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Stefan Arnason, son of Arni Jonatansson and Gudrun Jonsdottir, was born August 17, 1882 at Fagriskogur in Eyja Fjordur, Iceland. The eldest of 12 children, he was educated at the Gagnfraedaskoli at Mofurvollum in 1900. He immigrated to Canada in 1904 and spent time in Tantallon, Saskatchewan and Winnipeg, Manitoba, before homesteading in Pine Valley (Piney), Manitoba in 1908. He married Gudrun “Sigurbjorg” Einarsdottir (born 1889, Hallson, North Dakota) in 1911, who had settled in the Pine Valley area with her parents.

The Arnasons took over Sigurbjorg’s father’s farm at Piney and had 12 children. Amongst the first settlers in the area, they were active in the community, helping build the first high school and hall. Stefan Arnason was on the school board, and worked for the municipality. The Arnason family were forced to move to the Vancouver area during the depression due to lack of employment opportunities. They moved thirteen family members (the eldest daughter stayed in the Piney area for 2 more years) in a one and a half ton Dodge truck to Burnaby, in April-May 1937.

Stefan Arnason passed away in 1956.

Reverend Jitsuo Morikawa was born in Port Hammond, British Columbia in 1912. He was the youngest son of Yasutarō and Tora Morikawa. His mother died shortly after he was born and his father remarried in 1919.

He graduated from the University of California-Los Angeles and of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1940. He went to work after that as a pastor for three different Japanese-American congregations before being forced with his wife, Hazel Takii (1915-2005), to move to an internment camp in Poston, Arizona where they lived for 18 months. During his time there he served as a pastor in the camp.

After being release, he moved to Chicago in 1943 where he became the associate pastor and later pastor of First Baptist Church of Chicago until 1956. Jitsuo then moved to Valley Forge, Pennsylvania where he served as director of evangelism (1956-1966) and office of planning (1966-1972) as well as the associate executive secretary of the American Baptist National Ministries until 1976. He was the interm pastor of Riverside Church in New York from 1976-1977 and later settled in Ann Arbor, Michigan where he was the minister of the First Baptist Church until he retirement in 1982.

He was the vice president of American Baptist Churches USA from 1984-1986. He was well-known and well regarded in the evangelistic community. He died in 1987. His wife wrote his biography after his death, "Footprints: One Man's Pilgrimage, a Biography of Jitsuo Morikawa" and it was published 1990.

Kiyoko (Beverly) Inouye was known as Cookie to her childhood friends and Beverly in most official communication, she was the 2nd daughter and youngest child of Zennosuke and Hatsuno Inouye. Beverley graduated from UBC in 1953 with a BA 2nd class and subsequently worked in high schools and junior highs in Powell River, Hamilton, and North Vancouver as a math teacher. She helped researchers when her father's correspondence become of interest, had strong friendships with the women she went to school with and carried on correspondence with many photos. Later in her life she volunteered at the Japanese Canadian War Memorial.

Zennosuke Inouye was born in Asagun, Hiroshima, Japan, on September 13, 1883. He immigrated to Canada in 1900 and worked various jobs. He worked for Saeki Tadaichi who had a real estate business in Vancouver and became the first Japanese-Canadian to get a chauffeur license. He became a naturalized citizen in 1914.

He enlisted in the Canadian Army on June 6, 1916 in Alberta after being denied the opportunity to do so in British Columbia. He served in 13th Battalion of the Canadian Mounted Rifles, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, and the 52nd Canadian Infantry Battalion and became one of 222 Japanese-Canadians who served in World War I. Zennosuke was wounded while serving in France in 1917 and then was discharged in 1919. In 1920, Zennosuke married Hatsuno Morikawa (1900-1993). Together Zennosuke and Hatsuno had 5 children: Arthur Rizo (1921-1990), Tom Futari (1923-1981), and Robert Zenso (1925-1995), and then two daughters, Yasuko (Mary) and Kiyoko (Beverly).

Working with Hatsuno and their children, Zennosuke turned a portion of his land into profitable berry fields, and was also the president and a shareholder of the Japanese-Canadian owned and operated Surrey Berry Growers’ Cooperative Association, producers of Sovereign Brand strawberries and jam berries. The cooperative was fairly successful, acquiring a five-acre property in New Westminster.

In February 1942, the Canadian government ordered all Japanese Canadians from coastal British Columbia to relocate to the interior. The Inouye family was sent first to Hastings Park, Vancouver, and then to the small town of Kaslo, British Columbia. There the Inouye family lived in one room and Zennosuke worked as a caretaker for the British Columbia Security Commission. His sons, who were at that time self-supporting, went to Vernon, BC, where they worked on a farm. In 1945, the family was reunited in Vernon, British Columbia.

His brother-in-law, Reverend Jitsuo Morikawa who lived in the United States was also interned during World War II and corresponded frequently with the family before, during, and after the war.

After the war Zennosuke petitioned as an individual to have his land returned to him, he wrote many letters to anyone who might be swayed by his demonstrated loyalty as a World War I veteran. When his land was returned to him in 1949, he became the sole dispossessed Japanese-Canadian veteran to have his land returned.

John Guy "Jack" Pearcey was born in Dagenham, England, on Nov. 5, 1901. He moved with his family to Vancouver, B.C., four years later. Pearcey enrolled at the University of British Columbia's science program in 1919, taking some time away from school to work. During the 1920s, Pearcey worked as a surveyor throughout the province, including around the Britannia Mine in the Howe Sound area. He resumed his studies and graduated with a degree in geological engineering in 1927, starting his career with the American Smelting and Refining Company (ASARCO) that same year.

From 1927 to 1948, Pearcey worked at the Silbak Premier mine in northern British Columbia, where he eventually became a mining superintendent. In 1948 he was transferred to Salt Lake City for four years as Resident Engineer with ASARCO. From 1952 until his retirement in 1966, Pearcey worked at ASARCO's New York office. He then did consulting with a Guggenheim mining company (Straus Exploration Co.) until 1971, when he purchases property in Palm Beach, Florida. He divided his time Between Florida and New York until his death in Palm Beach in 1984 due to a heart attack.

Pearcey was a lifetime member of the B.C. Association of Professional Engineers. He was also an amateur photographer. Pearcey was married and had three children (Joan Cooke, Lynn Allen, and Gail Hall).

Jim Coleman, born October 30, 1911, in Winnipeg, Manitoba was an award winning Canadian sports journalist that focused his efforts primarily on the three sports of: horse racing, Canadian football, and hockey. He was named to the Order of Canada in 1974; was inducted into the Canadian News Hall of Fame in 1980; won the Professional Hockey Writers’ Association, Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award in 1984; and was inducted into the Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1985.

Mr. Coleman wrote prolifically for the Vancouver Province (1939-1941), and the Globe & Mail (1942-1961) newspapers, and eventually became a syndicated columnist writing for Southam Newspapers (1962-1983).

Mr. Coleman also wrote two books, both on the topic of sports. The first book, titled “A Hoofprint on my Heart” was published in 1971; and the second book, titled “Long Ride on a Hobby Horse” was published in 1990.

Mr. Coleman passed away on January 14th, 2001 in Vancouver.

Jim Wong-Chu was a writer, photographer, historian, radio producer, community organizer and activist, editor, and literary and cultural engineer. He was born in 1949 in Hong Kong. In 1953, he was sent to live with this aunt and uncle in Canada as a "paper son", a term which referred to the practice of children who immigrated to the Canada by using real or falsified identification papers of relatives living in Canada. He was sent back to live with his parents in Hong Kong in 1957 out of concern that his paper son identity might be discovered by government authorities. However he returned to live with his aunt and uncle in Canada in 1961.

He attended Vancouver School of Art (now Emily Carr University of Art + Design) with a focus on photography and design from 1975-1981. He also attended the University of British Columbia for creative writing from 1985-1987.

He worked as a letter carrier for the Canada Post from 1975 until his retirement in 2013. However he also worked as an associate editor for Douglas and McIntyre and as an associate editor for Arsenal Pulp Press. He also did consulting work for various community organizations as well as film and television productions and literary publications.

He was a founding member of various community and cultural organizations including: Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop (ACWW), Vancouver Asian Heritage Month Society/explorASIAN, the Pender Guy Radio Program, Asia Canadian Performing Arts Resource (ACPAR), Ricepaper magazine, and literASIAN: A Festival of Pacific Rim Asian Canadian Writing.

In addition to founding many community and cultural organizations, he was also involved in explorAsian (Vancouver Asian Heritage Month), Go for Broke Festival, B.C. Sinfonetta Society, Federation of British Columbia Writers, The Chinese Community Library Association, B.C. Heritage Trust and the Chinese Cultural Centre in Vancouver. He also served on juries and advisory panels for various government grants and book prizes including the Vancouver Book Prize, B.C. Book Prize, and Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize, and Multiculturalism Canada publishing grants.

He was the recipient of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal, the Queen's Golden Jubilee Medal from the Department of Canadian Heritage, and the Canada Post Silver Postmark Award.

Selected Written Publications: Inspection of a House Paid in Full (author), Chinatown Ghosts (author), A Brief History of Asian North America (author), Strike the Wok: An Anthology of Contemporary Chinese Fiction (co-editor), Inalienable Rice: A Chinese and Japanese Canadian Anthology (contributor), Many-Mouthed Birds: Contemporary Writing by Chinese Canadians (co-editor), Millennium Messages: An Anthology of Asian Canadian Writing (contributor), and Swallowing Clouds: An Anthology of Chinese-Canadian Poetry (co-editor). He has also had written works published in West Coast Review, Bridge, Mainstream, New Shoots, Asianadian, and Shift Current Anthology.

Selected Photograph Publications and Exhibitions: The B.C. Photographer (publication), Mainstream (publication), Asianadian (publication), Inalienable Rice: A Chinese and Japanese Anthology (book), and Yellow Peril: New World Asians (exhibit).

Jim Wong-Chu passed away July 11, 2017.

John Cooper Robinson was an Anglican missionary who lived and worked in Japan in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. He was born in Canada on July 7, 1859, in the rural community of Blenhiem in southern Ontario, the eldest of five children born to Aaron and Melissa Rowe Robinson. Aaron Robinson had come to Canada from England, and the Robinson family grew up as devoted Anglicans.

John Cooper Robinson initially studied accounting, graduating in 1877, and worked at a bank for a few years before enrolling at Wycliffe College, an Anglican Church seminary associated with the University of Toronto, in 1881. He graduated from Wycliffe and was ordained a Deacon in 1886, then was ordained as a Priest in 1887. On May 26, 1888, he married Bessie Poynton. Later that year they moved to Japan, where he was the first Canadian-sponsored missionary. Robinson and his wife spent most of their remaining years in Japan, returning to Canada for a few short furloughs (in 1894, 1902, 1911, 1918, and part of WWI). They lived in the towns of Nagoya, Hiroshima, and Niigata. Robinson and Bessie had five children, two of whom died as babies. The other three were Lucy Winifred (born in Tokyo in 1890), Cuthbert Cooper (born May 26, 1893), and Hilda. Bessie passed away in the fall of 1919. Robinson passed away in July 1926 in Saint Thomas, Ontario, and is buried at the St. James cemetery in Toronto.

Robinson was an avid photographer and captured life in Japan at a unique time, when the country was transitioning away from feudal society. The photographs that Robinson took are the only known comprehensive photographic record of this period in Japan. Robinson also published a book in 1912, entitled Japan, Island Empire of the East: Being a short history of Japan and missionary work therein with special reference to the mission of the M.S.C.C.

Hilda Robinson remained in Japan with her parents for much of her life and assisted in their missionary work. Cuthbert and Lucy grew up there as well, but eventually moved back to Canada. Lucy married George Bryce in 1913, and went on to receive a PhD and published multiple books about India, where she and George did missionary work. Cuthbert was ordained in the Anglican Church, eventually becoming Bishop of Moosonee, Ontario. Lucy and Cuthbert both had children.

Sources:
Wycliffe College. “From Wycliffe to Japan.” Insight. December 2012 No. 74. http://www.wycliffecollege.ca/documents/WC_INSIGHTXmas2012_LRproof.pdf

United Church of Canada Archives. Lucy Winifred Bryce fonds. http://www.archeion.ca/lucy-winifred-bryce-fonds

The Val d’Or Star. “Gibsons Attending Bishop’s Services.” January 7, 1955.

Larry was raised north of Lundbreck, Alberta and attended University of Alberta in Edmonton. He later completed post graduate studies with an Honours Master of Arts from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. The curator of the Doukhobor Discovery Centre in Castlegar B.C. since 1993, Ewashen previously worked in theatre and film, a career which included directorships and instructorships in the United Kingdom and Canada, as well as free-lance work.
Sources:
Doukhobor Discovery Centre. “The Curator, Larry A. Ewashen.” http://www.doukhobor-museum.org/html/curator.htm (accessed November 19, 2010).

Lazara Press is a small, progressive publishing house located in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The publishing house was founded by its current owner, Penny Goldsmith, in 1982. They publish poetry, literature, broadsides, and chapbooks. They also publish the "Discussions" series which serves as a forum for provocative and challenging essays and speeches on current issues. Lazara Press is committed to publishing, keeping in print and distributing works that might not otherwise be available.

Paul Tiessen was born in 1944. He is Professor Emeritus in the Department of English and Film Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University, located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. He has published widely in the fields of modernism, cultural theory, and film theory. Tiessen retains special interest in the works of Malcolm Lowry: he was editor of the Malcolm Lowry Newsletter (1977-1984); founding editor of The Malcolm Lowry Review (1984 to 2002); and editor and co-editor of works by Lowry and scholarly volumes about Lowry. Significant critical volumes on Lowry that Tiessen has edited or co-edited include The Letters of Malcolm Lowry and Gerald Noxon, 1940-1952 (1988), Apparently Incongruous Parts: The Worlds of Malcolm Lowry (1990), The Cinema of Malcolm Lowry: A Scholarly Edition of Lowry’s ‘Tender is the Night’ (1990), Joyce/Lowry: Critical Perspectives (1997), and A Darkness that Murmured: Essays on Malcolm Lowry and the Twentieth Century (2000). In collaboration with five other academics and the Editing Modernism in Canada (EMiC) project, Tiessen has created a series of new scholarly editions of Lowry’s works, including Swinging the Maelstrom (2013), In Ballast to the White Sea (2014), and The 1940 Under the Volcano (2015). Additionally, Tiessen wrote the introduction to Notes on a Screenplay for F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ‘Tender is the Night’ by Malcolm Lowry and Margerie Bonner Lowry (1976).

Rex Pendril “Pen” Brown was born in Vancouver in 1923 to Emma Bentall Brown and Philip Pigott Brown, both from Essex. Brown attended UBC at age 16. At age 19, Brown was called to serve the army in WWII, but received conscientious objector status. Brown objected the war on philosophical grounds, having read pacifist writings by Bernard Shaw and others. His mother, a member of the Society of Friends and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, supported his conscientious objection.

Brown served his time in alternative service work camps at Kootenay National Park and Blubber Bay. He also served 30 days in Oakalla prison for refusing to complete work during his service. After the work camps, Brown worked as a bank teller in Vancouver. He was released from service in 1946. He married Elizabeth Dorothy Kovalcik in 1957, and the couple had two children, Rex and Marian. Brown was the lighthouse keeper at Pine Island, off the coast of British Columbia, from 1957 until a major storm damaged the station in 1967. The family then moved to Victoria, where Brown worked for the Coast Guard until retiring in 1989. He passed away on April 11 2018.

Ron Bick Lee (born Yat Yee Lee), also known as Bick Lee, was a Chinese Canadian pioneer, a successful businessman and community leader. Bick Lee was born in 1892 in Ong Sum Village, Toisan, Guangdong, China. He left his hometown for Canada in 1911. First landed in Victoria, BC working as a dishwasher, he moved to Vancouver in 1916 and worked at the historic White Lunch Restaurant. By 1921, Bick Lee had gained ample experience and sufficient capital to found Foo Hung Co. Ltd., his own importing and exporting company of Asian goods in Vancouver. The sister company, Foo Hung Hong Kong operated by his brother Yick Bun Lee was the main supplier of Bick Lee’s business in Vancouver. Foo Hung soon became one of the leading importers of Asian goods in Canada. In 1933, Bick Lee purchased a greenhouse business in east Vancouver and successfully operated the Grandview Greenhouses business and the Foo Hung business during the Depression. Bick Lee also had various other business partners in North America, China mainland and Hong Kong.

With a strong commitment to serve the community, Bick Lee led the fund-raising and re-construction projects of the Vancouver Chinese Public School and served as the school chairman for several terms. He was also the chairman of the Lee’s Association in North America for a term. As a supporter and leader, Bick Lee was involved with several other associations including Chinese Merchants’ Association, Toi San Benevolent Society and Chinese Social Development Society. Bick Lee was also an active member of Kuomintang Party in Vancouver, and he supported the Party financially during wartime.

Bick Lee married to Gin King Choon from a village near his own back in China in 1914 through a pre-arranged marriage. Because of the immigration restrictions in Canada at that time, Mrs. Lee did not get to immigrate to Canada till 1928. The couple had seven children altogether (4 sons and 3 daughters) in Canada. Bick Lee was committed to supporting and helping his own and his wife’s extended families in mainland China and Hong Kong. Bick Lee passed away on December 22, 1994 in Vancouver, BC, at the age of 104.

Angela Codina, a Canadian lawyer, was residing in Macau at the time of the Tiananmen Square incident in Beijing in 1989. The Tiananmen Square incident, also called June Fourth incident or 6/4, was a culmination of a series of protests and demonstrations in China in the spring of 1989 that culminated on the night of June 3–4 with a government crackdown on the demonstrators in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Although the demonstrations and their subsequent repression occurred in cities throughout the country, the events in Beijing—and especially in Tiananmen Square, historically linked to such other protests as the May Fourth Movement (1919)—came to symbolize the entire incident. In the midst of this unrest, Codina traveled to Beijing to conduct a series of interviews with the leaders of the uprising. Codina also participated in the Tiananmen Square uprising as a speaker at the gathering there, bringing greetings of solidarity as a Canadian to those who were present.

UBC Library Vault is an initiative of the UBC Library Development Office which aims to showcase rare and special images from the holdings of UBC Library through an online gallery and print publications such as bookmarks, promotional items and gift cards. Images are often drawn from the collections at Rare Books and Special Collections, University of British Columbia Archives, UBC Asian Library and Woodward Biomedical Library.

The Vancouver Fishermen's Settlement Service was started in February of 1943. It was set up to make trip settlements, pay bills, make income tax deductions, and keep income records exclusively for fishermen and vessel owners. It operated by charging a flat rate per person, per trip, as well as a discount on bills paid through the office. It was sponsored by the Fishing Vessel Owners' Association of British Columbia and the United Fishermen and Allied Workers' Union. It also dealt with other regional unions and associations as well as private vendors of fuel, fishing tackle, and other supplies. Although it was very successful early in its history, it was in decline by the early 70s.

James Lind was a professionally trained physician in Scotland during the mid 18th century, where he co-founded the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Lind was born the 17th of May 1736 to Alexander and Helen Lind. He graduated from Edinburgh University in 1765 with an undergraduate degree in medicine. He next worked as a surgeon for the East India Company, sailing to China in 1766. By 1768 he received his doctorate degree, and on the 6th of November 1770 he became an official Fellow of the College of Physicians in Edinburgh. In 1772 Lind accompanied botanist Joseph Banks on a voyage to Iceland, and in 1777 he became a Fellow of the Royal Society of London. He settled in Windsor and became physician to the royal household. He married Ann Elizabeth Mealy and together they had four children; three daughters, Dorothy, Anne, Lucy and one son, Alexander. Lind died on the 17th of October 1812 in London.

Melvin Lloyd Gaudin, M.D. was a British obstetrician and gynaecologist in the mid twentieth century. Gaudin became a member of the Royal College Obstetricians and Gynecologists on April 25th 1942. He worked at The Jessop Hospital for Women in Sheffield, England, circa 1940, and was Head Surgeon in the hospital in 1941.

Alan Francis Brooks was born on August 20th, 1917 in London, England and was raised in Montréal, Quebec. He would go on to join the Royal Canadian Armed Forces and serve overseas with the Bomber Command during WWII. After the war, he earned a degree in Chemical Engineering at McGill University in Montréal, which led to a job with mining company Cominco Ltd. (currently known as Teck Resources Ltd.) in Trail, British Columbia. The facility he worked at had a large smelter that used a significant amount of power, causing him to become attentive to cheap power alternatives. As such, Alan was highly interested in hydroelectric projects being undertaken in the Pacific Northwest, especially the Columbia River Treaty and the Columbia Basin Project. In pursuit of the former, he dedicated time outside of work to actively following local news coverage of the treaty and filling twenty-six scrapbooks with newspaper clippings detailing its development.

Alan’s job with Cominco also prompted transfers that would take him to Montréal, Calgary, and Vancouver, where he would eventually settle down and retire. In retirement, he spent his time photographing nature, continuing his lifetime hobby of collecting stamps, and becoming a member of the Golden Agers Hiking Club as well as the philatelic group The 21 Club. He remained in Vancouver until the end of his life at the South Granville Park Lodge retirement facility. Alan passed away on November 26th, 2015 at the age of 98, surrounded by family. He was predeceased by his first wife Audrey Holmes Brooks and his second wife Muriel Floud Brooks and he is survived by his daughters Carolyn and Louise and grandchildren Ryan, Brendan, and Alexa.

The Lumber Inspectors' Union, B .C . Division, was incorporated under the Societies Act on March 7th, 1945. On April 11th, 1949, upon the recommendation of its executive officers, members agreed to transfer to the Canadian Congress of Labour (CCL) and become the Lumber Inspectors' Union, B .C . Division, Local 1, CCL. Following the receipt of its charter from the CCL on May 5th, 1949, this title was officially certified. In 1956, the Union became a charter local of the new Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) . On May 1st, 1961, it joined the International Woodworkers of America (IWA) to become the sole member organization of Local 1-288, which was a local chapter of IWA's Western Canadian Regional Council No . 1 .

The Lumber Inspectors' Union's mandated objectives of 1945 were to organize and unionize lumber inspectors in British Columbia , to promote lumber inspectors within the industry, to increase their knowledge and efficiency, to create and distribute opportunities in lumber inspection, to further the enactment of legislation which would benefit the Union members, and to secure compensation and pay comparable to that of similarly skilled workmen . As well, the Union was to promote cooperation and friendship among its members, to encourage members and their families to achieve a high level of citizenship, and to make provisions for misfortune or death benefits for the members and/or their dependents . These last three objectives were expunged in the 1949 Constitution . In the 1961 Constitution, only the first four objectives of the Societies Act remained, while the responsibility for the payment of benefits was jointly assumed by the Welfare Fund (1951), the Lumber Inspectors' Mutual Benefit Association (1953), the Lumber Inspectors' Credit Union (1955), and the Benevolent Society (1955). In reality, the functions the Union carried out were supporting on the job concerns (including safety, working conditions and promoting the availability of job positions), assuring general job satisfaction (through negotiations, arbitrations, grievances, and conciliations), and maintaining the members' financial security (by administering benevolent funds, pensions, and workers' compensation) . The Union's primary responsibility was to its members, although it was subordinate to the CLC and later the IWA . The Union was organized on a province-wide basis, with sub-locals in Victoria, Duncan, Nanaimo, Port Alberni, 100 Mile House, Haney-Mission, Tahsis, and Vancouver . Its records were kept in the Vancouver sub-local's office . The Union's membership's primary employer was the Pacific Lumber Inspection Bureau (PLIB), although any inspector in British Columbia, regardless of his or her employer , could be a member of the Union . In 1980, the Lumber Inspectors' Union was disbanded and its members transferred to other IWA locals.