by lakecountry | Jan 3, 2014 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
Before the navigation canal was built in 1908, a creek drained Wood Lake into Long (Kalamalka) Lake. Wood Lake was initially four feet higher than Kalamalka, perhaps five or six feet higher during the spring freshet. In some years the water gushed down the creek...
by lakecountry | Dec 27, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Carol
In an era before ski hills and organized sport, Lake Country residents enjoyed the great outdoors with sledding on local hills and skating on local ponds. May all of you also enjoy a happy winter season! Left to Right: Mary (Carter) Jeglum, Yoshiko Kobayashi (Mende),...
by lakecountry | Dec 13, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Carol
If you’re still looking for a great Christmas gift, especially if it’s for a history buff, a senior, or a new resident interested in learning more about the Okanagan Valley, look no further than the Okanagan Historical Society’s latest annual report...
by lakecountry | Dec 6, 2013 | Bloggers, Community Events, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Carol
Allan Osamu Kobayashi remembers Christmas concerts at the Okanagan Centre School: “Special days came and went with the changing seasons. The first grand occasion was Halloween which meant a masquerade party. … Then came Christmas and the concert. [Teacher]...
by lakecountry | Nov 29, 2013 | Bloggers, Community Events, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
Oyama was a wonderful place to grow up during the Depression. This dance troupe performed at a Kalamalka Women’s Institute garden party held on the grounds of the Prickards about 1939. By all reports it was a wonderful setting, featuring an amazing peony hedge...
by lakecountry | Nov 22, 2013 | Bloggers, Community Events, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
In the pre-WWII years, Oyama boys were numerous enough to field a hockey team that played against Vernon and perhaps other teams. They practised and played on a community hockey rink on the flat land formerly occupied by the Sterling and Pitcairn Packing House (just...
by lakecountry | Nov 15, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
The Lake Country Museum and Archives received this wonderful photograph from Mary Bailey (née Ellison). Through Gladys Trewhitt’s album on Oyama history we have identified all of the folks in the photo. The photograph was taken on August 12, 1958, marking the...
by lakecountry | Nov 1, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
Oyama High School, under the leadership of coach Clause Bissell, had a great record on the soccer pitch. Their greatest rival was the Mackie Prep School in the Coldstream and in 1943 the Oyama team was victorious, winning the prestigious Silver Pheasants trophy for...
by lakecountry | Oct 25, 2013 | Bloggers, Exhibitions, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Carol
When I [Allan Kobayashi] began my education in 1932, the Okanagan Centre School was brand new. My cousin Margaret and I were in the first Grade 1 class. From Grade 1 to 8 we were the only two in each grade as the years passed so one of us always ranked first or...
by lakecountry | Oct 18, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Shannon Jorgenson
Land development in Lake Country was initiated by the Maddock brothers who, in 1892, bought up thousands of acres of land spanning a good part of Lake Country, an area from the Rainbow Ranche south to McKinley’s Landing, and from Okanagan Lake east to the flats of...
by lakecountry | Oct 4, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Natural History, Thomson, Carol
There was a time when fish were abundant in the lakes of the Okanagan. In recent years, however, newspaper headlines have warned us of the dire straits of our local fishery. In the Kelowna Daily Courier reporter Don Plant headlined his piece: Plenty of fish? Not in...
by lakecountry | Aug 30, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
The stretch of Highway 97 has been completed, directing through traffic from the lakeshore (now Pelmewash Parkway) to higher levels. This is not the first or last change in route for the Kelowna to Vernon road. The road was originally completed in 1875 and was known...
by lakecountry | Aug 16, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
Soccer was a popular sport in the Central Okanagan while Claude Bissell was teacher and coach, first at Oyama High School and later in Rutland. This photograph of the Okanagan Zone Soccer Champions shows the Rutland team about to leave by bus for Penticton where they...
by lakecountry | Jul 26, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Laura Neame
The Okanagan today is identified with beaches, orchards and vineyards, rather than the Wild West. However, this letter, written in 1910, is a glimpse into the Okanagan’s frontier past. James Goldie, manager of the Rainbow Ranche in Okanagan Centre, was...
by lakecountry | Jul 12, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
Pelmewash Parkway is about to be devoted entirely to local traffic, providing Lake Country with the wonderful asset of seven kilometres of lakeshore for all manner of recreation. This seems to be an opportune time to discuss the origin and possible meaning of the...
by lakecountry | Jun 14, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
“The Railroad” was the name used on the earliest colonial maps, before the settlement in Lake Country, to refer to the isthmus at Oyama. The term certainly did not refer to any European-made feature; it had to refer to either a natural or an Okanagan Indian structure....
by lakecountry | May 31, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Laura Neame
April 29, 2013: e-mail to Mits Hikichi, son of Rainbow Ranche (Lake Country) Foreman Sam Hikichi, from Laura Neame, archivist of Lake Country Museum and Archives. Hello Mits Hikichi, We are hoping you can shed some light on a mystery. We received some donated papers...
by lakecountry | May 17, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Carol
The following poem, by Meiri (Koyama) Itami, was written in 1980 to honour Eijiro Koyama. Koyama farmed in the Winfield area in the 1920s. Eijiro Koyama died on January 17, 1956. A Day with Dad on the Farm As certainly as dawn crept over the hills he was awake. No...
by lakecountry | Apr 26, 2013 | Bloggers, Hayes, Bob, History of Lake Country
On page five of the Thursday, November 16, 1911 edition of The Kelowna Courier and Okanagan Orchardist appeared the following article: DIED – At the Hospital, on Monday, Nov. 13th, Frank Reiner, Okanagan Centre, aged 52. Mr. Reiner had been ailing several weeks, but...
by lakecountry | Mar 22, 2013 | Bloggers, History of Lake Country, Thomson, Duane
How did one travel from the Okanagan to the coast in the first decades of the twentieth century? Crossing the coastal mountains was no easy task. The Dewdney Trail, connecting the South Okanagan to Hope, had been built during the Gold Rush, and for years supplies came...
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