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In June 2013 a blog was posted about a letter from Okanagan Centre written by pioneer Dorothea Scott-Coward. That post, and the letter it contained, initiated a number of interesting responses — one from a relative in the UK.

Now, a collection of these letters has been added to the Lake Country Museum and Archives website.

Dorothea Scott-Coward Allison

Dorothea Scott-Coward in 1898

These letters were written by Dorothea (Scott-Coward) Allison, a pioneer woman who lived in Oyama, British Columbia, Canada. She was British and came to Canada in 1912, to visit a cousin, John Stokes.1 While visiting, she met Robert Allison, and the couple married in December, 1913. A number of her letters written between 1913 and 1922 have survived. One of the letters in the collection was written to her sister,   who lived in India at the time.

In addition to the letters themselves, typescripts have been added to ease the reading of handwriting. Although beautiful script, the manuscripts are sometimes difficult to read.

Biographical sketches of the people in Dorothea’s letters are also available on line.

These letters (typescripts and manuscripts) were originally published on the Royal British Columbia Museum’s Living Landscapes: Thompson-Okanagan website. The Lake Country Museum & Archives was authorized to transfer them to the Museum’s website.

1 The Lake Country Museum & Archives houses the John Stokes’ photograph collection. The photographs were taken by Schofield, a professional photographer who Stokes had hired to document his life in the Okanagan. Many thanks to Nancy and Peter Mcdonnell who contributed these photographs.