INSIDE DOUGLAS COLLEGE / June 11, 1997

 

 

 

Ghosts

continued from page 1

mainland. Identified
simply as ‘Workers
Temple’ in a 1947
index, the large
wooden building
faced Royal Avenue
on the corner of 7th
Street. At different
times during its
mixed history, the
building hosted
labour rallies and
accommodated a
cigar plant and the
Women’s Christian
Temperance Union.
Temperance
played a futher role
in the block’s history.
During the 1920s,

 

 

 

standing on the
downhill corner of
8th Street. and Agnes
(it continued from
7th to 8th before the College was
built), was a large building ad-
ministered by a fraternal order
called the Knights of Pythias. The
building's top floors featured 15
rooms for accommodation. Shops
and a Pentecostal Mission were
located at street level. From
October to November of 1925, the
Pentecostals’ Good News Mission
gained local prominence by host-
ing a crusade led by William
Booth-Clibborn, grandson of
General Clibborn, founder of the
Salvation Army. Booth-Clibborn
not only preached to the faithful;
he also provided most of the enter-
tainment by playing the violin.
Later celebrity-seekers would
be interested in a house visited by
actor Raymond Burr when he was
a toddler. The large wooden home,
owned by Burr’s grandmother,
stood next to St. Paul’s Episcopal
Church (on Royal and 7th Street,
across the street from the College
site). It was demolished in 1975
and replaced by an Agriculture
Canada office building. If you’re
wondering, Raymond was born in

This duplex stood at 701 Agnes Street. It was demolished in 1980 to make way

for the present New Westminster campus.

a house on Queens Avenue —
which has since been torn down
and replaced by an apartment.

The College block also once fea-
tured a roller-skating hall (on the
uphill corner of 8th Street and
Agnes), which was long gone
before wreckers descended in 1980
to clear the remaining old houses
to make way for the present cam-
pus. Remnants of those old homes,
such as the ornate woodwork
which decorated the ubiquitous
front porch, can be viewed at the
blacksmith’s shop in Burnaby’s
Heritage Village.

The most painful ghost on the
College site hovers around the
corner of 7th St. and Agnes, next
to the library’s reflecting pool. On
that spot stood a magnificent two-
storey brick duplex with bay win-
dows, constructed before the fire
of 1898. The duplex was the only
structure on the block to survive
the blaze that destroyed most of
the existing town. As the College
shifted to its new location, stu-
dents petitioned to preserve the
building and to integrate it into

plans for the new campus. In-
stead, as the furore rose, the house
was levelled on a Sunday without
public knowledge.

 

Inside Information

Inside Douglas College is published
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Room 4840 at the New Westminster
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Westminster. Mailing address: P.O. Box
2503, New Westminster, B.C. V3L 5B2.

 

 

 

Ss Pee