Editorially speaking...
Let’s begin with an update on the Oct. 17, 1951 Mount Benson plane crash that I told you about several months ago.
At the time, with 23 dead, it was B.C.’s worst aviation disaster.
The 70th anniversary of this tragedy is fast approaching and those 23 victims, so far as Greater Nanaimo area is concerned, have been all but forgotten even though eight of them are buried in the Nanaimo cemetery. (Because of the resulting fire three have never been officially identified.) Such as it is, this is their headstone:
As photographer and fellow historian Darrell Ohs so aptly put it, “It must have cost all of a sack of cement.”
Not just sad but appalling.
In short, it’s nowhere near good enough and, while researching the story for the Chronicles, and particularly after visiting the site on Mount Benson last June, I resolved to try to get the Regional District of Nanaimo to erect a proper memorial.
At the foot of Mount Benson, off Jinglepot Road and within a half-hour’s hike to the wreck site, is Mount Benson Regional Park which is owned by the RDN. It’s the perfect location for a monument of marble that tells the story of this terrible aviation accident. There’s even a ready-made clearing of cedar bark chips that would be ideal for its placement.
The marble headstone and bench the Friends of the Morden Mine erected several years ago in honour of Island coal miners at Morden Colliery Provincial Heritage park cost $7000—we’re not talking millions like it took to ‘rehabilitate’ the Kinsol Trestle.
As of today (May 25), and my second visit to the wreck site, this one with Darrell and his fellow members of the Nanaimo Historical Society to shoot a video, I’ve upped the ante. I now want the memorial in Mount Benson Park, a photo display in the Nanaimo Museum, and a new bigger and better headstone in the Nanaimo Cemetery to replace that travesty of a stone in the photo.
Here’s the type of aircraft we’re talking about, a Second World War Canso twin-engine amphibian used primarily for coastal anti-submarine patrols (and in later years for fighting forest fires). The plane that crashed on Mount Benson had been converted to carrying passengers and was operated by Queen Charlotte Airlines which was made famous by its former owner, Jim Spilsbury, with his best selling book, Accidental Airline.
I’ve also been giving you weekly updates on the campaign to save Hope’s 1916 CNR station house from demolition and I’ve been asked to write a letter to Hope Council to plead for its salvation. This is another occasion, such as occurred when it was announced that the Kinsol Trestle was to come down, that I have no choice but to walk the talk, even in the full expectation that I’ll be regarded as an outsider who should mind his own business. But I’ll make a modest presentation to Council and hope that, with the combined efforts of so many people who’ve been labouring on behalf of the station house and Hope’s heritage, something positive will come of it all.
Another landmark has also been in the news but, happily, for a very different reason. Royal Roads University which occupies coal baron James Dunsmuir’s waterfront castle at Colwood, is in the process of restoring the estate’s once internationally famous Japanese gardens and glass conservatory at an estimated cost of $100,000. The latest development is a replicated waterwheel.
“The inter-action of a waterwheel and nature results in a greater force,” university president and vice-chancellor Philip Steenkamp told the Times Colonist. With the aid of donors the university wants to “create spaces that provide greater peace and solace—so essential in this time of great change and uncertainty”.
This time of great change and uncertainty—all the more reason to acknowledge, to appreciate—and to preserve—our cultural DNA.
In May it was reported that the Tsartlip First Nation is “taking steps to honour a heritage barn in Central Saanich”. This is the ca 1887 Woodwyn Farms Barn. Unfortunately, it and a second barn on the property “with heritage value linked to early pioneering days” have deteriorated to the point that both will be taken down.
TFN acquired the landmark property from the provincial government last December as part of the Tsartlip’s original territory.
The “honour” paid to the barn(s) will be the saving of construction materials. “We will salvage as much of the wood as possible for reuse in ways that respect and reflect the history of the barn,” Tsartlip Chief Don Tom said. “And we will donate some reclaimed wood to the municipality, so the District of Central Satanich can also use the lumber in ways that acknowledge the past...”
Ironically, the tribe, which says it’s in need of barn space, would have saved them had an independent report of their structural condition not recommended otherwise. “While it’s going to be sad to see them go,” said Central Satanic Mayor Ryan Windsor, “I am thankful for the efforts being put into salvaging the wood and commemorating it.”
Ironic, really. The Tsartlip don’t want to take the barns down but feel they must. The Hope station house is said to be structurally sound but it’s on leased land and Council wants it moved—or demolished.
It all comes down to this:
Heritage buildings are like old-growth forests: they’re not making them any more.
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