Simpson house on Lot 29 was built of logs cut on the property before it became a famous rhododendron garden. Lynne Bowen

Roger Wiles and Susan Bannerman share the porch of the Simpson House with the Nixons and the Bowens. Lynne Bowen

An old sign reminds us of the days when Camp Six was the most important camp at Cowichan Lake. Lynne Bowen

An abandoned speeder from the days when there were no roads around the lake and loggers, shoppers and party-goers travelled by rail.
Dick Bowen

Lynne talks to Barry and Lou Volkers, historians, friends and purveyors of pear mincemeat. Dick Bowen

A rusted coffee pot peeks through the vegetation that has covered the site of the Rounds camp. Lynne Bowen
 
Lake People Cover

 

 

Those Lake People

Stories of Cowichan Lake (1995)(2019)

 

 

Twenty-six miles of fresh water teeming with fish and surrounded by old-growth forest: this was Cowichan Lake at the end of the nineteenth century. Home to trappers, hunters and a handful of remittance men, the lake was also the favourite holiday destination for dukes and duchesses, Hollywood actresses and New York tycoons.  Soon the giant trees began to fall to the crosscut saws of immigrant loggers from Finland, Norway, Sweden, India, Japan and China.

As technology advanced in the logging industry and the woods became a killing ground for loggers, the camps around the lake became the testing ground for union organizers whose clandestine activities contrasted remarkably with those of rhododendron and alpine flower growers who have left their mark on gardens throughout the Pacific Northwest.

 

M and M camp, later known as Rounds, where blacklisted loggers could find work.
BC Archives

One of several floathouses on Cowichan Lake before World War One.
Kaatza Station Museum

Ivor and Alice " The Green Hornet" Pederson, taxi and bus drivers c. 1965 in
Lake Cowichan, B.C.
Kaatza Station Museum

Constable Smokey Parsley stands in front of the Lake Cowichan police station in the 1940s before the explosion destroyed it.
Kaatza Station Museum

Tall timbers on the road to Cowichan Lake.
BC Archives

Swedish and Finnish loggers pose in Cowichan Lake logging camp in 1926. Kaatza Station Museum

Cowichan Lake loggers prepare to fell a tree before power saws and hard hats changed logging in the 1940s. Kaatza Station Museum
Those Lake People can be found at:

Kaatza Station Museum in Lake Cowichan, B.C.

Rocky Point Books through the CONTACT key on this website

Major libraries or through inter-library loan.

A second-hand copy can be purchased through AbeBooks or Amazon.ca