Editorially speaking...
I probably shouldn’t admit to this but I’m not the only British Columbia historical website available to you online.
In fact, they’re growing in number all the time, to the point that I begin my work day by opening my email and checking, on average, 20-30 emails (plus more throughout the day). Some of them I subscribe to, some are of little interest to me, but rarely are they spam.
Not all of them are as I mentioned above, of course. Which is just as well for me as they all demand at least some of my attention, even to delete them, and ultimately consume considerable time.
I’ll name four fascinating Facebook sites right off the top: Gold Trails & Ghost Towns; Historic Hotels & Pubs; You Know You’re From Duncan When...; and Vancouver Island Railways.
That doesn’t even scratch the surface. Many if not most provincial historical societies, the lifeblood of small community history and heritage, have good websites these days and you don’t have to have serious surfing skills to sleuth them out—just patience and a sense of curiosity.
So many newspaper are now digitized, too, the latest being the Victoria Daily Times. When all is said and done, there would be no local or regional history on record at all if it hadn’t been for newspapers which recorded the immediate and the mundane, usually on a weekly basis. As any of you who’ve been following my 100 Years Ago This Week post will have noticed, not every front-page news story is a barn-burner!
But without those regularly published roundups of the activities and personalities of local clubs, churches and other social doings, we’d know next to nothing today of who they were and what it was like to live in, in this instance, the Cowichan Valley of a century ago. I know of no better way to learn about how real life was for real folks back then than to read the Cowichan Leader. Many of us who truly believe that we’ve had a hard life, that we’ve worked hard and sacrificed much, don’t have a clue!
You want real hardship and hard work—I mean hardship and hard work—just go back in time via newspapers and published memoirs, etc., for a reality check. And you had to do it all, in the so-called good old days, without the promise of a pension or any of the benefits that we take for granted today.
But I digress...
Speaking of newspapers and history/heritage, these two quickies: Langford’s landmark Western Speedway is about to bite the dust. Oh, it has to go through the motions of being rezoned but we can consider that a foregone conclusion in this bulldoze-and-build municipality.
Many, many moons ago I traded a day of helping to spray-paint the grandstands for a season’s pass to the drag races that were an extremely popular weekend event for Victorians. I did enjoy the races to an extent but beat-up old cars circling a track, loud engines and gas fumes have never been of great appeal to me. (The french fries were usually pretty good.) I much more enjoyed the Sunday flea markets of the 1970s, although you’d cook on the paved track on a hot summer day. Now that was something that pleased me (not the cooking, the flea market).
But, for years now, the ca 1954 racetrack has been dormant other than for its go-kart track, mini-golf and batting cages, and it’s up for commercial and residential development. What makes it of historical interest is that it’s western Canada’s oldest speedway. In 2018 a “Stop of Interest” sign was erected on-site to mark its heritage significance. Soon, I bet, that’s all there will left of the track.
And, on a subject that’s really close to my heart, there’s a photo on last week’s front-page of the Nanaimo News Bulletin of a repaired Morden Colliery. Finally, the last standing tipple/pithead of Vancouver Island’s coal mining industry (one of only two surviving in North America) has been stabilized against further deterioration if not restored.
But I’m not going to quibble. For years, I and many others devoted vast amounts of time and energy to trying to engage the interest of the public and the province (owners of Morden Colliery Provincial Park) to save it from inevitable destruction from the elements and half a century of neglect. The Liberals were a lost cause but not so the New Democrats, for which I’m thankful.
My thanks, too, to Helen Tilley, historian of South Wellington, who was inspired to approach B.C. Heritage Trust for funding, and the Friends of Morden Mine Society who followed up. The work is now done, the scaffolding coming down after more than a year of repairs. For me, a happy day and one long, long overdue.
Coal mining has become a dirty word these days but, less than a century ago, it was the financial mainstay of much of Vancouver Island. Almost 1000 men are known to have been killed on the job, 1000s more were injured and maimed while trying to make a living for themselves and their families. Ten Vancouver Island communities, including Nanaimo, Ladysmith and Cumberland, owe their starts to coal mining.
So soon we forget...
On that happy note I leave you until next week.
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