The calendar
for 2015 shows on its cover the water tower of the “Whonnock mill.”
The history
of a mill at that site started in 1929 with the incorporation of the Whonnock
Lumber Mill Ltd. by Zentaro Shin and two partners. The mill they built would
work on second-growth timber and also produce railway ties and poles.
The mill closed
down a year or so later and in 1932 the ownership changed to Tidewater Lumber Company.
Tidewater
rebuilt and enlarged the mill – probably to accommodate first-growth timber –
and started operations again early in 1934 with Zentaro Shin as manager of the
mill.
Peter Bain
purchased the mill in 1936. His company held substantial lumber rights in
Whonnock above Dewdney Trunk Road (“X” limits).
In 1947 Bain
Lumber Mills Ltd. sold the Whonnock mill to Yorkston Lumber Co. who in 1963
incorporated the mill as Whonnock Lumber Co. Ltd. In 1966 the owners, Frank
Brooks and Adrian Yorkston started a process to transfer of the mill to its
employees.
The plant was
closed and demolished in 1994.
