Gladys Lomas Howe was born on June 20, 1901 at the Riverside Hotel in Lake Cowichan. She was the daughter of Ed and Dora Lomas. Mr. Lomas was a manager the Riverside Inn and a prospector. Gladys attended school in her early primary years in Duncan, as there was no school at the Lake. She attended "Beech Hall" when it opened in 1913. She was the first child to take her grade VIII in Cowichan Lake. She then attended Duncan High School and later Victoria Normal School for her teacher's training. Her first teaching assignment was in Falkland, BC, then she taught in Blubber Bay. When the new school opened in Lake Cowichan (the Bridge School/Bell Tower School) she was appointed the Grade 1 - 4 teacher. She remained teaching for eight years. At this time she married Art Howe of Chemainus in 1934. They had one son, Richard, born in 1935. Gladys was active in the United Church, a charter member of the PTA and an original member of the Knitting Club, which was the origins of the local IODE, in which she served for many years. The Gladys Lomas Annex, a room of the Bell Tower School was named in the honour of Gladys in 1964. Gladys died in 1983. Art Howe managed the butcher shop at Gordon's Store for 20 years. In 1954 he opened a meat and cold storage locker used by local hunters, ran the Gordon Store Meat Market and later Howie's Little Porkies. He was an avid fisherman, hunter and golfer. In 1986 he married Anne Patrick and lived at the lake until he died in 1996.