Editorially speaking…
If you don’t think history is alive and well, you’re not following the news.
By alive, I mean, current stories whose roots go back—often way back—in time. Sometimes, alas, they’re in the news because they’re still festering like an unhealed wound.
But I’ve no wish to dwell on doom-and-gloom today; it’s hot, I’m tired of this scorching summer, and...you get the idea.
So, for starters, a sad story, yes, but one with as happy an ending as one could hope for.
I’ve told the story of the crash of a Queen Charlotte Islands passenger plane on Mount Benson when we were still the Cowichan Chronicles.
A wartime Canso such as this, converted to carry passengers, struck Mount Benson and killed all 23 aboard in 1951. —warplane.com
It was back in October 1951 that the Canso’s pilot mistook the lights of Nanaimo for those of Vancouver and flew into this small mountain, killing all 23 crew and passengers. At that time it was B.C.’s worst air disaster.
Several of the victims, some of them unidentifiable because of fire, were interred in Nanaimo’s Bowen Road Cemetery with the cheapest headstone that the City could provide—a concrete slab bearing the legend, AIR CRASH VICTIMS, and the date. Nothing more, nothing to identify those interred there.
This has been a bone of contention for me since I first learned about this disaster.
But, at last, 74 years—three-quarters of a century!—later, this is being corrected. This Saturday, 11:00 o’clock, August 16th, the BC Labour Heritage Centre, BC Building Trades Council and the Nanaimo Historical Society will unveil a heritage plaque “honouring 23 workers killed October 27, 1951”.
The workers were those of the ill-fated Flight 102 flying home from their jobs building the new Kitimat aluminum smelter.
There’s the possibility of rain but there will be tents and, if it’s hot, water provided. This memorial event, to be followed by a reception across the road in the Bowen Park hall, is open to the public. Should Chronicles readers wish to attend, it’s best to RSVP tickets—they’re free—at info@labourheritagecentre.ca.
I’m looking forward to it.
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In life, of course, we win some, we lose some. I’m referring to two of the Cameron Lake trestles of the E&N Railway’s Parksville-Port Alberni spur which have been consumed in the ongoing wildfire.
The first time I set eyes on them as a kid, from the highway across the lake, I vowed to walk them one day. Some years ago, Jennifer and I did just that. I’m sure glad we did.
But it looks to be another nail in the E&N’s (Island Corridor’s) coffin, I’m afraid. One of the hopes of salvaging a working railway was to use the Parksville-Alberni spur for a tourist train. But no one will go the cost of rebuilding those trestles, or repairing a third one which was damaged, I’m afraid.
Sigh....
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I said it’s hot and I’m tired—you, too?—so a couple of quickies and I’ll ring off for today.
It has been said that British Columbia is a “young” province, by which is meant we’re still a teenager in real historical terms. As opposed to parts of eastern Canada which go back, colonially speaking, more than 400 years.
In B.C., anything more than 50-60 years old is considered to be almost ancient. We tear down solid, substantial buildings for new development by dismissing them as having reached the end of their viable life—all of 40 years.
So, to see that Victoria’s W&J Wilson Clothiers is 163 years old is absolutely incredible. In fact, it’s “the oldest family-owned clothing store in North America”.
Name another B.C. business that comes even close to that!
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Finally, for today, the recent story of three miners trapped underground in northwest B.C.’s Red Chris Mine.
This real-life, life-or-death saga occurred as I was writing last week’s post on “Forgotten Heroes,” about four men who gave their lives to save their coal mining comrades.
But, about all that the three miners of today and the coal miners of yesterday had in common was their profession: mining. The men of the Red Chris were able to calmly and, I guess, comfortably await rescue in a refuge chamber, with enough food and water for an extended stay, as one news account put it.
In other words, they were in a sort of sealed capsule with its own air supply. Noting like a coal miner who faced poison gas, explosion and rock falls—and which explains why more than 600 of them were killed in the Greater Nanaimo area alone.
I’m not making light of “new age” mining, merely drawing notice to the extremes of hardship and danger experienced by the miners of old and those of today. Mining is and always will be a dangerous business, not one for the faint of heart.
That’s enough for today until next week, try not to melt!
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