Yasui family photographs series
https://search.heritageburnaby.ca/link/museumdescription21423
- Repository
- Burnaby Village Museum
- Date
- [1923-1937] (date of originals), copied 2004
- Collection/Fonds
- In the Shadow by the Sea collection
- Description Level
- Series
- Physical Description
- 11 photographs (tiffs)
- Scope and Content
- Series consists of copies of photographs pertaining to the Yasui family while Sukegoro (Shoyen) Yasui worked for the Nichols Chemical Company and the family lived on the site of Barnet. These photographs were published in the book "In the Shadow by the Sea: Recollections of Burnaby's Barnet Village…
- Repository
- Burnaby Village Museum
- Collection/Fonds
- In the Shadow by the Sea collection
- Description Level
- Series
- Physical Description
- 11 photographs (tiffs)
- Scope and Content
- Series consists of copies of photographs pertaining to the Yasui family while Sukegoro (Shoyen) Yasui worked for the Nichols Chemical Company and the family lived on the site of Barnet. These photographs were published in the book "In the Shadow by the Sea: Recollections of Burnaby's Barnet Village".
- History
- Sukegoro (Shoyen) Yasui (1884-1972) and his wife Tane (Hirata) Yasui (d.1987) emigrated from Japan to Canada in 1919. Sukegoro and Tane had two children Yasue Margaret (Matsumura) (1921-2019) and Harding Yasui (1923-2008). Sukegoro worked as a burner operator for the Nichols Chemical Company of Barnet B.C. The family lived on the site with five other families in a bunkhouse including the three Kokuryo brothers and their families and the Kojima family. The children attended Barnet School for three years before the family moved to Surrey in 1934 after purchasing farm land. Sukegoro and Tane Yasui grew strawberries and raised chickens on the farm and Sukegoro continued to work shift work at the Nichols plant. In 1942, the Yasui family were interned and sent to work on a sugar beet farm near Lethbridge, Alberta. While living in Picture Butte, Alberta,Yasue married Matsuo Matsumura. Following the war, the whole family moved to Kingston, Ontario where Harding completed his senior year of high school. A few years later, Harding moved to Montreal and his parents joined him. The Barnet Lumber Company also known as the Barnet mill was in operation between 1925 and 1932. The mill was located on Burrard Inlet in the neighbourhood of Barnet and was one of the most successful local employers in Burnaby until the 1930s when the Great Depression resulted in a strike at the mill. The City of Burnaby eventually assumed control of the site including all of the homes when the company failed to pay it's taxes. The city then dismantled the mill and sold the property in two parts - the eastern section would become the Kapoor Sawmills Limited and the western portion, the McColl-Frontenac Oil Company.
- Accession Code
- BV019.32
- Date
- [1923-1937] (date of originals), copied 2004
- Media Type
- Photograph
- Related Material
- See also, City of Burnaby Archives: Burnaby Historical Society fonds - "In the Shadow by the Sea subseries"
- Notes
- Title based on contents of series
Kapoor Singh Siddoo series
https://search.heritageburnaby.ca/link/museumdescription21422
- Repository
- Burnaby Village Museum
- Date
- [1940-1947] (date of originals), copied 2004
- Collection/Fonds
- In the Shadow by the Sea collection
- Description Level
- Series
- Physical Description
- 31 photographs (tiffs)
- Scope and Content
- Series consists of copies of photographs pertaining to the family of Kappoor Singh Siddoo and the Kapoor Sawmills Limited that were published in the book "In the Shadow by the Sea: Recollections of Burnaby's Barnet Village".
- Repository
- Burnaby Village Museum
- Collection/Fonds
- In the Shadow by the Sea collection
- Description Level
- Series
- Physical Description
- 31 photographs (tiffs)
- Scope and Content
- Series consists of copies of photographs pertaining to the family of Kappoor Singh Siddoo and the Kapoor Sawmills Limited that were published in the book "In the Shadow by the Sea: Recollections of Burnaby's Barnet Village".
- History
- Kapoor Singh Siddoo was born in 1885 in the Punjab village of Kharaudi, India. Kapoor was one of the pioneer South Asian Canadian Sikhs who first immigrated to America in 1906, arriving in San Francisco in 1906 with twenty illiterate compatriots seeking employment. As the only one among them with a formal education, Kapoor acted as their interpreter, manager, and accountant. They worked along the Southern Pacific Railway line near Marysville, California, as it inched toward Reno, Nevada. At the same time, Kapoor was asked to help raise funds for a mining company in British Columbia founded by a Punjabi spiritual leader. Kapoor attempted to join the company in British Columbia (attracted partly by stories of the province’s natural beauty), but was turned back at the international border at Blaine several times before entering via Victoria in 1912. Once settled, he operated a successful dairy, invested in various businesses, and socialized with other South Asian immigrants interested in politics. However, emotions of those around Kapoor began to heat up; frustration among opponents of British rule in Indian grew intense. Kapoor left the explosive situation for Ontario in June 1914, determined to find a place for himself in Canadian society. He tried homesteading in the “Clay Belt” of northern Ontario, but like others found the extreme winter conditions intolerable. He returned to British Columbia in 1916, invited by a group of Sikh sawmill workers to help them manage the accounts at a Fraser Valley sawmill they had leased. Kapoor found his niche in the sawmill industry. Fraser Valley timber sat on land granted by the Dominion government to railways to help finance their construction. South Asian workers could get timber rights on these lands, unlike on Crown Lands elsewhere in the province. Kapoor and his new partners, particularly Mayo Singh, looked for other promising “railway belt” locations for another sawmill and found an ideal location on Vancouver Island near Duncan. Kapoor and his colleagues opened a large, modern mill in 1918 and despite various setbacks, prospered for the next decade and a half. In 1923, with a change in immigration laws, Kapoor arranged for his wife, Besant Kaur, to emigrate from India. Besant came to Canada with Kapoor’s older brother, Bhagwan. Kapoor and Besant had two daughters while in Duncan: Jagdis Kaur Siddoo (1925) and Sarjit Kaur Siddoo (1926), both of whom eventually became physicians. Kapoor’s lumber business on Vancouver Island flourished until 1935, when a fire destroyed the original mill. He moved his family to Vancouver, although retaining interest in another Vancouver Island mill. In 1939, he purchased a large piece (45 acres) of the former Barnet Mill in Burnaby, recently acquired by the Municipality as payment for tax default during the Depression. Kapoor named the mill Modern Sawmills and finalized the purchase though a business agent to get around Burnaby’s bylaw prohibiting the sale to a non-White person. Eventually he changed the mill’s name to Kapoor Sawmills Limited. The mill received timber in log booms from Vancouver Island, and once processed, the wood was then shipped via the Canadian Pacific Railway that ran past the mill, and still does today. Kapoor’s younger brother, Tara, who had earlier worked with Kapoor in other sawmills, joined the venture as a shareholder. Tara and his wife, Beant, took up residence in Barnet from 1943-1945 with their family: sons Lakhbeer, Gurdeb, Gurcharn, Baldev, Hardev and daughters Harjeet (Sangha), Runjeet (Basi) and Buckshish (Sarai). Tara oversaw the regular delivery of logs from Vancouver Island to the Barnet mill. He also became known as a local Burnaby philanthropist, donating to Burnaby General Hospital. The Kapoor sawmill prospered but burned to the ground on January 14, 1947. A smaller mill was rebuilt on the site and remained a successful financial operation until 1959. When he retired in 1959, Kapoor Siddoo was one of Vancouver’s most influential men in the South Asian Community. He was a leading businessman, but had also fought to give South Asian Canadians the right to vote. The year he retired, the family set up the Kapoor Singh Siddoo Foundation and with help from his wife and daughters opened a hospital in the Punjab village of Aur. In 1964, Kapoor died in India at the age of 79 years.
- Accession Code
- BV019.32
- Date
- [1940-1947] (date of originals), copied 2004
- Media Type
- Photograph
- Related Material
- See also, City of Burnaby Archives: Burnaby Historical Society fonds - "In the Shadow by the Sea subseries"
- Notes
- Title based on contents of series
Royal Bank exhibit series
https://search.heritageburnaby.ca/link/museumdescription17800
- Repository
- Burnaby Village Museum
- Date
- 1974-1999
- Collection/Fonds
- Burnaby Village Museum fonds
- Description Level
- Series
- Physical Description
- 127 photographs + 4 cm of textual records
- Scope and Content
- Series consists of records and photographs pertaining to the history, acquistion, restoration, opening and exhibit of the Royal Bank building that was relocated from it's original location at Britannia Beach to Heritage Village (Burnaby Village Museum) in 1976. Fonds is arranged into the following…
- Repository
- Burnaby Village Museum
- Collection/Fonds
- Burnaby Village Museum fonds
- Series
- Royal Bank exhibit series
- Description Level
- Series
- Physical Description
- 127 photographs + 4 cm of textual records
- Scope and Content
- Series consists of records and photographs pertaining to the history, acquistion, restoration, opening and exhibit of the Royal Bank building that was relocated from it's original location at Britannia Beach to Heritage Village (Burnaby Village Museum) in 1976. Fonds is arranged into the following subseries: 1) Royal Bank history and restoration records subseries 2) Royal Bank building photographs subseries 3) Royal Bank exhibit photographs subseries
- History
- The Royal Bank Main Branch Vancouver opened a sub branch operation at Britannia Beach in 1923. The bank provided twice monthly banking service at Britannia Beach and Town site (later named Mt. Sheer) until a permanent branch was established. The new branch building was completed and opened for business on December 1, 1950. The building was designed by bank manager, Mr. Fred Schwab in a simple and traditional design. Since there was no railway and Britannia was only accessible by boat, accommodations for the employees was incorporated into the design. This consisted of two rooms located at the rear of the branch building. The building was furnished with artifacts from the Royal Bank’s central warehouse and soon after with fixtures from the Royal Bank in Nelson including desks and a partition around the manager’s office which was cut down to fit. The bank had two old “Royal Bank of Canada” signs, one hung over the main entrance and the other located over the gable facing Howe Sound. A memorial plaque mounted on the wall inside the bank was one of 1,495 erected in memory of employees of the Royal Bank who died during World War I. The plaque was dedicated to Goldwin William Harron, who worked as a teller at the Royal Bank and was killed in action on July 5, 1916. Goldwin William Harron was born in Kitchener, Ontario in 1897 and later moved to Venn Saskatchewan and enlisted from the Venn Branch of the Royal Bank in October 1915. He first served with the 53rd Battalion and later joined the 28th Battalion. Fred Schwab served as bank manager between December 1, 1950 to August 1956 and Ken Moir served as bank manager from August 1956 until March 1958. When copper prices dropped in 1958, the Howe Sound Mining Co. closed down the mine and many miners and their families left the area. In 1964, Anaconda Mines purchased the Howe Sound Mining Co. and later reopened the mine. After 1958, the Britannia Beach branch continued to be operated as a sub-branch of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh branch serving Britannia Beach and vicinity until 1974. In 1975, the Royal Bank building was donated to Heritage Village by Anaconda Britannia Mines. On April 24, 1976, the building was transported by barge up Howe Sound to North Vancouver and then up the Fraser River to New Westminster where it was then loaded onto a truck and transported to the Heritage Village site. The building and much of the labour was donated along with $15,000 from the Royal Bank of Canada. The bank safe, oak panelling and some of it’s original furnishings came with the building and were incorporated into the building and the Heritage Village Museum collection. A new building foundation and basement were constructed for the Royal Bank building before it was placed at the south end of Hill Street inside Heritage Village. The basement interior finishing, including wiring and plumbing was undertaken and completed by the Burnaby Centennial Lions Club as a service club charitable project. The Lions Club raised funds for the project and in turn were also granted the use of the completed basement space as a meeting room which they referred to as the “Lion’s Den”. The Royal Bank building and exhibit officially opened on the site of Heritage Village Museum May 23, 1977. The ribbon cutting was done by former bank managers Fred Schwab and Ken Moir. Speakers at the opening ceremony included; Royal Bank representative, M.D. Pollock, President of the Century Park Museum Association, Ted Burnham with closing remarks by Burnaby Mayor, Tom Constable. During the opening ceremony, a presentation of keys for the “Lions Den” was made by Burnaby Centennial Lion’s Club President, Erchil Nordby to Century Park Museum Association President, Ted Burnham and Controller of Anaconda Britannia Mines, Anaconda Canada Ltd. J. MacDonald delivered a speech regarding the donation of the bank building.
- Accession Code
- BV020.5
- BV022.1
- Date
- 1974-1999
- Media Type
- Photograph
- Textual Record
- Architectural Drawing
- Related Material
- Century Park Museum Associaton fonds
- Burnaby Village Museum fonds
- Arrangement
- The majority of the records were created and managed by Heritage Village Museum staff. Records follow the arrangement maintained by both Heritage Village Museum staff (1974-1989) and later, Burnaby Village Museum staff (1990-2020).
- Notes
- Title based on contents of series
- Further accruals are expected
- Some records within this collection are subject to FIPPA