August 11, 1921
What was happening a century ago this week from the front page of the Cowichan Leader.
August 11, 1921
The big story of the day is another Maple Bay Regatta with 100s of Valley residents enjoying “pleasures of shore and sea and excellent racing” with the bonus of the events being promptly conducted.
But we’ve covered several regattas in the past few weeks so I’m going to be brutally brief with this one. What made them so popular was that, while participants were doing their boating thing and having fun, it was a free show for Valley residents, young and old, who crowded the beaches to watch the events. For six hours there was “something compelling attention on water or land all the time,” in the words of a Leader reporter.
“...All afternoon a procession of motor cars came up and down the hill. School buses were run by Duncan Garage Ltd., under arrangements made by the regatta committee and these carried children free of charge...
“There was hardly a vacant spot which was not used for the parking of all these cars, and launches and boats of all descriptions came in from different points on the bay, Cowichan Bay, Crofton and elsewhere.
“Everyone was agreeably surprised to find that the old wharf, which for some time past has been an eyesore alike to visitors and residents, was no more and in its place a fine new runway and float had been built...”
Let’s just assume that a good time was had by all.
The real news story of the day was the trial in police court of Charles Kuckalano for illegally fishing with a weir and obstructing a police officer while he was assisting a fisheries officer. The case before Magistrate James Maitland-Dougall lasted two days and resulted in conviction and sentence of two months in jail and $100 fine. This was Kuckalano’s second offence, he having been convicted two years before of obstructing and assaulting a fisheries officer who was investigating illegal fishing.
Kuckalan’s defence was that he was following tribal fishing tradition as it had been practised long, long before the arrival of Europeans and their laws.
There were 50 people in the public gallery, most of them sympathetic to the 80-year-old Kuckalan. Magistrate Maitland-Dougall certainly wasn’t, saying, “Indians [sic] have got to understand the same as the whites, that they have got to have respect for the police and officers. It is about time they did understand.”
Emotions had run so high during the arrest that RCMP Constable Conkin had drawn his revolver and waves a crowd back then had wrestled briefly with Kuckalan while trying to open the weir. As police and fisheries officers left the river they heard several shots fired behind them.
In other news North Cowichan Council had had little business to deal with in its regular meeting. One item was a suggestion by the Chemainus Board of Trade that bathing houses be erected for the use of children at Maple Bay. Because of the lateness of the season, Council thought it should be deferred until next year, Reeve Paitson expressing the view that he didn’t think bath houses qualified as a public expenditure.
The Municipal campaign against Canadian thistle continued and residents were encouraged to report sightings of the noxious weed. Clr. Rivett-Carnac asked what Council intended to do to alleviate unemployment. The reeve said that there was sufficient money in the roads budget to employ workers during the last three months of the year; until then they should try to find work harvesting on the Prairies.
And the new wharf at Maple Bay had cost twice its estimate.
Council agreed to meet Miss Patchell’s suit in court if she followed through with her threat of legal action after injuring herself on a Chemainus sidewalk. They also agreed in principle with Duncan City Council’s proposed resolution banning property ownership by ‘Orientals.’
Finally, irony of ironies, their request that the owner of Swallowfield Farm accept responsibility for closing and maintaining the gate across the new Mainguy Island road that cut through his farm and which he’d fought and won a bitter lawsuit against the Municipality was snubbed.
Duncan Council had entered into a contract with a Vancouver firm for the sum of $9750 to pave Station and Craig Streets, to begin next week. Ald. Whidden was absent because of ill health and Ald. Smythe away at Ladysmith. Ald. Dickie reported that it would cost $670 to install steel mains and connections on Station Street.
Because of the dry summer his recommendation that watering lawns with garden hoses be prohibited between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. was adopted.
A CNR barge had loaded 200,000 feet of lumber at the Genoa Bay mill, the fishing was good, there had been an impromptu dance with local music, and Douglas Wallis of Victoria who’d spent his summer working at the mill, was off to resume his science studies at UBC after what the Leader surmised had been a “strenuous holiday”.
Four new teachers had been hired by the Duncan Consolidated School Board, a run of spring salmon was drawing fishermen to Cowichan Bay, the yacht club under Commodore Arthur lane was active. Cowichan Bay resident John Spears had completed 50 “pictures” (it’s not stated whether they were paintings or pen and ink or...) that he intended to enter in various art classes and fall fairs. The Leader wished him well.
The Golf Club of Koksilah had leased almost 32 acres (on both sides of the railway tracks on the site of today’s Duncan Mall) for 10 years for a new nine-hole golf course, to be financed by the sale of $4000 debentures, with the expectation of being able to renew the lease upon expiration. Work on building a clubhouse was to begin at once and it was hoped that golfing could begin in the Fall.
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