80 Years Together

80 Years TogetherTHE LANGLEY ADVANCE

Your community newspaper since 1931LANGLEY BOARD OF TRADEGreater Langley Chamber of Commerce

From a small groupof local merchants,the chamber haschanged.

by Matthew [email protected]

When Langley merchantsand tradesmen came togeth-er in the spring of 1931, it’sdoubtful that they guessedthey were creating an insti-tution that would live on for80 years.

In March, two years intothe Great Depression, 63Langley residents signedthe papers to form whatwas then known at theLangley Board of Trade.It would later transforminto the Langley Chamberof Commerce, eventuallyabsorbing several regionalchambers and becoming theGreater Langley Chamber.

Those early founderswould have their namesattached to roads, streets,parks and schools aroundthe community in the com-ing generations.

Near the top of the listis Dr. Benjamin Marr, aFirst World War veteran,and Langley’s first residentphysician after he arrived in1907.

NoelBooth, thelongtimeTownshipcouncillor,signed, list-ing his jobas merchant.

P.Y.Porter, whose general storestill stands at Murrayville’sFive Corners, added hisname.

The professions listedinclude quite a few mer-chants and storekeepers,along with a real estatebroker, some hotel keepers,engineers, carpenters, farm-ers, a veterinarian, and oneman who listed himself asunemployed.

Other jobs on the list are

long gone, or have beentransformed by time. A.G.Fulton is listed as a stationagent for the long-gone B.C.Electric Railroad, which ranthe length of the commun-ity.

There are also tailorsand shoemakers, a miller,a tinsmith, and one manwho listed his occupation as“cafe jack.”

The documents mentionthe most recent census in1929, which put Langley’spopulation at just 5,012people. There was also justone Langley, as the splitbetween Township and Citywas almost 25 years in thefuture.

Lynn Whitehouse, thecurrent executive directorof the chamber, said that,despite all that has changed,much has remained thesame.

Some of the earliest rec-ords, from the 1930s, werelost, apparently in the greatflood of 1948.

“Records were kept inpeople’s place of business,or in a storeroom,” she said.

But when the first hand-written minutes, taken inthe early 1940s during theSecond World War, emerge,they show that local busi-ness owners have always

had thesame con-cerns.

Flipthrough afew of theyellowingpages anddecipherthe spidery

handwriting, and issues oftransportation, taxes, andparking jump out.

“Transportation has beena concern in the Langleyssince the day the firstwagon came into town,”Whitehouse said.

Early minutes also containreferences to the board oftrade opposing the introduc-tion of parking meters inLangley City.

They won that battle – the

board suggested a parkingbylaw instead, and parkingtime limits remain in placein the City to this day.

Also in 1944, one of thefirst items discussed atone meeting was tolls onbridges.

In that case, it was thePatullo Bridge, then theonly fixed link between thenorth and south sides of theFraser River, that local mer-chants were worried about.They wanted those tollsremoved.

Changes in technologyand institution have erasedother concerns.

Minutes from a 1945meeting contain a sugges-tion to the volunteer fire-fighters. When they are outat a call, one man shouldremain at the nearest phone,in case a second fire beginsin another part of the town.In an era of cellphones andprofessional firefighters, thatrecommendation seems to

have been met.The popularity and

strength of the Boardof Trade, and later theChamber, waxed and wanedover the years.

In the early 1960s, theold board of trade re-nameditself the chamber of com-merce, a trend that wassweeping Canada at thetime, transforming manyother boards into chambers.

Whitehouse noted that the500 people who attended anannual general meeting in1959 is actually a few morethan turn out for modernAGMs.

But by the early 1970s,the chamber almost van-ished.

A motion was actuallyput in place to dissolve theentire organization, after afew years of low attendanceat meetings and limitedparticipation. Fortunately,Whitehouse said the shockmotivated more members

to return, and within afew years the chamberhad returned to fightingstrength.

For most of its history,the chamber operated outof businesses, holding all itsmeetings in restaurants andhalls. In some cases, meet-ings were held as far afieldas White Rock.

In the 1970s, the monthly

meetings were held in along-vanished Chinese res-taurant called the GoldenPagoda, while meetingsof the board were held inthe Prairie House, a con-verted home at the cornerof Glover Road and theLangley Bypass.

While the chamber hadan office by the 1980s,it moved into its presentlocation in 1996, when itdesigned and bought itsown offices.

The mortgage for thebuilding was burned in2006, just a decade later.

The chamber has con-tinued to innovate, recentlyadding a new videoconfer-encing centre to its GloverRoad location. It allowschamber members to attendconferences in Vancouver,the Interior, or halfwayacross Canada without leav-ing their home town.

The chamber’s 2011 AGMwill be held this week.

Chamber of Commerce

Chamber’s ups, downs mirror history of Langley

Matthew Claxton/Lagnely Advance

Lynn Whitehouse, executive director of the Greater Langley Chamber of Commerce for a quarter century, read one of the Langley Advance’sspecial supplements created for the chamber. This one dated to the 1990s.

The Advance has profiledLangley and its businesscommunity many times over thepast 80 years.

“Transportation has been

a concern in the Langleys

since the first wagon came

to town.”Lynn Whitehouse

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“My brother and I have always loved cars,”says Dan Springman, co-owner of Springman’sAuto Centre in Langley on the Langley Bypass.

The brothers started Springman Motorsin Langley in 1986, selling quality pre-ownedvehicles, becoming a Saturn dealer in the early1990s.

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“Our goal has always been to deliver aquality product backed by excellent service,”states Dan.

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The Springman brothers foresee greatthings in the future as the new owner of Saabbrings the company back to its roots.

Dan and Rueben are excited about thefuture with Saab. They also want to make sureall of their past and current customers knowthey will continue to receive the same highquality service they have come to expect.

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Tuesday, June 21, 2011 | LangleyAdvanceB2 80 Years TogetherLANGLEY ADVANCEYour community newspaper since 1931

LANGLEY BOARD OF TRADEGreater Langley Chamber of Commerce

LangleyAdvance | Tuesday, June 21, 2011 B380 Years TogetherTHE LANGLEY ADVANCEYour community newspaper since 1931


From the beginning

by Bob [email protected]

The first edition of the Langley Advance

rolled off the presses and into the hands ofthe waiting community on July 23, 1931.

It was an eight-page tabloid newspaper,printed on “boiler plate” shipped in fromWinnipeg. (Boiler plate was newsprintpre-printed with national and internationalnews and features on one side, the otherside awaiting local advertising and repor-ters’ stories.)

The newly formed LangleyBoard of Trade (now theGreater Langley Chamberof Commerce) had let it beknown that it would wel-come a locally producedcommunity newspaper forLangley.

The first few editionswere produced locally byE.J. Cox and Jerry Hellerof the Abbotsford News,printed in Abbotsford, butit soon became the soleproprietorship of Cox, whoinstalled a press and supple-mentary equipment at theLangley operation.

Getting the newspaper started proveda hard go. Few new businesses startedin Langley in the 1930s lasted long – allof Canada was in the throes of the GreatDepression, and despite a gentlemen’s

agreement that the new venture wouldreceive some support from members of theBoard of Trade, money was tight.

And the daily Columbian newspaper,produced and printed in New Westminister,had a lock on Langley business.

Cox won the community over with hisdogged dedication to the community hisnewspaper served. He sold subscriptions bybarter, trading for butter, firewood, vege-table produce, and anything that he and his

family could use – and thatcash-poor potential readerscould offer.

He also traded subscrip-tions for news – house-wives would keep tabs on“newsworthy” events intheir neighbourhoods, inexchange for a byline and afew issues of the Advance.

The first, July 23, 1931,edition of the Advance includ-ed columns such as “NewsItems of Langley PrairieBriefly Told,” and, “NewsItems from Aldergrove.”

The highly localized col-umns were filled with newssnippets like, “Mr. and

Mrs. A. Ross and family spent Sunday withfriends in Vancouver,” and, “Miss Eileenand Master Harold Butterworth from MooseJaw, Sask., are visiting with Mrs. Garrett fora few days.”

Not dissimilar to today’s community fare,one column advised the community, “TheLangley Prairie Dramatic Society has com-menced preparation of the farce comedy,‘Nothing but the Truth,’ which will be pre-sented about the middle of September.

Buried at the very end of one such “localnews” column was a brief note indicatingthat the goings-on in town were not allabout social pleasantries: “An unsuccess-ful attempt was made last week to robthe offices of the Langley Electric Bakery.Matthew’s Store at Murrayville was alsoentered, but the marauder, being discov-ered, jumped through the glass in the frontdoor and made his escape in the woods,despite the fact that he was chased by resi-dents.”

Cox worked hard to win over his newcommunity – including the businesses that

had asked him to start the newspaper in thefirst place.

That first edition of Langley’s new news-paper included a lengthy article espousingthe value of Boards of Trade within a com-munity – an article that undoubtedly wouldhave pleased the likes of prominent localbusinessmen Joe Gibson, J.G. Jervis, JackDonnelly, and Ted Fuller, who were work-ing hard to establish a firm foundation forthe Langley Board of Trade that they hadgot going only a few months earlier, in May1931.

The current Langley Chamber’s record asone of B.C. most active and effective is atestament to their efforts.

Nevertheless, it would be several yearsbefore The Columbian’s virtual monopolywas broken, and the Langley Advance becameLangley’s community newspaper of record.

Advance publisher’s strategywas to emphasize community

Langley Advance files

A photograph from the Langley Advance archives shows E.J. Cox and his son Fred standing outside thedoor of the Advance’s first home, on Fraser Highway in Langley Prairie. Barely discernible inside thedoor is the figure of a womna, believed to be E.J.’s wife Ida.


By the end of the Second WorldWar, the Langley Advance wasa technological leader amongcommunity newspapers.



Before the Advance

It had been tried before, but 80years ago, E.J. Cox summoned upthe winning formula.


With a brand new business organiza-tion trying to get a foothold in Langley, itwas certainly no shocker that its promoters– people like Joe Gibson and Jack Donnelly– were eager to have a newspaper that thecommunity could call its own.

There was no televisionand radios were scarce.A progressive town– the kind of town thatthe Langley Board ofTrade wanted Langleyto be – had to have itsown news and informa-tion source, it’s own vehicleto promote local business through advertis-ing, directly to consumers.

It was fortunate that the fledgling Boardof Trade (now the Greater Langley Chamberof Commerce) happened upon E.J. Coxwhen it did.

Cox had the determination and savvyneeded to get a newspaper business off theground during the Great Depression – whileso many other businesses were failing.

Indeed, there had been previous attemptsto start newspapers in Langley – and in farmore flush economic times.

In his local history From Prairie to City,Warren Sommer notes that an attempt hadbeen made in the 1890s.

But little is known about it.There only slightly more information

available about the Langley Leader, whichaccording to an article in the Langley

Advance’s 50th Anniversary edition in 1981,was published in 1911. It is not known howlong that publication lasted, or how manyeditions were ever printed.

The Valley Sentinel was published inLangley in 1921 – but again, very littleinformation remains, except that it was veryshort-lived.

An earlier incarnation of the LangleyBoard of Trade made an attempt at bring-

ing the newspaper busi-ness home by sponsoringpublication of the LangleyLantern. Only three edi-tions are known to havebeen published, datedNov. 8 and Dec. 15, 1922,and Jan. 10, 1923.

Throughout thistime, The Columbian, published in NewWestminster and covering news fromthroughout the Fraser Valley and elsewhere,was the dominant newspaper in the area.

Perhaps the most successful attempt tounseat The Columbian, prior to the Cox’sarrival and the advent of the Langley Advance,was the Langley Press.

It was started by G.Y. Timms, founder ofthe successful Langley Greenhouses. AmongTimms’ many ventures were a numberof business blocks in downtown LangleyPrairie. He also owned and operated a printshop in New Westminster, and using thatfacility, he was able to keep his newspapergoing for about a year.

Newspapers tried and failed

Between 4,000 and 5,000 peopleattended a Fort Langley celebration

– equal to about 100 per cent ofLangley’s population.

LANGLEY PRESS – MAY 7, 1925

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LangleyAdvance | Tuesday, June 21, 2011 B580 Years TogetherLANGLEY ADVANCEYour community newspaper since 1931


A Langley Prairie businessmanmade a lasting impression on thiscommunity.

by Heather [email protected]

It wasn’t long after Joe Gibson moved toLangley in 1919 that he started changing theface of the community.

He would end up owning many local busi-nesses but would also become involved inpolitics and the movement to create LangleyCity.

Joe opened an electrical supply shopin the Theatre Block in 1922. In 1926, heexpanded the electrical shop to includehardware. He added a real estate office in1930.

In 1931, he sold the store but put up abuilding supply store that his son Colin ran.When he died in 1933, Joe closed the store.

In 1934, he and his wife Olive reopenedthe Langley Theatre, running it until 1945 when it was sold to Peter Barnes and his sisterMyrtle. The theatre had been built around 1915 and was demolished in 1958. From around1930 until Gibson purchased and reopened it, the theatre had been used as, of all things, ahardware store.

In 1938, Gibson opened his most successful venture, an auction house, running Thursdayauctions that were vital to this still agricultural community. He also had auction houses inCloverdale and Chilliwack.

Gibson’s Auctions was owned by Mickey Gibson after Joe retired in 1958.Despite having many business ventures, Joe was still active in the community. It was at

Gibson’s Auctions that a group of Langley Prairie residents met to discuss creating a newmunicipality, separate from Langley Township. Gibson also served a couple of terms onmunicipal council and pushed for the formation of the City.

He was involved with the Langley Hospital board, the Lions, the Elks, the Legion and theShriners.

Joe had married Olive in 1911 and she followed him to England when he went overseas

with the air force during the First World War.When the family celebrated their 55th anniversary, Joe paid tribute to Olive.“He said ‘I wish I could spend another 55 years with her,’” recalled Elaine Vaughn, one

of his grandchildren.He was an electrician in the air force and he put what

he learned to use in his electrical business here. Hislifelong love of animals was evident by his purchase ofa farm at Jardine (near Fort Langley), where he keptlivestock.

Joe and Olive’s family included Colin, Eveline, Graceand Mickey.

Vaughn said he could be strong-headed in his busi-ness and political life but was a loving Irish grandfatherto her and her cousins. All the Gibson kids worked fortheir father’s businesses and some of the grandkids aswell.

She recalls hanging around the auction yard, whichwas on Fraser Highway at 203rd Street. (Today there’s a tattoo parlour and u-brew oper-ation in the same building where cattle were once paraded through.) There were the auc-tions of goods in the mornings and livestock in the afternoon, she recalled.

“Langley was a great place to grow up,” Vaughn reminsced.The community was a place where everyone knew each other.

- With files from the Langley Centennial Museum

Gibson family

Joe Gibson, on the microphone at his auction, hada variety of businesses in Langley City.

Gibson family

Joe Gibson, beside his daughter Eva.His son, Mickey, is behind him inthe glasses. His children all workedfor dad.

The TheatreBlock includedvariousbusinesses,including thoseowned by JoeGibson. Heeven bought thetheatre around1934 and ownedit for about adecade.


Business

Gibson was one of those who created Langley City

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Happy 80th Anniversary to The Langley Advance!Thanks for Serving Our Community Since 1931

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Congratulations to the Langley Advance& Langley Chamber of Commerceon your 80th Anniversary!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011 | LangleyAdvanceB6 LangleyAdvance | Tuesday, June 21, 2011 B780 Years TogetherLANGLEY ADVANCEYour community newspaper since 1931


The Langley Advance archives reveal

The way we were

The first Langley Walk started at Aldergrove Park and finished in Fort Langley in 1963. The 1,000 walkers who completed the 17-mile (27 kilometre) journey wereferried back to Aldergrove in cars, trucks, and buses.

Trees were bucked by hand by loggers like brothers Walter and Eskil Johnson, giving way toLangley farms, homes, and businesses.

Over the years, the Langley Advancehas utilized some of the most modernequipment available – like the linotypemachinery that graced the newspaperproduction shop in the 1940s.

A typical home in Langley in the 1930s– predominately occupied by bachelors– would have been framed with lumberdirectly out of the bush, and roofed withhand-split shakes, while the siding wasmore often made of purchased shingles.

One of the first bulldozers in Langleypushed through town in 1929,preparing Fraser Highway for paving.

The community tripwas a major annualevent in Langley,sponsored jointlyby the Legion andmunicipal council.The place wouldliterally close downfor the day so thatall the townspeoplecould hop aboardthe Interurban intoVancouver, wherethey would board achartered boat andsail to one of the GulfIslands or elsewhere.

Langley’sfirst firetruck wasan oldHudsoncar, re-fitted bythe Hiltonbrothers.

Aerial photo looking west along Fraser Highway through Langley City in theearly 1960s.

As automobiles began taking over from horses, anumber of Langley’s blacksmith shops, like the oneowned by Charles Reid, purchased from George Medd in1912, were turned into garages.

Aviation pioneerArt Seller based hisnational Skyway Air

Services operation inLangley, making thelocal airport one of

Canada’s biggest andbusiest in its early

years.



One of Langley’s oldest familieswas one of the earliest subscribersto the Langley Advance.


Doris Blair remembers when Langley wasstill largely dairy farms, sawmills, and a fewclusters of shops.

The 92-year-old Milner resident was bornin Cloverdale, and moved to Langley whenshe married Bill Blair more than 70 yearsago. The Blair family had farmed land at216th Street and 56th Avenue since the1880s.

Her in-laws had already been taking thepaper since soon after its founding in 1931– although Doris remembers her father-in-law George didn’t take it for some years.Back in the 1940s, Advance editor E.J. Coxwas known as a federal Liberal, and Georgewas a Conservative.

The paper was then weekly and paidfor by subscription, rather than being freetwice-weekly as it is now.

The content was quite different.“There was a column for Mrs. So-and-So

visited Mrs. So-and-So for afternoon tea,”said Blair.

While the paper doesn’t do so many stor-ies on afternoon tea any more, it still coverscommunity events closely.

“That’s what I like about it,” Blair said.“The Advance seems to do more articles onLangley, people of Langley.”

The Blair family not only read the paper,they became part of the coverage, as Bill

Blair was elected first an alderman, andthen mayor of Langley Township.

Bill bought ads in the paper to seek hisre-election, was the subject of coveragemany times over the years, and he was thetarget of an editorial cartoon at least once,Doris remembers. He wasn’t too fond of thecartoon, but it was part of the job, she said.

Politics in those days was more hands-on. She remembers going for quite a fewSunday drives when Bill was an aldermanin charge of public works. He’d take the carout and check out the back roads for potholes personally.

Her current favourite section of the paperis Looking Back.

History

Still reading, after 70 years

Matthew Claxton/Langley Advance

Doris Blair has been reading the Langley Advancefor about 70 years.

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How Langley promotes itself haschanged much over the past halfcentury.


It wasn’t so long ago that fishing andhunting were among the main tourismdraws in Langley.

The Greater Langley Chamber ofCommerce ran tourism promotions for thecommunity until it helped form TourismLangley as a separate group five years ago.

As far back as the 1950s, the chamberwas putting out brochures and maps, try-ing to lure people to visit what was then amostly rural farming community.

A brochure from the late 1950s mentionsthe then-new Albion Ferry, the NewlandsGolf Course, and the “modern” museumadjacent to the Fort Langley historic site.The Langley Centennial Museum was thenbrand new, having been built to mark theprovince’s centennial in 1958.

The first attraction mentioned was fish-ing, though golfing, shooting at the Rod andGun Club, bowling, and roller skating alsogot prominent promotion.

“There are approximately 120 miles ofpaved roads and 250 miles of gravel roadswhich are being prepared for eventual pav-ing,” the brochure noted.

At the time the brochure was printed, thetwo Langleys together had a population of15,000. Today’s population is more than130,000.

Tourism

History, fishing lured tourists

The LangleyBoard of Tradeand its successor,the Chamberof Commerce,createddirectories,maps, andbrochures tohelp lure visitorsto Langley sinceat least the1950s.

Matthew ClaxtonLangley Advance

Leonard Nicholas, Chairman,Langley Lions in front of thedevelopment signs forLangley Personal Care Lodge.(approx 1972)

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Yale Garage fire

Fear of a fire resulted in the lossof all the Advance’s files – and amad scramble to replace them.


That the Langley Advance

has a complete microfilm

archive of its editions

going back to the first

one on July 23, 1931, is

almost a miracle.

And it is certainly a

testament to the bond

that the newspaper

established with the com-

munity it serves.

Owner, publisher,

and editor E.J. Cox and

his family were sitting

around their dining room

table one night in 1934

when a telephone call

informed them that the

Yale Garage, next door

to the Advance office and

printery, was on fire.

Arriving at the news-

paper office, they found

well-meaning friends

busily securing the prem-

ises, saving files, papers,

and equipment from

impending doom.

As recounted by family

members years later, E.J.

called out to his daugh-

ter Kay to put all the ledgers and the files

– copies of all of the issues printed over the

previous three years – in the back seat of

the car.

She did so quickly and efficiently, placing

all the business books and files in the back

seat of a blue car parked nearby.

But it wasn’t the family car.

Although the Cox’s

advertised extensively,

nobody came forward

with the files.

The Advance appealed to

the community to come

to the rescue, and bought

back many of the missing

editions for $2 each.

The subscription list

was also lost, but cus-

tomers knew when their

subscriptions expired,

and when it was time to

renew, they came into

the office and paid for

the next year.

The fire never did

jump from the Yale

Garage to the Advance

office.

But when the Cox’s

returned home hours

later, after all danger

had passed and the print

shop was once again

secure, they found that

a cigarette had fallen

from an ashtray, and had

burned a hole through

their dining room table.

Archives lost – and restored

Some of the local busi-nesses that advertisedin the first edition of theLangley Advance:

• C.H. Rogers – Farm Land andInsurance Brokers

• Pioneer Dry Goods (Phone 125R2)• Yale Garage (Phone 107)• Angus M. Plewes – Prescription

Druggist (Phone 88)• Fuller Meat Market (Phone 71)• Kerr’s Truck Line (Phone 140)• U-R Next Barbershop and Beauty

Parlour (Offering Blabbering,Marcelling, and Finger-waving)

• Thos. Bradley, Auctioneer(Phone 169)

• Langley Shoe Repair• Ken McClary’s Store (Phone 4)• Langley Electric Bakery (Phone 65)• W.J. Duckworth Dry Goods

(Phone 100-L-2)• Alf Toon Farm Machinery

(Phone 198)• Teece’s Cash Grocery (Phone 81)• A.J. McDougall, Hardware

Merchant (Phone 57)• The Advance, printing (Phone 64)

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12t h A n n u a l

2009

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Congratulations toCongratulations to

the Langley Advance & thethe Langley Advance & the

Langley Chamber of CommerceLangley Chamber of Commerce

on 80 years of service.on 80 years of service.

Coastal Web PressPrinter of Newspapers, Magazines, Periodicals, Flyers, etc.

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604-626-4332Fax: 604-626-4314

Congratulations Langley Advancefor serving our Community

for 80 years!

Reflecting back....

The Meadows at Langley (located on Glover Road between the Fraser Highway and the LangleyBypass) has evolved into a beautiful community since 1991, when construction of the first phasecommenced.

A mixture of townhomes and condominiums, this phased community consists of 480 homes, including74 condominiums in the final phase, Fairfield Lane.

Combining the best of natural and urban settings TheMeadows at Langley is complemented by a naturepathway that meanders along Logan Creek.

Magnolia Gardens, our first Seniors’ Residence, islocated on Glover Road and backs onto The Meadows.Completed in September, 2001, Magnolia Gardensis home to many of Langley’s seniors who enjoy theirindependence with assurance that their changing needsare being met and that, should the need arise, licensednursing care is available in the same building.

Moving forward...

Located in Murrayville in the Township of Langley, Sunridge Place is a mixed use phaseddevelopment that will include Sunridge Gardens, a 145 unit seniors’ community, Solaro,a 114 unit condominium project and eight single family homes. Scheduled for completionin the Fall of 2011, Sunridge Gardens expects to achieve LEED Gold certification and willfeature geothermal and solar panel alternate energy sources.

Sunridge Gardens is a residence built for seniors who are looking for spacious,comfortable living areas, as well as a place to meet their friends and families. Similar to itssister residence, Magnolia Gardens, Sunridge has a variety of suite types, common roomsand introduces the idea of bringing the outdoors in with warm rich tones, soft flowing forms,and organic materials. Sunridge Gardens feels like a country home in a suburban setting.

Sunridge Gardens is also part of Bria Communities - a family of residences designed forseniors who want the freedom to be themselves, to live independently, and to experiencefun and enjoyment with their friends and families every day.

www.SunridgeGardens.net

Congratulations to the Langley Advanceon your 80th Anniversary!

We look forward to working with you for many years to come.

The beautiful courtyard gardens,

lovingly and proudly cared for by

residents at Magnolia Gardens

Century Thinking Builds Community. 06

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75

Langley residents havebenefited from the selflessefforts of local hospitalauxiliaries.

by Heather [email protected]

It would be impossible to calculate the number ofhours Langley Hospital Auxiliary volunteers such asAlvina Hansen have devoted to local health care.

After all, there have been local volunteers sincebefore there was even a hospital.

Hansen has lived in Langley for more than 60years, coming as a young bride from Saskatchewan.

She wasn’t looking to get involved but once shestarted, she found she enjoyed working with theothers and was proud of what they accomplished.

“I keep telling them they’re not getting rid ofme,” said Hansen, who turns 80 in September.

She’s done just about every job possible and heldevery job, served more than 25 years on the execu-tive and even did a couple of terms as president.

“My neighbour,” she said when asked how shebecome involved. “They caught her and got her in.She said ‘You’re going to the next meeting.’”

Her daughter, now middle age, would sit nearmom when Hansen was volunteering in the giftshop, which opened in the mid-1960s when thecurrent hospital was constructed.

Before then, there was the Langley CottageHospital, a much smaller facility.

Hansen was present when the last of Langley’s aux-iliaries folded, Otter and Brookswood, and members joinedthe current auxiliary which was created in 1947.

Langley was a Township of neighbourhoods with manycreating their own auxiliaries to support health care. The

Langley Hospital Auxiliary has journals dating back to 1916detailing the activities, in immaculate script, of the earliestof the local auxiliaries, such as the Thimble Club.

By 2000, all the neighbourhood auxiliaries had ceased ormerged with the Langley Hospital Auxiliary.

Volunteering was much different in decades past.They did activities that freed up doctors and nurses.

That includes sewing bandages.The needles are still active today but for different rea-

sons.Members make items for sale in the auxiliary gift shop

and they knit little caps for each newborn.They also provide full knit outfits to the families of still-

born babies.There are hundreds of one-of-a-kind finger puppets

given to children to given them a little friend to go alongduring tests and x-rays.

The auxiliary also does TV rentals and major fundrais-ers such as the annual gala. That’s because health carehas changed. Equipment is much more expensive and the

auxiliary is now a much largerenterprise so it can continueto make important contribu-tions to local health facilities.

Hansen said in the past, theauxiliaries could hold a bakesale or set up a raffle to raisemoney.

“Then you just went outand did what was needed,”she said.

Nowadays, such things asfood regulations and controlby the Fraser Health Authoritymean there’s more paperwork,formality and restrictions.

Still Hansen enjoys makinga difference in an area of lifethat affects everyone.

Ironically, she’s never had to use Langley MemorialHospital, having worked hard all her life, like so many ofher generation. Her two kids were born in Langley CottageHospital and she’s never been a patient since.

• More online at www.langleyadvance.com, click on “Life”



Heather Colpitts/Langley Advance

Alvina Hansen, a volunteer with the Langley HospitalAuxiliary for more than four decades, shows logsdating back to 1916 for groups such as the ThimbleClub, one of the neighbourhood groups thatsupported local doctors and nurses before there wasa hospital here. The club sewed bandages and didother helpful projects. The clubs evolved into theauxiliary. The Langley Hospital Auxiliary has a photoof the Gift Nook. It operated the kiosk (right) withhomemade items when the current hospital openedin the mid-1960s. Volunteers still make items forpatients and selling.

Health

They’ve been working for decades to help others

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JOEL SHARON TYLER DENIS

THE SCHACTER TEAM

Will Rempel Clare Player Bob Kalo Kathleen Christensen Yvonne VanGelderenDoug & Krista

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Ann Lapierre

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Jo Ann Gordon Shelly Lederer

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Deanna Horn

Steve Klassen Nancy Pinchin Dean Hooseman, PREC Garth Olson

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Mortgage Consultant

Vince Johnson &Carol Little Tammy Evans Jodi SteevesJim Hughston

Bridget Dunbar

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Tuesday, June 21, 2011 | LangleyAdvanceB12 80 Years TogetherTHE LANGLEY ADVANCEYour community newspaper since 1931


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80 Years Together