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CITY HERITAGE
Celebrating the city’s Chinese roots A CLOSER LOOK By Grant Granger
ggranger@burnabynow.com
It was an area unlike the rest of Burnaby. Back in the day, what’s now called Big Bend on the north side of the Fraser River was known as The Flats and was full of farms. Almost everywhere else in the city was hilly and bursting with suburbia. It was different in another sense.The farms were almost exclusively tended to by Chinese families while the rest of Burnaby had a paler complexion. As part of Canada’s 150th Life on The Flats: birthday and the The Hong family 125th anniversary of Burnhas been tilling aby being inthe soil and corporated, the making a living city’s Commuoff of the land nity Heritage in Burnaby for Commission dedecades. Now six cided to create sisters keep the commemorative tradition alive at plaques of Burnthe Hop On Farms. aby’s history. For their story, One theme is disee page 3. versity and will include a plaque celebrating the long presence of the Chinese farming community on the south side of the city. “They’ve been around for a long time,” said Burnaby Village Museum researcher Denise Fong. “It’s challenging the assumption that Burnaby’s immigrant community is a recent arrival. “The presence of different groups has been around for many, many years.” Their stories, and those of other Chinese Canadians, will be featured on Wednesday, Oct. 4 as part of the Burnaby Neighbourhood Histories Series. But while The Flats is the most visible evidence of the historical Chinese contribution to Burnaby, it is by no means the only noteworthy one.
Inside:
BURNABY PIONEERS: Chinese immigrants played a significant role in Burnaby’s growth, not only in farming, such as the original partners in Hop On Farms on Marine Drive (see story page 3), including Gay Tim Hong (above, far right), but in other industries as well. PHOTO HONG FAMILY, CONTRIBUTED “The Chinese played a key role in different stages of the local food production and distribution network,” said Fong in an email. “Aside from market gardening, there is historical evidence as early as the 1890s that early Chinese agriculturalists and hog-keepers raised pigs for use in land clearing, fertilization, and as a food source. Chinese labourers were often hired for ditching and land clearance due to
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their experience and skills. Chinese farmers worked cooperatively with Chinese peddlers who sold their products door to door to private residences and businesses throughout the region.” The earliest census for Burnaby, 1901, shows numerous wood cutters with Chinese names. Some were employed at the North Pacific Lumber Mill, also known as Barnet Mill, as labourers and cooks. Oth-
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ers harvested tree stumps for shingle making, or worked as shingle weavers at the Shull Lumber and Shingle Company at the south foot of Boundary Road. “Chinese operated different types of small businesses in Burnaby as early as the 1930s,” wrote Fong. One wasY. Hoy Produce Company, a green grocer on Hastings Street which Continued on page 4
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