a. a Saturday, June 27, 1992 @ 'y best truly Canadian ex- perience was when I real- ized how lucky I was to be living here. This spring I was fortunate to get the opportunity to be able to travel to Europe (Germany) with my friends and their mother. It was very nice there, but when I came back to Cana- da (after spending a month there) I was so glad to be living here. It is much cleaner, the skies were much bluer, the people were much nicer to you in the stores you were in, Lucky Canadians we are much more free, and Canada| was just over all better. While I was there I learned that the kids there weren’t even allowed to leave the schools with out permission from the school board for even two days and I was aloud to go for a month and the school was happy that we were able to go. : realized that I was very privi- leged to be living here. I’m glad that I am able to be growing up here in Canada, and I hope that Cana- da will never change and I hope that my children will be able to enjoy the Canada that I realized was the best. There is no country that could com- pare to Canada. Loanada > 4 / a —our future — our dreams TROPHYS & ENGRAVINGS 2173 Columbia Ave., Castlegar Phone & Fax 365-8289 . Amy Babakaiff is 12 years old. Proud to be back home My best truly Canadian experience was the day I returned to Canada to re- sume my position as a Canadian citizen. As a child I had lived in the States due to the nature of my father’s work. As an adult I chose to live in the country of my birth . .. Canada. I have seen the Spaceneedle, but it never matched the majesty of Canada’s pines. Viewing the Mexican Gulf never made me catch my breath the way that the fiery sunset over the shimmering Arrow Lakes does. The Astrodome pales beside the vision of our towering mountains and green fresh valleys. . I have seen rivers, oceans and waterfalls, but always from the view of a dis- placed Canadian longing for her homeland. For me, my best truly Canadian experience is knowing that I am part of this heritage and part of this land that I proudly call home . . . Canada. Karen L. Kerkhoff ( Celebrate our Heritage WM. BERG CONSTRUCTION LTD. General Contracting « All Work Guaranteed Site 30, Comp. 7, R.R. #1 Castlegar, B.C. ViN 3H7 Phone 365-3771 ¢ Fax 365-6463 The station you can depend on. AM 610 Trail/Castlegar - 880 Nelson - 1340 Creston FM 93.5 Silverton/New Denver - 95.3 Kaslo - 102 Kootenay Lake It's Great to be in the Kootenays! 5 Saturday, June 27, 1992 Zand 25 iis sank of Montreal celebrates its 275th - Bank has 100 years of history. This is a special year for the Bank of Montreal and its employees right icross Canada, especially in the Koote- proud to be celebrating its 100th an- niversary in the Kootenays. The Bank of Montreal was a pioneer bank in the Kootenays, operating in the beginning out of Nelson. The first Nelson manager, Arthur H. | Buchanan, made his way from Van- + couver by train, horse and foot to set up shop in the middle of the winter of 1892. He rode the Great Northern Railway across northern Washington State, then switched to a branch line that ended in Northport. He is believed to have then followed the Columbia River on horseback north to Sproutes Landing, at the mouth of the Columbia. No rail line existed in Nelson and Buchanan travelled the last 50 miles on foot using snowshoes over the deep snow. Having gone to such lengths, Buchanan wanted to open the new branch as soon as possible after he ar- lazived. At the time, Nelson was described as more of a frontier camp than a town. It was home to some 200 souls. The first thing Buchanan had to do was buy a round of drinks at the Nel-. son Hotel. It was, after all, New Year’s Eve. This nearly cleaned him out of the meagre funds he had carried with him, leaving him with only $2.50. So he contacted E. H. Applewhaite, a leading Nelson businessman, who loaned him his available funds of $13.50. Kootenay, which was designed by the famous architect Francis M. Ratten- bury, who also designed the bank’s branches in Rossland and Victoria, as well as the parliament building in the provincial capital. The present Nelson branch building was completed in 1899 and has been the bank’s centre of Nelson operations ever since. es So, the Bank of Montreal’s Nelson branch was the forerunner for the bank’s gradual spread into the Koote- nays. And it was gradual. It wasn’t until 1946 that the Bank moved into Castle- So, the Bank of Montreal’s Nelson branch was the forerunner-for the bank’s gradual spread into the Kootenays. \ With this small capital, Buchanan opened the Bank of Montreal’s Nelson branch for business next morning, on January 2, 1892, in a former barber- shop with a 10-foot frontage on Baker Street. The bank shortly relocated to shared premises, with Hudson Bay Co., at the corner of Baker and Stanley where Hipperson’s Hardware currently stands. In 1900, the branch then relocated to its current building at Baker and gar. Responding to a request from Castlegar residents and the town’s Board of Trade, the Bank opened its of- fice here in July of that year. The Castlegar branch’s first teller was the late Margaret Rowe. She de- scribed the arrival of banking services in this community as follows: “It was an extremely hot July 2, in 1946, when Hubert Radcliffe, manager of the Bank of Montreal's Trail branch, and I, a teller there, left Trail with a supply of cash, cheques, deposit slips, and other banking necessities. - “During our 30-minute drive to Castlegar, Mr. Radcliffe left me in sus- pense as to what our mission-was. He disappeared, then eventually returned with M_E. Dixon of our Nelson branch, and I was let in on the secret. “We were to open the first office of a chartered bank in Castlegar! “Our first office was one half of Ed Lewis’ barber shop and the barber’s chairs were quickly pushed aside to make room for us.:Two orange crates formed the manger’s office furniture and another crate was the tellers cage. - Barbering and banking were carried on at the same time. “Two weeks later a bank vault was installed, along with partitions to sep- arate the two businesses. New office furniture replaced the orange crates and Mr. Dixon became the first man- ager while I was the first teller.” During the first three years the of- fice operated as a sub-agency of the Trail branch and service was given three days a week. It was raised to branch status in 1948 and in 1950 the Castlegar branch moved into new, larger premises. Other managers over the years have included Huntley Miller, J.R. Elliott, Cyril Onions, R.D. Minniou, W.J. Lam- beth, George Paulson and Don Carmichael. "ONLY A TINY MINORITY OF ALL THE HUMAN BEINGS WHO EVER LIVED HAVE BEEN AS FORTUNATE AS CANADIANS." HAPPY BIRTHDAY CANADA! POPE & TALBOT LTD. CASTLEGAR, B.C. —,