morris, is now in the hands of the printer. It will no doubt be very useful to travelers and the information contained in it has been accurately prepared."

2. From The Vancouver Daily World, Wednesday, 18 May 1898, page five, under "LOCAL ITEMS":

"A work, British Columbia for Settlers, by Frances McNab, has been recently published by
Chapman & Hall, of London, Eng. [sic] Miss McNab was in British Columbia last year to spy out the land and tells the reader tersely, faithfully and lucidly what she saw and ascertained. She is very hopeful of the future of the Province, but does not represent it as a paradise for the miner, the farmer or the trader. Her criticisms of some features of colonial life will not be pleasant reading for the people of Vancouver or Victoria."

3. From The Vancouver Daily World, Friday, 15 July 1898. page six:

"EAST TO THE WEST
Is the Title of Miss Scidmore's Latest C. P. R. Book -- A Clever Description of Vancouver and Victoria

One doesn't have to travel very far on any line of railway in America to hear it said that whatever the Canadian Pacific Railway of Canada takes in hand it does well. Vancouverites know that about as well as anybody. Even to its railway literature, the best of descriptive writers are employed. Miss Eliza Scidmore passed through the city several months ago on the return trip from India and it was then announced that she had in hand another book for the company, not a mere railway guide but a little volume that it would pay anyone to read. This has just been issued from the head office at Montreal. It is of 100 pages and richly illustrated..."

4. From The Vancouver Daily World, Thursday, 03 November 1898, page six, advertisement:

"An Unrivalled Publication
There is now in the press and will be published in a few days, a Bird's-Eye View of the city of Vancouver. The size of the sheet is 24 by 43 inches. This will be in every respect a first-class, up-to-date publication. Every street in the city will be shown, as well as every building -- public, business and residential. There will appear on the sheet a key, or index, to a large number of buildings. The harbor will also be shown with the vessels bearing their names lying therein. It will be printed in colors, and will be without doubt the handsomest and most artistic work, as well as the most accurate and valuable for reference and other purposes, ever published in the Northwest. Those who have examined the proof sheets -- and they have been quite a few -- pronounce it to be by all odds the best work of the kind they have ever seen."

Map Resources on the Internet

1. This site is called Mapping Canada and features a time line showing the political map of Canada at various points in its history from 1870 to the present day.
http://www.canadiangeographic.ca/mapping/default.asp?section=mappingcanada

2. Canada at Scale: Maps of our History at http://www.archives.ca/05/0514_e.html
Under "Government Cartography" I found this one: "Settlement of the West, 1886. Poster map celebrating the bounty of the Canadian prairies designed to promote immigration to lands owned by the Canadian Pacific Railway. Many similar maps, atlases and posters combining illustrations, statistics and text were produced during this period."

3. The W. H. Pugsley Collection of Early Canadian Maps at McGill University at http://digital.library.mcgill.ca/pugsley/

4. Historical Maps of Canada, courtesy of ITP Nelson Publishers. The list includes a number of maps and drawings from L. J. Burpee's "An Historical Atlas of Canada," 1927. http://www.nelson.com/nelson/school/discovery/images/symbimag/mapscan/mapseng.htm

5. Historical Maps of Canada, published by the Association of Canadian Map Libraries and
Archives, at http://www.sscl.uwo.ca/assoc/acml/faclist.html
In the list I found (1) New Map of British Columbia, R. T. Williams, 1882, and (2) Vancouver Harbor, British Admiralty Chart, 1893.

6. Maps of Canada held in the Yale University Library Map Collection, some of which are in colour, at http://www.library.yale.edu/humanities/canmaps.html

Architects and Buildings and Related Stuff

Last fall I spent some time proof-reading a book about the architects that practised in British Columbia, entitled "Builders of the West" and compiled by Donald Luxton, Vancouver heritage consultant. Having read at length about the building booms that occurred in Vancouver at various points in its history, I was delighted to encounter the following in The Vancouver Daily World, 08 August 1898, page eight:

"BRICKS ARE SCARCE

Work on Two Buildings Stopped on Account of the Shortage
Bricks and ice are about the two most scarce commodities in Vancouver just now. There are so many new buildings going up that there is a famine of bricks and on two buildings, the DeBeck and Skinner blocks, operations have been temporarily suspended, but probably work will resume tomorrow.

C. P. Shindler, contractor for the DeBeck building on Hastings street, said this morning that he had been procuring his brick from the North Arm yard, but they had run short. The South Vancouver yard had their hands full in supplying the Molson's bank and the Leckie building. He had been thinking of getting some from Victoria, but no tugs were available.
On the Thompson block, considerable delay has been caused on account of the difficulty of procuring iron work, the B. C. Iron Works having shut down. There is room for an improvement somewhere."

Another article on the same subject appeared in The Vancouver Daily World, Saturday, 05
November 1898, page eight:

"VANCOUVER BUILDING STONE

It is a matter for satisfaction that such fine building stone can now be found within a reasonable distance of Vancouver. Most of the fine white stone, such as is used in the Leckie building on Granville street, comes from Gabriola, or some of the other islands in the Gulf of Georgia. The darker colored stone, like that used in the Molson's bank building, is from Calgary. If the marble from Texada island turns out well, some Vancouver buildings will probably use that next year. It is expected that the quality of the stone will improve on the development of the quarry."

By the way, "Builders of the West" is expected to be available in 2002.

Sometimes You Have to Read Everything in Sight

... which is why research can take a lifetime. However, once in a while one finds a gem, which makes all of it worthwhile. This item from The Daily Columbian, Monday, 06 February 1893, page two, under "Langley Prairie Notes," clarifies the history of the Read family, Delta farmers whose historic home was threatened with demolition in the late 1990s:

"Mr. A. Read and family left here last Thursday for Ladner's, to take charge of Mr. Kirkland's farm there. Mr. Read is a good farmer, and was generally respected here. Our loss is Ladner's gain."

The house still stands, although it hasn't been lived in for five years or more. The land is part of what in Delta is referred to as "the back-up lands" expropriated by the Province of British Columbia in 1969 and now included in the negotiations with Tsawwassen First Nation. The future of the house is uncertain, but the beautiful oak mantel that was salvaged after the departure of the last tenant is now part of the holdings of Delta Museum and Archives and is on display for the public until May.

From "Missing Links" dated 03 July 2001

I am including this item here with the permission of the original submitter:

• Found in a letter-case sold at auction in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada sometime before 1975: teacher's certificate, employer references, blotter with several letters, and 22 family photographs pertaining to Annie Amelia AVERY (born about 1858) of England (some places mentioned are: Ramsgate, Swindon, Shoreham by Sea, and Southborough). There is also an autograph book (dates 1896-1900) belonging to Elsie Maude WITHERS of Sandown, England, but I cannot be sure if the autograph book is related to the Annie Amelia AVERY materials. If you are related to either (or both) women, please e-mail me providing additional family information to prove your connection. I would like to reunite these materials with family members.

Claire Smith-Burns claireburns@telus.net

Food, Glorious Food

The Food Timeline website at http://www.gti.net/mocolib1/kid/food.html is so fascinating that it was difficult to pick one item to quote. However, since rhubarb is starting its season here on the west coast of Canada, it was a promising candidate for something starting out as "Did you know...?"

"It is now a well established fact that although various types of rhubarb grow in different parts of the world (Altay, Siberia, the Himalayas, Tibet and Mongolia), true rhubarb, that is to say the kind which offers such very special active elements (the purgative elements!), is the Chinese variety (Rheum palmatum?), which is only to be found growing in Ama Surga and Dsun-molun, in the mountainous regions of Kansu province. ... In 1778 rhubarb is recorded as a food plant in Europe. The earliest known usage of rhubarb as a food appeared as a filling for tarts & pies. Some suspect that this was a hybrid of the Chinese variety of rhubarb."

There are recipes also (a link for the year 1590 and Shakespeare's food, or for the year 1901, Victorian Christmas Day desserts), but I won't spoil the adventure by adding more here.

Back Issues of "History Helps"

An archive of back issues of this newsletter will be available on my website sometime later this month. Access is quite straightforward via the "Newsletter" button on my home page http://www.ladnerslanding.com/home.html.

Something to Think About

Borrowed from RootsWeb Review, Vol. 5, No. 5:

"When some people talk about their family tree, they trim off a branch here and there."

Reminder

These newsletters are all dated. Consequently, some of the websites recorded therein may no longer be operating at the stated web address.

Subscription, Privacy Policy

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Your e-mail address is not shared with anyone.
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Gwen Szychter, M.A.
Volunteer for Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness at
http://www.raogk.org/

P.S. Here's a favour you can do for me: If you liked this newsletter and found it helpful or just interesting, please pass it on to a friend or colleague. Thank you.

Newspaper Obituary Database coming to

History of Delta, British Columbia On-line

Delta History On-Line

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