MEMBER SOCIETIES Member Societies and their Secretaries are responsible for seeing that the correct address for their society is up to date. Please send any change to both the Treasurer and the Editor at the addresses inside the back cover. The Annual Return as at October 31 should include telephone numbers for contact. MEMBERS’ DUES for the current year were paid by the following Societies: Alberni District Historical Society Box 284, Port Alberni, B.C. V9Y 7M7 Alder Grove Heritage Society 3190 - 271 St. Aldergrove, B.C. V4W 3H7 Arrow Lakes Historical Society Box 584, Nakusp, B.C. VOG 1 RO Atlin Historical Society Box iii, Atlin, B.C. VOW lAO Boundary Historical Society Box 580, Grand Forks, B.C. VOH 1 HO Bowen Island Historians Box 97, Bowen Island, B.C. VON 1GO Burnaby Historical Society 6501 Deer Lake Avenue, Burnaby, B.C. V5G 3T6 Chemainus Valley Historical Society Box 172, Chemainus, B.C. VOR 1KO Cowichan Historical Society PC. Box 1014, Duncan, B.C. V9L 3Y2 District 69 Historical Society Box 1452, Parksville, B.C. V9P 2H4 East Kootenay Historical Association P0. Box 74, Cranbrook, B.C. Vi C 4H6 Gulf Islands Branch, BCHF do A. Loveridge, S.22, C.i 1, RR#i, Galiano. VON 1 P0 Hedley Heritage Society Box 218, Hedley, B.C. VOX iKO Kamloops Museum Association 207 Seymour Street, Kamloops, B.C. V2C 2E7 Koksilah School Historical Society 5203 Trans Canada Highway, Koksilah, B.C. VOR 2C0 Kootenay Museum & Historical Society 402 Anderson Street, Nelson, B.C. Vi L 3Y3 Lantzville Historical Society do Box 274, Lantzville, B.C. VOR 2HO Nanaimo Historical Society P0. Box 933, Station A, Nanaimo, B.C. V9R 5N2 North Shore Historical Society 1541 Merlynn Crescent, North Vancouver, B.C. V7J 2X9 North Shuswap Historical Society Box 317, Celista, B.C. VOE 1 LO Okanagan Historical Society Box 313, Vernon, B.C. V1T 6M3 Princeton & District Museum & Archives Box 281, Princeton, B.C. VOX iWO Qualicum Beach Historical & Museum Society 587 Beach Road, Qualicum Beach, B.C. V9K 1 K7 Salt Spring Island Historical Society 129 McPhillips Avenue, Salt Spring Island, B.C. V8K 2T6 Sidney & North Saanich Historical Society P0. Box 2404, Sidney, B.C. V8L 3Y3 Silvery Slocan Historical Society Box 301, New Denver, B.C. VOG iSO Surrey Historical Society Box 34003 5790- 175th Street Surrey, B.C. V3S 8C4 Trail Historical Society P0. Box 405, Trail, B.C. Vi R 4L7 Vancouver Historical Society P0. Box 3071, Vancouver, B.C. V6B 3X6 Victoria Historical Society P0. Box 43035, Victoria North, Victoria, B.C. V8X 3G2 AFFILIATED GROUPS Kootenay Lake Historical Society Box 537, Kaslo, B.C. VOG 1 MO Lasqueti Island Historical Society do P Forbes, Lasqueti Island, B.C. VOR 2J0 Nanaimo and District Museum Society 100 Cameron Road, Nanaimo, B.C. V9R 2X1 SUBSCRIPTIONS I BACK ISSUES Published winter, spring, summer and fall by British Columbia Historical Federation PC. Box 5254, Station B Victoria, B.C. V8R 6N4 A Charitable Society recognized under the Income Tax Act. Institutional subscriptions Si 6 per year Individual (non-members) Si 2 per year Members of Member Societies $10 per year For addresses outside Canada, add $5peryear Back issues of the British Columbia Historical News are available in microform from Micromedia Limited, 20 Victoria Street, Toronto, Ontario M5C 2N8, phone (416) 362-521 i, fax (416) 362-6161, toll free 1-800-387-2689. This publication is indexed in the Canadian Index published by Micromedia. Indexed in the Canadian Periodical Index. Publications Mail Registration Number 4447. BRITISH COUJM Financially assisted by () Bdtih Coiubia Historical News Journal of the B.C. Historical Federation Volume 30, No.4 Fall 1997 EDITORIAL CONTENTS Questionnaires, forms and check lists arrive FEATURES intermittently for our magazine. Each is duti fully filled out and mailed back to the sender. Dr. George Sanson 1862 - 1916 2 One such form comes from Ulrich’s Interna by Esther Darlington Directory. Professor tional Periodicals Lake Outing 6 Bartholomew found an unusual bit of B.C. his Pitt 1906 tory, wrote it up, and mailed it to us using the by Mary De Zwart address found in Ulrich’s. This is the first sub A Chinese Secret Society in the Cariboo 9 Australia. we had mission from (Previously by Erin Payne articles from authors scattered across U.S.A. and one based in London, England.) Alderman Corey’s Autograph Collection 14 byAdam Waldie Miss Esther Paulson, R.N., was Director of East Kootenay Health & Welfare Services 1935-1938 17 Control when your editor joined Nursing forT.B. Esther Paulson her staff in 1951. The two were reintroduced by through an alumni gathering a couple of years Murder at Christmas Hill: Sir James Douglas and ago. When Miss Paulson heard references to the Peter Brown Affair 22 Wasa and Cranbrook, memories of her years in the East Kootenay bubbled forth. The good by Lindsay E. Smyth lady was persuaded to put these memories on A Balloon Mystery: B.C. and Manitoba 1896-97 27 paper. Helen Shore, a nursing classmate of editor Naomi, turned written words to typed by Robert E. Bartholomew font - and we are pleased to present this look A Trip Through the Fraser Valley by Interurban 29 back at health and welfare services in the by Ken Broderick 1930s. (p 17) Was There a Spanish Invasion 31 We are approaching the season when the by Winston Shilvock keeps at home. weather and early darkness us NEWS FROM BRANCHES 33 For many this is the ideal time to sit down and type that favorite historical yarn or neat re NEWS and NOTES 35 search so that it may be shared with other readers of the B.C. Historical News. Please BOOKSHELF make this the year that YOU send in that tidbit Indians at Work: 1858-1930 37 of B.C. history to the Editor, Box 105, Wasa, Review by Brian Gobbett B.C. VOB 2K0. Kimsquit Chronicles 37 Naomi Miller Review by Leslie Kopas Bright Seas, Pioneer Spirits: the Sunshine Coast 38 COVER CREDIT Review by William McKee The Sunshine Coast: From Gibsons to Powell River 38 Mary Leah De Zwart did considerable research Review by Kelsey McLeod la while expanding on information in a young A Most Unusual Colony: Vancouver Island 1849-1860 39 dy’s diary of 1906. The Home Dressmaker page in the Vancouver Daily Province of July Review by Donna fran Mackinnon 16, 1906 gives readers a glimpse of the slim 0-Bon in Chimunesu 39 waisted, richly ornamented garments that were Review by Phyllis Reeve fashionable. Note the gloves considered also in Your Shorts 40 and hats. Thank you to Mrs. De Zwart for show Cactus ing us what the heroine, Jessie McLenaghen, Review by Susan Stacey may have worn during her summer visit to Van Ladner’s Landing ofYesteryear 40 couver. Review by Susan Stacey Manuscripts and correspondence to the editor are to be sent to P0. Box 105, Wasa, B.C. VOB 2K0. Correspondence regarding subscriptions is to be directed to the Subscription Secretary (see inside back cover). Printad in Canada by Kootenay Kwik Print Ltd. Dr. George Sanson by Esther Darlington There is little on the surface that indi despite a severe bout of rheumatic fever the work-a-day world after graduating cates the complexity of Dr. George during his high school years, he was not from the University of Toronto. The Sanson’s character. And certainly little deterred from his aim. In fact, there was Canadian Pacific Railway was complet in the strong, handsome features of this evidence of a single-mindedness in ing the last lap ofthe track through Brit tall, burly, outdoors kind of man, that Sanson’s character from his youth. An ish Columbia and hired Sanson as a hints of the quality of his skills. Skills, interesting story related by Sanson’s company doctor. He was stationed at by all accounts, that were formidable daughter Margaret, about her father and Donald, B.C. When the job was termi enough to have qualified him to practice a neighbourhood girl named Jennie nated about a year later, Sanson drifted in a large, sophisticated city anywhere. McDonald supports this view. into the Okanagan country and settled The fact that Sanson chose to spend the One afternoon, as Sanson was seated in the town ofVernon where he quickly greater part ofhis working life in an area beside his father on the veranda of their set up a practice. He had only been in where climate and terrain was often harsh home, Jennie walked by. Sanson said to Vernon a few months, when he met a and unforgiving, among a tough, hardy his father, “Some day, I am going to colleague named Williams. Williams had people, most of them illiterate, reveals marry Jennie McDonald when I have just returned from a sojourn in the more about the man than meets the eye. become a doctor and set myself up in Cariboo country and he was full of tales Sanson’s story begins in the agricultural practice somewhere”. about his adventures. Intrigued, Sanson community ofPetrolia, Ontario, in 1862. A surprising prediction from a lad of impulsively offered Williams his practice, His family had been in Canada since the 17 about a little girl of 10! and made off for the South Cariboo. It early days of that century, and had origi The startled older Sanson peered down was a decision he never seemed to have nally come from Scotland and France. at the girl walking by, a stare that fol regretted, despite a remark, much quoted Sanson’s father raised thoroughbred lowed Jennie for years, for she told her in later years about the town ofAshcroft horses.