Todd Wong's blog

Georgia Straight: Joy Kogawa House is "BEST NEW PLACE TO GET WRITING DONE "

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 16:42:26 -0700

Joy Kogawa House is:

BEST NEW PLACE TO

GET WRITING DONE

Pictures: Joy and brother Tim and Kogawa House circa 1944, chery tree and house 2007, Joy Kogawa and children from Thomsett Elementary School, Joy Kogawa and house photo by Dan Toulget/Vancouver Courier, Joy & brother Tim with school friends circa 1944

When I joined the "Save Kogawa House" campaign in September 2005, I just knew it was something that had to be done. Three years later we now have our first writer-in-residence program with the arrival of Madeleine Thien and a grant from the Canada Council.

The House was purchased by The Land Conservancy of BC in May 2006, and we have since had readings by Ruth Ozeki, Shaena Lambert, Sharon Butala, Heidi Greco, Marion Quednau, and Vancouver’s poet laureate George McWhirter, as well as Joy Kogawa herself. We have also had musical performances by opera soprano Heather Pawsey, flautist Kathryn Cernauskas and pianist Rachel Iwaasa.

It's an amazing story that this house has survived not only the WW2 Internment of its previous owners, but also rising real estate prices and the threat of demolition. It was a vision that we had to create a home for writers, to both recognize the accomplishments and life of Joy Kogawa, as well as to provide a place for them to hone their craft, and hopefully inspire them to their own greatness.

Check out page 77 of the Sept 18-25 / 2008 issue of the Georgia Straight. Kevin Chong writes that "Madeleine Thine will take up residence at a retreat dedicated to Joy Kogawa"

Writers work against city's shifting backdrop

Historic Joy Kogawa House

1450 West 64th Avenue

Now that Joy Kogawa’s childhood home has been purchased and saved from the wrecking ball after years of struggle, it’s set to become a writer’s retreat for visiting authors, starting in 2009. (The first author to arrive in the house, located in leafy, sleepy Marpole, will be Madeleine Thien.) Hopefully, the house, which celebrates the contributions of one of B.C.’s best-known authors while reminding us of a regrettable episode in our nation’s history—the internment of Japanese Canadians during World War II—will inspire new books in the years to come. More info is available at www.kogawahouse.com/ .

Page 77

Kogawa House cherry tree at Vancouver city hall is given a plaque on the 20th anniversary of the Japanese-Canadian redress.

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 22:14:25 -0700

"Friendship Tree" plaque at Vancouver City Hall for the "Kogawa House cherry tree" graft - photo Ann-Marie Metten.

Sixty-six years ago, in 1942, Japanese-Canadians were "evacuated" from Canada's Pacific coast and sent to internment camps for the duration of WW2.

in 1981, Joy Kogawa wrote her first novel Obasan, the first novel to address the issue of the Japanese-Canadian internment. Joy Kogawa would receive the Order of Canada in 1986 for her literary acheivement, what Roy Miki called "a novel that I believe is the most important literary work of the past 30 years for understanding Canadian history."

20 years ago, the Japanese Canadian Redress settlement was signed in Ottawa with Joy present. She stood in the House of Commons gallery, when NDP leader Ed Broadbent read a passage from "Obasan"

2005 was a busy year for Joy Kogawa. Obasan was the "One Book One Vancouver" selection for the Vancouver Public Library. "Naomi's Road", a mini-opera based on her children's novel debuted by the Vancouver Opera Touring Ensemble. And the childhood home of Joy Kogawa, which she had always hoped her family could return to after the war, was threatened with demolition. And on November 1st,at Vancouver City Hall, there was the Joy Kogawa Cherry Tree Planting".

On November 3rd, a presentation was made to Vancouver City Council to do whatever they could to stop or delay the proposed demolition of Joy Kogawa's childhood home. An unprecedented motion was passed to delay the processing of the demolition permit by 3 months. read Kogawa House: Vancouver Council votes unaminously to create 120 day delay to demolition application.

City councilor Jim Green accompanied Joy Kogawa in turning the sod. Jim had helped Joy take the original grafts from the tree a year before. They were accompanied by Vancouver chief librarian Paul Whitney, and Vancouver Opera managing director James Wright.Now there is a plaque to officially recognize and commemorate the significance of this young cherry tree. It is grafted from the original cherry tree from Joy Kogawa's childhood home.Joy Kogawa with City Librarian Paul Whitney, Opera Managing Director James Wright, and City Councillor Jim Green - photo Deb Martin

In May of 2006, The Land Conservancy of BC purchased the house at 1450 West 64th Ave, to help preserve the childhood home of author Joy Kogawa.

In April 2008, Joy released a children's picture book titled Naomi's Tree. It encompasses the stories of the WW2 internment, and also the saving of her childhood home, while reflecting on the friendship of a young child and cherry try as they both age and meet again. This book tells the story of the "Friendship Tree," Joy Kogawa reads "Naomi's Tree" at Vancouver Kidsbooks for the Vancouver book launch.

Visit Joy Kogawa at the Royal BC Museum - take a picture with her!

Fri, 12 Sep 2008 11:47:35 -0700

Where is Joy Kogawa in this picture?

This is the interactive photo display in front of the Royal BC Museum, in Victoria BC, for the "Free Spirit" exhibition celebrating the 150th Anniversary of British Columbia. These pictures are from "The Party" display which features 150 of BC's most fascinating people.

The display also features Japanese-Canadian David Suzuki and other famous authors such as Jane Rule, Douglas Coupland, PK Page and Dorothy Livesay.

Check out the website and find Joy and David Suzuki in:

http://www.freespiritbc.ca/virtualexhibition/theparty.aspx

hint: you can stand behind Joy, as Kogawa House committee member Deb Martin is doing. This picture of Joy was taken by Kogawa House committee members Deb and Todd Wong- who is is also featured in "The Party" exhibit.

The exhibition opened in March, Deb and I went to visit "Joy" in April: read our story: Traveling to "The Party" at BC Royal Museum

Cherry Tree planted, Sen. Ruth acknowledged as $ 1/2 Million donor, Joy given Georrge Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:18:42 -0700

It was a wonderful busy

busy day of celebration

at Joy Kogawa House

on April 25th.

3pm press conference, introduction of formerly anomnynous $500,000 donor (Sen. Nancy Ruth) + baby cherry tree planting

At 3:40pm, we sat inside the living room of Historic Joy Kogawa House and listened to CBC Radio One's Arts Report by Paul Grant. Paul had interviewed Sen. Nancy Ruth, Bill Turner and Joy Kogawa for his story on how the house was saved, and how Sen. Nancy Ruth's formerly anonymous gift of $500,000 was important. In this picture Hon. Iona Campagnolo, Sen. Nancy Ruth and Joy Kogawa.- photo Todd Wong

Hon. Iona Campagnolo (former BC Lt. Gov. speaks about importance of preserving culture and heritage represented through Historica Joy Kogawa house. She stands next to Joy Kogawa, Bill Turner (TLC executive director), Senator Nancy Ruth, Ujal Dosanjh MP for Vancouver South, Ellen Woodsworth (former Vancouver City councilor) - photo Todd Wong

4pm VIP reception - where we sold 6 baby cherry trees that will be planted at designated public sites (I want to plant one at Government House in Victoria)

Joy Kogawa signs books for MP Ujal Dosanjh and Vancouver councilor Heather Deal - two of the politicians we first contacted in 2005 to find ways to save the house and ensure its heritage designations. - photo Todd Wong

8pm Music and Poetry with Joy Kogawa and Friends, featuring poets George McWhirter, Heidi Greco, Marion Quednau, soprano Heather Pawsey, flautist Kathryn Cernauskas, pianist Rachel Kiyo Iwassa, and composer Leslie Uyeda.

Author Joy Kogawa reads to a packed house in her childhood home. Composer Leslie Uyeda stands 2nd from left. Vancouver Public Library Community Programming director Janice Douglas sits in the front row, 3rd from left. - photo Todd Wong

Following the music, Joy was presented with the George Woodcock Literary Achievement Award from BC Bookworld Publisher Alan Twigg, Vancouver Public Library Community Programs Director Janice Douglas, and historian Jean Barman.

Alan Twigg speaks of Joy's accomplishments Joy Kogawa accepts the award

This morning Joy Kogawa sent this email out to our Historic Joy Kogawa House Society

Dear Friends,

For a day of unalloyed happiness --

I have had many many wonderful days in my life -- but this one! It was the happiest. If ever I've felt at home.... Or felt the love that underlies all...

My friend Heather Pawsey, soprano wrote:

Last night was one of the most beautiful and profound evenings of my musical life. Heartfelt thanks to everyone behind Kogawa House. May it continue to rise and spread its wings.

Pictures and more details to follow.
see:

Kogawa House April 25 2008

Joy Kogawa House, April 25th 2008

Globe & Mail: 'Instead of dying, it's been given a second chance' - story about Joy Kogawa's childhood home and beloved cherry t

Fri, 25 Apr 2008 13:36:02 -0700

Globe & Mail: 'Instead of dying, it's been given a second chance' - story about Joy Kogawa's childhood home and beloved cherry tree

1) Joy and Timothy @ Kogawa House circa 1939 2) Joy and Timothy with friends circ 1939 3) Rev. Tim Nakayama, Roy Miki, Joy Kogawa and Todd Wong May 2005, at the Obasan Launch for One Book One Vancouver, Vancouver Public Library.

This is truly a miracle story. I remember in the early 1980's shelving "Obasan" on book shelves while I worked at the Vancouver Public Library. Just the existence of the book spoke to me about Asian-Canadian history and identity. I was inspired to learn more about Japanese-Canadian history as part of my own Asian-Canadian history, as part of my own identity as a Canadian.

The very first time I met Joy Kogawa was at Expo 86. She gave a reading, and read a poem titled "Oh Canada," about the sorry and loss of the internment. I introduced myself to her friend Roy Miki and he gave me Joy'
s copy of the poem.

Many years later, I am honoured to call these great Canadians as friends. It is a pleasure to be president of the Historic Joy Kogawa House Society, with so many good-hearted people on our board.

As I told CBC arts reporter Paul Grant, back in 2005 when we had just re-started the Save Kogawa House campaign, "Saving the house is a calling. It's something that has to be done.

Today, we have a literary and historic landmark for not only the City of Vancouver, but for all Canadians. And we still have work to do. We must restore the house to its 1942 qualities when Joy and her brother Tim lived in the house, before they were sent away to the internment camps and beet farms. We must build a writer's-in-residence program for this house.

'Instead of dying, it's been given a second chance'

Celebrated author Joy Kogawa returns to the house her family lost during their wartime internment and revels in its future

ROD MICKLEBURGH

From Friday's Globe and Mail

April 25, 2008 at 5:18 AM EDT

VANCOUVER — As a girl, Joy Nakayama would write from her family's miserable shack in the Alberta sugar beet fields to the new occupants of the comfortable Vancouver home seized from her family during the wartime internment of Japanese Canadians.

She begged the owners for a chance to get the house back. They never replied.

More than 60 years later, in a charming circle of history, Ms. Nakayama, better known as the celebrated writer Joy Kogawa, stood once more in her childhood home this week, eager to guide a visitor through its emotional past.

From her former bedroom window, she gazed again at the famous backyard cherry tree that forms the heart of her memories and so much of her writing.

"It's the tree, more than anything else, that grips me," Ms. Kogawa said. "It's as if it has a message written upon it, that everything we've gone through in life is known. ... When it dies, I feel I will die."

Split in the middle, oozing sap, with many of its limbs missing, the gnarled, ailing tree is nonetheless draped in a glorious display of springtime blossoms, as much a miracle of survival as the house itself.

The modest bungalow in the city's now fashionable Marpole district was just days from destruction when a last-minute, anonymous donation of $500,000 allowed The Land Conservancy to buy it, with hopes of establishing a writers' residence and a tribute to Ms. Kogawa and her award-winning novel Obasan, about the tragedy of internment.

The donor's identity is to be disclosed at a ceremony this afternoon. But The Globe and Mail has learned that the improbably large sum came from Conservative Senator Nancy Ruth, sister of former Ontario lieutenant-governor Henry Jackman.

"Why? Because I have a tremendous fondness for Joy Kogawa," Ms. Ruth explained, adding with a modest chuckle: "And also because of the tax incentives of the Harper government. No capital gains on stock earnings given to charity."

Internment was a shameful act, she said. "I can remember reading Obasan and weeping at the pain."

Yet, Ms. Ruth said, Ms. Kogawa retains a deep sense of faith in humanity, that reconciliation and hope are still possible, even in the face of things that are terrible.

Writers residing in the house in the future will have to deal with that, Ms. Ruth said. "How can you sit at a desk and look out at that cherry tree and not think from whence all that came?"

As for Ms. Kogawa, the six-year-old who once dangled upside down from the tree's low branches is now grey-haired and 72, albeit with undiminished energy and flashing eyes.

She can scarcely comprehend the astounding chain of events that has brought her childhood refuge back after so many years, particularly on a street where many residences were torn down long ago in favour of larger, more expensive dwellings.

"I had given up. I'd gone to the realtors. I pleaded and begged not to let it go. I offered to write books for them, to name characters after their children. It all fell on deaf ears."

Now, she marvelled, "such a strange thing has happened here. It's all a bit surreal, dream-like. I don't know even how to describe it. It's like some movie script, this sense of wonder and delight."

During her tour of the house, Ms. Kogawa indicated how much has changed over the years. New walls, doors and windows replaced, closets ripped out.

"My mother's piano was right there," she said, gesturing toward an empty corner of the living room. "The gramophone was over there, and that's where the goldfish

bowl stood."

She headed into the basement. Suddenly, there were gasps of surprise.

"There they are! The windows and the doors!" She pointed to a pair of fine French doors and old window frames, carefully stacked along a wall. "And there's some of the cedar planks that my father put in. Wouldn't it be great if things could be brought back to the way they were?"

Ms. Kogawa brought back a few family possessions that survived internment. Her brother's toy cars, her mother's Japanese tea set, tattered picture books. "These are the pictures I grew up with." And an old apple crate. "That was saved, because it was useful when we had to move," she said, without bitterness.

It was a good day.

"The story of this house has come to a wonderful place, like a new beginning," she said, groping to find just the right words.

"It had one birth. It lived its life, and then, instead of dying, it's been given a second chance. That's a wonderful, wonderful thing to have.

"It's going to live again. It will breathe. It will bring life to people. It will bring reconciliation. Those are the things this house has been called to do."

A Place of Compassion: Joy Kogawa's Dream Vancouver statement

Sun, 21 Oct 2007 09:53:09 -0700

A Place of Compassion:
Joy Kogawa's Dream Vancouver statement

Joy Kogawa holds up her arms to embrace and support everything she loves in the world
- photo Todd Wong

Joy Kogawa, author of Obasan, has written A Place of Compassion for her submission to the Dream Vancouver conference and website, organized by Think City. While Joy will not be attending the conference, I will be as one of the directors of the Joy Kogawa House Society.

Dream Vancouver is an all-day conference which will take participants from their dreams about Vancouver to a possible agenda for change. The conference will be facilitated by Bliss Browne, internationally-renowned speaker and president of Imagine Chicago. Former City of Vancouver Co-Director of Current Planning Larry Beasley is key note speaker. Ms. Browne will then facilitate a discussion-based session which will take participants through a series of questions designed to bring them to a collective vision of what the city could be.

To attend you must register, click here.

Registration: 9:30 am - 10:00 am
Conference: 10:00 am - 3:30 pm
Reception: 3:30 pm - 4:30 pm

Location: Jewish Community Centre, 950 W. 41st Avenue, Vancouver (at Oak Street).

- photo courtesy Joy Kogawa

Is Joy a Vancouver dreamer? She was born in Vancouver in 1935. During WW2 in 1942, when she was 6 years old, her family was removed from Vancouver and sent to internment camps for Japanese-Canadians. She forever dreamed about returning to the the house in Vancouver's Marpole neighborhood, even after the Canadian government confiscated the property of the Japanese-Canadian internment victims, and resettled them to work as labourers on Alberta beet farms. She lives mostly in Toronto but returns to Vancouver often, and has great hopes for Vancouver as a city, and as a cultural entity.

Joy Kogawa and her brother Rev. Timothy Nakayama, at the opening event for Obasan, the 2005 choice for One Book One Vancouver at the Vancouver Public Library - photo Todd Wong

Joy is acknowledged as one of Canada's most important writers in the 20th Century for her ground breaking novel Obasan - a story about the impact of the internment on the Japanese Canadian community. Since May 2005, when I met Joy, at the first Obasan event for One Book, One Vancouver event at the Vancouver Public Library, our developing friendship was been a wild ride as I became a key player on the Save Kogawa House committee (See my articles on Joy Kogawa & Kogawa House).

I have witnessed Joy speak in numerous circumstances and she always seems to have an unwavering position that calls for peace and compassion in so many circumstances. It embraces her anti-war stance, the Japanese-Canadian redress, South African apartheid, the Chinese-Canadian head tax issue, Japanese atrocities against China in WW2, the history of her ancestor's home of Okinawa, the naming of the 401 Burrard building after Howard Green. Joy doesn't look to find blame for right or wrong, she looks to find resolution.

Joy Kogawa and Todd Wong at the 2006 Canadian Club Vancouver's annual Order of Canada / Flag Day luncheon. Joy was key note speaker, and Todd was one of the event organizers - photo Deb Martin

Vancouver has long had a reputation for a history with peace activism. This is part of our social-cultural make up, and can be embodied through social policy initiatives. Perhaps it has become such because so many people have come to Vancouver after leaving war, destruction, starvation, revolution, upheaval in their home lands.

Joy has given Dream Vancouver a very apt and fitting dream statement to find reconciliation and understanding "within and between the faiths, between rich and poor, among immigrant groups, in established neighbourhoods, in the Downtown Eastside, among those who are still suffering from unresolved injustices of the near and distant past can come to healing and hope and inner freedom."

Joy Kogawa and children from Tomsett Elementary School in Richmond. After seeing the Vancouver Opera Touring Ensembles production of "Naomi's Road", the children were inspired to helps save Kogawa House from demolition. Joy and the children stand in front of the house for their own private tour and reading event. - photo Joan Young

On November 10th, come to the 2nd open house event at Kogawa House.
Sunday, 3-5pm. 1450 West 64th Ave. (just East of Granville St.)
Admission is by donation. Proceeds go to restoring historic Joy Kogawa House, now owned by The Land Conservancy of BC.

A Place of Compassion

Posted October 15th, 2007 in Dreamers

Joy Kogawa, poet and novelist: The dream I have for this west-coast city on the edge of the peaceable ocean is the dream I have for the world - a dream of peace. What better time than this to abolish war as we face our common planetary fate?

We have choices - to continue blithely on our way, fighting and devouring one another for the rest of our dwindling days, or we can individually and collectively lay down our weapons and practice the ways of truth and reconciliation, cooperation and peace.

In a city where east-west faces and races meet and mix, where cultures both clash and blend, the ways of peace can be cultivated, watered, nurtured and the seeds of that action can fly to the farthest corners of our hearts and the world.

As a Japanese Canadian, I have welcomed conversations with two granddaughters of Howard Green, the politician whose public words against us during the Second World War were dreaded in our community. If they can seek to make peace with us on behalf of the grandfather they loved, ought we not to walk with them? What an opportunity for peace making and for walking on.

And ought we not, as Canadian descendants from Japan, to stand with those Canadian descendants of China, who seek a fulsome parliamentary acknowledgment from the country of our ancestors for the horrors their ancestors faced in the Rape of Nanking? Or is it our choice to turn aside and say, "These are no concerns of ours." I believe that the morally appropriate action is to respond to those who suffer and who call our names.

But it is not for me to say what is right for anyone else. We are each required to struggle with our own conscience and to respond to the many voices that call us.

read here: for the rest of Joy's statement

Joy Kogawa House Society is a community partner for the Think City's "Dream Vancouver" conference

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 00:40:42 -0700

Joy Kogawa House Society is a community partner for the Think City's "Dream Vancouver" conference

I have registered Joy Kogawa House Society as a community partner for the Dream Vancouver conference, happening on October 21st.

The Dream Vancouver conference sounds like a great idea. It will bring together city leaders and community activists to build a collective vision for the city, that can embrace its development and its future.

No doubt the conference title was inspired by the wonderful book Dream City: Vancouver and the Global Imagination by Lance Berelowitz. It is about the story behind Vancouver's emerging urban form: the buildings, public spaces, extraordinary landscapes and cultural values that have turned the city into the poster-child of North American urbanism.

From the Think City website:

Think City believes that all of us can help shape Vancouver’s future by participating in the development of new ideas and proposals – for affordable housing, sustainability, culture and the health of our neighbourhoods.

At Dream Vancouver, Think City and Simon Fraser University’s Public Policy Program will bring together community activists, citizens and people like you to share ideas on the most pressing challenges facing the City of Vancouver.

The Dream Vancouver conference on Sunday, October 21, 2007 will follow an “open space,” Appreciative Inquiry format facilitated by internationally renowned speaker and Imagine Chicago President Bliss Browne. Our keynote speaker for the conference will be former City of Vancouver Co-Director of Current Planning Larry Beasley.

Last month the conference organizers asked me to be a "Vancouver dreamer" because of my work in developing Gung Haggis Fat Choy and in helping to save Joy Kogawa House. They asked for myself and Joy to write "Dream statements for the future of Vancouver" for the conference.

There are lots of great dream statements from people like Dr. Kerry Jang, Joy MacPhail, Mike Harcourt, environmentalist Joye Foy, SUCCESS Ceo Tung Chan, Vancouver Board of Trade manager Darcy Rezac, policy planner Kennedy Stewart.

Here is my statement:

Dream Vancouver:
Diversity in our History and our Future

When my great-great grandfather Rev. Chan Yu Tan came to BC in 1896, the roads were dirt, and there was a head tax on Chinese immigrants.

When I grew up in the 1960’s and 1970’s I marveled at the way Hawaiian culture was so ethnically diverse. Asian faces were on nightly news casts, and Hawaiian culture was embraced by mainstream American culture. In Vancouver, there was still a sense of racial divisions, and ethnic marginalization. Chinese-Canadian and First Nations history were more likely relegated to sidebar stories and foot notes.

Today, I am living my dream of making Vancouver and Canada more racially tolerant and interculturally exciting!

Every culture that lived along the Silk Road from Italy to Japan, from India to Egypt now lives in Vancouver. Through the cross-fertilization of ideas, we are able to express new ways of seeing ideas and expressing customs, of expressing the same oneness through many perspectives of the kaleidoscope of life. But so many times we talk about Canada as a mosaic or multicultural, and become more concerned with the pieces while we lose sight of the whole.

Vancouver IS an inter-cultural crossroad and we are inter-historic… linking not only Vancouver’s history with each new wave of immigrants – but also with our collective global history. We carry within us the global cultural history of the world… in our little city on the edge.

Vancouver must become a 21st Century Renaissance City. The “Gateway to the Pacific” is gone with the passage of steam ships… we are now in the computer internet information era. Everything is instant – within hours… minutes… seconds. We know what is happening around the world. Vancouverites can live here and work all around the world.

We must NOT be afraid of doing something new or borrowing from a different culture, nor to place an idea within a different context. Creative synthesis takes what already exists and applies it to different scenarios – new and exciting.

This is the simple beauty of Gung Haggis Fat Choy. How would a Robbie Burns Day be celebrated by Chinese-Canadians? How would a Chinese New Year be celebrated by Scottish-Canadians?

What if… Canadians had both Chinese and Scottish ancestry? What if we celebrated both Robbie Burns Day and Chinese New Year on the same day… with the same families?

This is the future of Vancouver. We are already acknowledged as the Canadian city with the most intercultural marriages.

We are all one family.

I see a day for Vancouver when every family will have a member whose ancestry: paid the Chinese head tax; was an indentured Scottish labourer after the Highland clearings; was a French-Canadian settler; is First Nations; left Iran after the Shah was deposed; was in the Japanese-Canadian internment camps during WW2; or fished in the Maritimes; or worked oil fields in Alberta; and is addicted to dragon boat racing.

We MUST know our history to build our future. How did we come to be here? Who built and shaped this city?

People told us it was impossible, when we embarked on our campaign to save author Joy Kogawa’s childhood home from demolition. But in our success we helped to build a corner stone foundation for our future Vancouver. It gave Vancouver its first literary landmark for a Canadian writer. It gave Vancouver a landmark from a dark period of its history when Canadians, born of Japanese ancestry were rounded up and sent off to internment camps in the mountains, and their property was confiscated… for no reason other than fear.

Kogawa House can link history, literature, the arts, social-criticism, heritage, and multiculturalism all together. By building understandings for our cultural history, through the arts, business, and even recreation sports like dragon boat racing, we can give value to our history… and to our future.

We need to educate and mentor our future leaders. Our city, our societies and our education must embrace the continued diversity of our cultures. We must build inter-disciplinary social-cultural philosophical infrastructures throughout business, society, arts, politics, academia, sports and recreation. There is no separation between business and art, between sports and history, between academia and recreation. All is related, and everything is possible. This is my Vancouver.

Todd Wong

Joy Kogawa's dream statement to be posted soon.

Joy Kogawa House Society is now a legal entity

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 00:02:12 -0700

The Historic Joy Kogawa House Society is now incorporated with the BC Registry of Societies, which means we’re now a legal entity that can carry forward the purposes of the society:

Purposes

The purposes of the Society shall be:

1. To operate and preserve the former Joy Kogawa family home at 1450 West 64th Avenue in Vancouver as a heritage and cultural centre and as a site of healing and reconciliation.

2. To establish in the former Joy Kogawa family home a centre for writers in which they can reflect on issues of conscience and reconciliation and write about their own personal experiences or the experiences of others, past or present.

3. To promote and negotiate the raising of funds for the pursuit of the Society’s purposes.

4. To encourage in the former Joy Kogawa family home educational programming along themes of social justice and social history, and to provide docent services for such programming.

5. To advocate on behalf of the continuing operation of the house in the public interest consistent with the above purposes.

Cherry tree blossoms at Kogawa House

Wed, 09 May 2007 23:23:42 -0700

Cherry Blossoms at Kogawa House

Joy Kogawa outside Kogawa House in Marpole 2005. "Photo-Dan Toulgoet, Vancouver Courier" - used by permission

The cherry blossoms have been out everywhere in Vancouver since late March. In mid-April I was driving through Vancouver's Marpole neighborhood, when I thought I should go visit Joy Kogawa's childhood home at 1450 West 64th Ave.

It had been back the summer of 2005, when I had received an e-mail from Ann-Marie Metten that Joy Kogawa's beloved cherry tree was diseased and dying. She and a group that included then Vancouver city councillor Jim Green, gathered grafts from the cherry tree to try to preserve it for future incarnations - because it was feared that the owner would not give up the house.

This was the house that the Save Kogawa House Committee, which I was part of, had worked so hard to save from demolition, when the owner decided to draw up plans to demolish the house and build a new one. It was an intensive awareness campaign from September to December when The Land Conservancy of BC decided to step in and take on this project, deeming it a worthy Vancouver landmark of cultural and historical importance. Then it was from December until May, as we tried to raise funds to save the house... almost taking a mortgage out before an anomynous donor stepped in with almost $300,000 to allow TLC to purchase the house.

But now the task is to continue raising funds and awareness to both renovate the home and restore it to the qualities it had before Joy and her family were forced to leave their house due to enforced internment of Japanese Canadians during WW2 - even though they were born in Canada! We also want to build an endowment and create a writers-in-residence program as well as community programming.

Cherry Tree at Kogawa House Nov 2005 - photo by Don Montgomery

Last spring, Joy was living in Vancouver, and she went to visit the cherry tree to find a few spare blossoms. The tree was sickly. At the open house in September - Joy placed manure around the tree's base, spoke kind words and blessings for the tree. Joy soon returned to Toronto, but has returned to Vancouver briefly for Christmas with her daughter and grandchildren and recently at the end of March to see relatives and to give a reading for the Alcuin Society at Kogawa House on March 30th.

I drove past the front of the house... everything looks nice, except the white picket fence has fallen down.

I drove around the back of the house... and saw a most beautiful sight. The cherry tree was in full bloom.

Blossoms on cherry tree at Kogawa House - photo Todd Wong

It is like the tree (and the house) knows it has a new life. It is an old tree but heavy and full with blossoms.
Beautiful... I know if Joy saw the tree with its blossoms, there would be tears of happiness in her eyes.

Blossoms on cherry tree at Kogawa House - photo Todd Wong

2007 Blossoms on Kogawa House cherry tree - photo Todd Wong

Joy Kogawa gives March 30th reading for Alcuin Society at Kogawa House

Mon, 23 Apr 2007 23:34:56 -0700

Joy Kogawa gives March 30th reading for Alcuin Society at Kogawa House

Seventeen Alcuin Society members and their guests participated in the first of a new series of members-only meetings on March 30th at the historic Joy Kogawa heritage house in Marpole.

Kogawa House Committee member Ann-Marie Metten started the evening by explaining the series of successful steps that were taken to save the historic house from demolition. Future plans are to return the house to its original condition and then to offer the house as a place of retreat for writers of conscience from around the world.

Richard Hopkins then spoke of Joy Kogawa’s considerable literary achievements in the areas of fiction, poetry and children’s literature. Joy’s books were available for members to examine after the presentations.

The definite highlight of the evening, however, was a reading by Joy herself from her award winning novel Obasan. The reading had particular resonance for the audience since Joy continuously referred to places mentioned in the novel that were right before the audience’s eyes.

After the reading she spoke with incredible energy and passion about the Japanese internment during the Second World War and all of the hardship and suffering that that injustice caused so many Japanese families and the Japanese community in Canada as a whole.

Fortunately some reparation for these wrongs have occurred in the form of Federal Government redress and in the saving of the Kogawa house itself. All of the audience members felt at the end of the evening that they had received a rare privilege in being able to hear Joy read and speak her own moving personal experience.

More heritage reconition for Joy Kogawa House - articles in Vancouver Commerce and Journal of Commerce

Wed, 28 Feb 2007 17:16:28 -0800

More Heritage recognition

for Joy Kogawa House

write ups in Vancouver Courier

and Journal of Commerce

Here are some articles about the Vancouver Heritage Awards.

Fred Lee wrote in the Vancouver Courier
Urban Landscape

Mayor Sam Sullivan conferred honours on the champions of heritage at the recent 28th annual City of Vancouver Heritage Awards held in historic Coastal Church on Georgia Street. Recipients included Duncan Wilson and Rowland Johnson for rehabilitating the 1899 Rand House on Bute Street, the Land Conservancy for its efforts in saving the home of writer Joy Kogawa and H.R. Hatch Architect, McGinn Engineering and Ballenas Project Management for the preservation efforts on the Left Bank temple bank building on Main Street. The Courier's Lisa Smedman picked up an Award of Merit for her series on the history of Vancouver neighbourhoods.

Journal of Commerce reported the winners:
City honours 2007 Heritage Award winners

The 28th annual City of Vancouver Heritage Awards were presented on February 19, the first day of Heritage Week, to honour the extraordinary efforts of architects, community organizations, developers, writers, artists and ordinary citizens who work to preserve our heritage.

Mayor Sam Sullivan conferred award certificates upon the winners who represented a range of projects which reflect the diversity of the heritage in neighbourhoods across the city.

Awards of Honour were presented for:

844 Dunlevy Street: awarded to owners Graham Elvidge and Kathleen Stormont for their exemplary restoration of this Queen Anne house in one of Vancouver’s first neighbourhoods, and advancing the education, awareness, and advocacy of heritage in the community and the city.

TLC, The Land Conservancy: awarded to TLC, The Land Conservancy, and the Save Joy Kogawa House Committee for its outstanding advocacy efforts in saving the childhood home of writer Joy Kogawa, and bringing municipal, provincial, national and international attention to the effort with its theme of “Hope, Healing and Reconciliation”.

TLC press release: VANCOUVER HERITAGE AWARD OF HONOUR GOES TO TLC & KOGAWA HOUSE COMMITTEE

Thu, 22 Feb 2007 15:20:50 -0800

NEWS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Feb 21, 2007

VANCOUVER HERITAGE AWARD OF HONOUR GOES TO TLC & KOGAWA HOUSE COMMITTEE

VANCOUVER, BC – TLC The Land Conservancy and Kogawa House Committee has received a 2007 City of Vancouver Heritage Award for their work in protecting the childhood home of Canadian author, Joy Kogawa.

The 28th annual City of Vancouver Heritage Awards were presented on February 19, the first day of Heritage Week, to tribute the extraordinary efforts of architects, community organization, developers, writers, artists and ordinary citizen who work to preserve Vancouver’s heritage.

Mayor Sam Sullivan conferred an award of honour to TLC and the Kogawa House Committee, for its outstanding advocacy efforts in saving the Historic Joy Kogawa House, bringing municipal, provincial, national and international attention to the effort with its theme of “Hope, Healing and Reconciliation”, thus preserving an important part of Vancouver’s cultural heritage.

Historic Joy Kogawa House is the childhood home of author Joy Kogawa, from which she and her family were removed from the home in 1942 as part of the Government’s policy of internment of Canadians of Japanese ancestry during World War II. Located in the Marpole neighbourhood of Vancouver, Kogawa House is a symbol of the wrongs that were committed in the past. It is this house that is featured prominently in her award winning novel Obasan, a powerful story of that internment and features the house prominently as part of her childhood recollections.

“It is an honour to be recognized among the heritage community and I’d like to thank everyone that worked on this fundraising campaign as well as our 550 donors,” says Bill Turner, TLC’s Executive Director. “I’m pleased to say this accomplishment is a testament of what a community of concerned individuals can to do to make a change in the world. It is important for us to ensure our stories as a national do not disappear over time. The story of the Historic Joy Kogawa House will live on with everyone it touched.”

“This house was saved by the poets, writers, film makers, literary and heritage lovers, and the activists and visionaries of our community, “ says Todd Wong of the Kogawa House Committee. “It is a powerful gift to Vancouver, BC, Canada and the world for the voices of conscience. That the house has survived this long is a miracle, and it took a miracle to save it. This house was destined to become both a historical and literary landmark. The Kogawa House committee is honoured to receive this award, and we are in debt to all the believers.”

In light of the fact TLC purchased the Historic Joy Kogawa House in early June 2006, donations are still required for restoration and an endowment to allow the house to be used both as an educational site addressing the issue of the internment of Canadians of Japanese heritage during the World War II and as a site for a ‘Writers-in-Residence’ program. Donations can be made by calling: (604) 733-2313.

-30-

For further information:
TLC: Bill Turner (250) 213-1090; bturner@conservancy.bc.ca
Save Kogawa House Committee: Todd Wong (604) 240-7090; gunghaggis@yahoo.ca

TLC and Save Joy Kogawa House committee both receive City of Vancouver Heritage Award of Honour

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 19:28:00 -0800

TLC and Save Joy Kogawa

House committee both

receive City of Vancouver

Heritage Award of Honour

It was a great night for the members of Save Kogawa House Committee and TLC: The Land Conservancy of BC. We were all honoured with the City of Vancouver Heritage Awards of Honour. It was the last award presented following the multiple recipients for awards of recognition and awards of merit. TLC executive director Bill Turner and myself, for Save Kogawa House Committee, were tagged to give the aceptance speeches.

The awards were held at the beautiful and historic Coastal Church, at 1160 West Georgia St. A reception was held from 5:30 to 7pm, and it was great to see and socialize with all the event's attendees. I had a great chat with historian Jean Barman. City Councillor Peter Ladner congratulated me on a well-run Gung Haggis Fat Choy that he attended. Other City Councillors Heather Deal, George Chow and Suzanne Anton congratulated us on saving Kogawa House. Friends Kelly Ip, Howe Lee were there. Parks Commissioner Spencer Herbert gave me the latest update on his petition to name the new Vancouver park at Selkirk and 72nd, as David Suzuki Park. Artist Raymond Chow and house genealogist James Johnstone were there. Dianne Switzer of the Vancouver Heritage Foundation waved to us.

The evening's emcee was Christopher Gaze, creator and director of Bard on the Beach. Gaze gave a summation of Vancouver's early arts and cultural history, accompanied by projected pictures. It started with the first piano arriving in 1851, and included great names and performances such as Nijinksky, Boris Karloff and Benny Goodman, as well as local luminaries such as Dal Richards and Jimmy Pattison. This "introduction" to the awards event finished with a musical performance by Destino, the four tenors "popera" group.

Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan came to the stage to welcome and thank all the nominees. Mayor Sullivan handed out the award certificates, after Gaze read descriptions of each of the award winning projects.

Here is the draft of the acceptance speech which I presented at the Vancouver Heritage Awards:

Once upon a time, 6 year old Naomi Nakane was told to pack for a train vacation with her brother Stephen. But it wasn’t a vacation. And the train took them far away from the house that they loved. They would never ever again live in a house as nice or as loved. They would learn that as Canadians of Japanese ancestry… they were being singled out, removed from the West Coast, interned in former ghost-towns as make-shift camps, have their houses, businesses and property left behind confiscated and sold by the government, and then given an option to “repatriate” to Japan or move East away from the coast, because the government and community leaders did not want them trying to reclaim their former property. They were dispersed across Canada like the blowing snow.

That is the fictional story of Joy Kogawa’s award winning books Obasan and Naomi’s Road.

Joy’s real story is that after they were interned, as a little girl, she would dream about their house. She would write letters to the occupants of the house, asking politely if someday, when they no longer wanted the house, if they could buy it back.

The little girl – Joy Kogawa grew up to become one of Canada’s most important writers. Her first novel Obasan was the first major Canadian fiction to address with Japanese Canadian internment. It later became a children’s story Naomi’s Road.

On later visits she discovered that the house, her childhood home was still standing. Attempts in 2002 to raise money to purchase the house, was thwarted when the house was sold to an overseas owner.

2005 was the year of Joy Kogawa. Vancouver Public Library chose Obasan as the 2005 selection for One Book One Vancouver. Vancouver Opera premiered a 45 minute opera based on Naomi’s Road to tour to BC Schools.

And during a week when Joy’s work was being celebrated all across the city, at Word On The Street, Vancouver Arts Awards, and by Asian Canadian Writer’s Workshop… We learned that the demolition permit was being applied for.

This house was saved.

This house was saved by poets, writers, film makers, human rights activists, historians, and visionaries.

From people all across Canada. From Canadians abroad – We heard from Sweden and Japan and USA. This house is for all Vancouverites, and for Canadians and global citizens who care about Canadian history. Culture and human rights. Anton Wagner, Ann-Marie and I are not Japanese-Canadians. We weren’t interned. We aren’t married into JC families. But we are concerned Canadians who love our history, culture and heritage. There is little in Vancouver to celebrate our Japanese Canadian, Asian Canadian pioneer heritage in Vancouver. We need to recognize our Asian-Canadian pioneers and our centuries long heritage.

Vancouver’s literary landmarks are a Robbie Burns statue and Pauline Johnson memorial in Stanley Park. Kogawa House gives us something contempoary. It lives and breathes with each reading of Obasan, each performance of Naomi’s Road. Millions of people visit Amsterdam to visit Anne Frank House. Millions of people visit Prince Edward Island to see the home of Anne of Green Gables. But Anne Shirley was fictional. Joy Kogawa is real. And Joy’s stories continue to tell the history and the culture of Canadians.

With a Kogawa House Writing Centre, we can continue to celebrated Joy’s works and the history of Japanese Canadians. We can also encourage writers to share their stories and help write our future story of Canada – hopefully one free of racism and internment camps.

We wish to thank:

Gerry McGeough and Hugh McLean of the City’s Heritage Planning department, who first communicated with Anton Wagner about the demolition. Hugh was responding to an Attention Read Note that former heritage planner Terry Brunette had placed on the Kogawa House property listing in the City’s planning department. Gerry was very helpful in drafting an unprecedented motion to delay approval of a demolition permit for 120 days.

Heather Redfern of the Vancouver Alliance for Arts and Culture, Marion Quednau of the Writers Union of Canada and Diane Switzer, for speaking on our behalf to Vancouver City Council on November 3, 2005.

Diane Switzer and Vancouver Heritage Foundation for first coming to Vancouver City Hall to meet with Terry Brunette in October 2003 and then connecting us with TLC The Land Conservancy after we had won the 120-day delay.

Jim Green and Sen. Larry Campbell for declaring Joy Kogawa Obasan Day at Vancouver City Hall, for making the first public announcment and telling the audience at Vancouver Arts Awards about the need to save the house.

Chris Kurata in Toronto for organizing to stop the demolition and creating the first Kogawa House website.

Roy Miki for always being there for consultation and readings.

Margaret Atwood and Paul Yee for their valued quotes.

James Johnston for his early genealogy of 1450 West 64th Ave.

Ellen Woodsworth for her early help prepping us for the City Hall Council meeting on November 3, 2005.

City Councilors Suzanne Anton and Heather Deal, whom we first contacted as Park Commissioners.

Raymond Chow for creating a painting of Joy as a child at the house circa 1941.

The 2005 Vancouver City Council for passing a unamimous decision to delay processing of the demolition permit and making donations out of their pocket that day to launch fundraising.

Literary and writing assocations across Canada for their early and continuing support, including the following:

Writers Union of Canada
Federation of BC Writers
Playwrights Guild of Canada
Canadian Authors Association
Periodical Writers Association of Canada
PEN Canada
Vancouver International Writers and Readers Festival
Canadian Society of Children’s Authors, Illustrators and Performers
League of Canadian Poets

Writers' Trust of Canada
Asian Canadian Writers Workshop

The project has also been endorsed by the Vancouver Public Library Board, Vancouver Opera, the Alliance for Arts and Culture, Heritage Vancouver, The Land Conservancy, the National Nikkei Museum and Heritage Centre, the National Association of Japanese Canadians, the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, Association of Book Publishers of BC

VPL's One Book One Vancouver Program & Vancouver Opera's Naomi's Road for really raising the awareness of Joy Kogawa and her work.

Joan Young and her Grades 3 and 4 class at Thomsett Elementary in Richmond, and her principal Sabina Harpe, for motivating the children to take part in the campaign. They created their own initiatives to save the house by writing letters to Vancouver City Council and meeting with Councillor Kim Capri.

The Reverend Val Anderson, former MLA for Vancouver-Langara, who took a special interest in the project because of his connections to the Japanese Canadian community in Marpole.

The Honorable Ujjal Dosanjh, who spoke on behalf of Kogawa House in Parliament on April 6, 2006.

The Nikkei Voice and the National Association of Japanese Canadians, who were supportive from the beginning of the campaign.

Don Luxton, executive director of Heritage Vancouver, who listed Kogawa House as one of Vancouver's Top 10 Endangered Heritage Sites in 2006 and then discussed our campaign during a guided tour aboard a vintage Transit Museum Society bus

Our wonderful anonymous donor (who came to the rescue when TLC was prepared to purchase the house with a mortgage).

TLC, The Land Conservancy of British Columbia, for stepping into the project to take over the fundraising and the nitty gritty details that we had no experience handling. Bill Turner, executive director, their team of Tamsin Baker, Heather Skydt and Rich Kenny, and the many board members.

Our dedicated members and volunteers of Kogawa House Committee:

Anton Wagner, Chris Kurata, Margaret Steffler, Tomoko Makabe and Kathy Chung in Ontario

Ann-Marie Metten, David Kogawa, Ellen Crowe-Swords, Richard Hopkins, Jen Kato, Joan Young, Sabina Harpe, Deb Martin, and Harry Aoki in Vancouver

Also . . . journalists who covered the story, including Alexandra Gill and Rod Mickleburgh of the Globe and Mail, Sandra Thomas of the Vancouver Courier; Kate Taylor and Michael Posner in the Globe and Mail; Barbara Wickens in Maclean's magazine; CBC Radio's Paul Grant and Sheryl Mackay for their stories; Radio Canada for covering our November 10 awareness event, and to Kathryn Gretsinger and her producer Rosemary Allenbach, who broadcast Joy’s appeal to rescue her home on a Boxing Day broadcast of "Sounds Like Canada."

Thank you all.

Joy Kogawa House committee to receive Vancouver Heritage Award of Honour

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 02:32:30 -0800

Joy Kogawa House committee

to receive Vancouver Heritage

Award of Honour

A young Joy Kogawa with brother Tim standing beside their childhood home in Marpole prior to 1942 - photo courtesy of Joy Kogawa

On February 19th, at Coastal Church, the City of Vancouver Heritage Awards will give the Heritage Award of Honour jointly to Joy Kogawa House Committee and The Land Conservancy of BC.

Joy Kogawa House was the childhood home of award winning author Joy Kogawa, which she was forced to leave in 1942, at age six, when Japanese-Canadians were "evacuated" from the BC Coast and sent to internment camps during World War 2. The Canadian government subsequently confiscated all their remaining property and auctioned it off, supposedly to help pay for the cost of internment.

She and her mother always dreamed of returning to the house, but their family was sent to live in Alberta as part of the Japanese Canadian dispersal program, in an effort to keep Japanese Canadians from returning to the Coast, and trying to reclaim their confiscated property.

Obasan (1981), is the award winning book that is a fictional memoir about the internment of the Japanese-Canadians. It is considered one of Canada's most important 100 books ever written according to the Literary Review of Canada. It is the second most studied book in Canadian schools and universities.

I am one of the committee members for the Joy Kogawa House committee along with Ann-Marie Metten, David Kogawa, Anton Wagner, Ellen Crowe-Swords, Richard Hopkins, Jen Kato, Joan Young and Sabina Harpe. We have all put in incredible hours of volunteer work to help realize this project.

It was only 17 short months ago, when Ann-Marie Metten contacted me for help when she learned that a demolition inquiry for 1450 West 64th Ave. was being made. In the months to come, we would be asked why it was important to save the childhood home of author Joy Kogawa. We would also be told that there was little chance to save it.

The 3rd week of September 2005, was a roller coaster for Joy Kogawa. She learned of the demolition plans in the same week that saw: 1) excerpts from the Naomi's Road opera performed at Vancouver Arts Awards; 2) she received the Community Builder's Award from Asian Canadian Writer's Workshop; and 3) the final event of One Book One Vancouver "Obasan" program where she gave a reading at Word On The Street book and magazine festival.

In December 2005, The Land Conservancy of BC stepped in to become a joint partner in our project to save the house. They became the chief fundraiser and eventually purchased the house in full in May 2006.

Joy with Richmond elementary students who wanted to save Kogawa House - photo Joan Young

We are ecstatic and honoured to receive the Award of Honour, for projects demonstrating an outstanding contribution to heritage conservation.

Nominations were accepted for:

Restoration, rehabilitation, adaptive re-use or continued maintenance of a heritage building, a significant interior of a heritage building, or characteristic features of a heritage building;
Use of innovative engineering techniques or restoration/conservation methods in upgrading a heritage building which may include seismic upgrading;
Preservation of a heritage landscape;
Heritage advocacy of a group or individual in the preservation of a heritage site or increasing public awareness of heritage issues;
Publication, education or exhibit that promotes heritage conservation;
Efforts in community or neighbourhood revitalization.

Click here to see past Heritage Award winners

The Tyee: Michael Kluckner about the importance of Kogawa House and The Land Conservancy of BC

Sat, 09 Dec 2006 00:24:34 -0800

The Tyee: Michael Kluckner about the importance of Kogawa House

and The Land Conservancy of BC

Michael Kluckner is a writer/painter and heritage advocate.  He has done

wonderful things to promote the heritage of BC, documented in his book

and his works titled  Vanishing British Columbia.  In a recent article by

Charles Campbell in The Tyee, Kluckner talks about the importance of

Kogawa House and the wonderful work by The Land Conservancy of BC.

http://thetyee.ca/Photo/2006/12/08/VanishingBC/

On the virtue of taking individual heritage preservation initiatives out of government hands:

"One of the things I can take some credit for being involved in at the very beginning and suggesting it is the privatizing of the B.C. Heritage Trust and the creation of the Heritage Legacy Fund of B.C., which was given $5 million in seed money right in the darkest days of the Liberal government. I was the treasurer, until a few weeks ago.

"The Land Conservancy is one of the partners in the heritage legacy fund, and they're going out and doing things like this marvellous high-wire act with the Kogawa house [where Obasan author Joy Kogawa lived before the Second World War internment of Japanese-Canadians]. In a sense, they are showing how some public money, put into an endowment administered by a private foundation, with private fundraising, can really make a difference. You think of how significant the Kogawa house is as a site on the cultural map of Canada. They're able to save this in the hottest real estate market that Vancouver's ever seen.

"Politicians come and go, and they're focused on their term of office. Stewardship is a longer-term commitment. The National Trusts in Britain and Australia have never been governmental organizations. There are governmental organizations in England that perform really good roles, but I think the evidence is that governments, whether they are left or right, can't be counted on to have consistent policies that allow for stewardship.

"The grassroots desire to save the Kogawa house -- this is not something that was seen by the Liberal or Conservative governments federally as being important. But there were obviously people all over the country who said 'This is important.' The people are ahead of the government on that. A mechanism that allows this to happen is often much more flexible. The reality is that in Australia, England, Scotland, you get people's interests reflected through an organization more than you get people's values reflected through a government. Governments have other fish to fry.

"The city is somehow way more accessible to people. What's missing is the idea of heritage that is more holistic. Going back to the walk-up apartments on South Granville -- somehow these buildings have to be recognized holistically as being part of the city's future as much as they are a part of the past."

On British Columbia's two solitudes:

"But then you get out into the countryside, and you've got the two solitudes, the urban and the rural. In the city, most of the change is due to development. The city's rich, and it can make choices, and most of the time they are pretty good choices. But out in the countryside, change is due to abandonment, and there's no money. And so that layer of human settlement is just disappearing off the landscape, and I think the province is impoverished due to the loss of that layer.

"In terms of heritage planning and inventories, the province has actually been quite proactive at finding money. And now the energy's going into the so-called keynote buildings, because of the development of the national register of historic places. Planning to a certain degree works in communities that are organized. You see it in Kamloops and Kelowna to a certain extent, in terms of retaining these layers.

"But then there's these almost folkloric places. For example, Doukhobor community villages in the Kootenays. There are just a handful now instead of a hundred. This is the evidence of the largest communal living experiment ever in Canada, and fascinating from that point of view. You then get The Land Conservancy [of B.C.] coming in and helping to buy one of the key places. The land conservancies are one of the most positive of the initiatives that have come along, and they've come along privately. The TLC is just a remarkable organization. The Nature Conservancy of Canada is very good too. And they've gotten into cultural sites, as has the land conservancy."

For more article see: http://thetyee.ca/Photo/2006/12/08/VanishingBC/