Family custodians of a heritage home

Coldstream Lake House: A storied landmark of the Okanagan
by Ken Mather

Surrey: Hancock House, 2024
$24.95  /  9780888397690

Reviewed by Adriana A. Davies

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People of all ages are drawn to historic properties because they serve as “portals” to other times. Mark Twain captured this interest in his novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1889) and popular television series such as Anne of Green Gables (based on the works of Lucy Maud Montgomery) and Downton Abbey (created by Julian Fellowes) have made the communities in which such properties are located tourist destinations.

The historic designation process, whether municipal, provincial or federal, allows individuals and/or non-profit entities to preserve and interpret places and landscapes with architectural and other significance; however, they can also become “contested” spaces as historical narratives change. This is particularly true with respect to the rightful questioning of colonialism in Canada and the treatment of Indigenous peoples. Thus, the custodians of structures associated with colonization are being challenged with respect to their relevancy in a more just and egalitarian contemporary Canada.

Ken Mather tackles this issue head on in his book Coldstream Lake House: a storied landmark of the Okanagan. He begins with a prologue based on the vision for the property of the last custodian, Paddy Mackie. Mather writes:

Paddy’s love for Lake House and its treasures was so much more than just coveting them as his personal belongings. He felt a responsibility to preserve the legacy left not just by his parents and uncle and the other families that had made Lake House their home, but also the entire community of Coldstream that had existed as a British enclave since the 1890s. For a time, Coldstream embodied all the characteristics common to the British colonial experience. 

While the recommendations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of which almost 100 pertain to museums, archives, and other heritage institutions, this process began well before the issuing of the report in December 2015. The Canadian Museums Association and Assembly of First Nations undertook a joint Task Force on Museums and First Peoples. This involved a national conference and also some hearings across the country culminating in a report released in 1992. The Mission Statement was: “To develop an ethical framework and strategies for Aboriginal Nations to represent their history and culture in concert with cultural institutions.” Mather and I are part of that generation of museum workers who took on this challenge in various ways.

Mather shows his sensitivity in the first chapter in which he begins with an account of “The Syilx People”; it serves as an extended land acknowledgement. After describing the geology, geography, and natural history of the area, he writes:

As the glaciers retreated from the area about ten thousand years ago, a group of Indigenous people speaking an Interior Salish dialect entered the Okanagan Valley, and these people gathered at locations on the rivers at certain times of year to fish. As well, there were important resources in the hillsides and mountains, meaning that their life involved a seasonal movement from one resource to the next… They resided in pit houses, dug into the ground and roofed over with logs, branches and mats covered with dirt or sand.

He next deals with the “naming” of things noting that the colonists gave the many lakes prosaic names such as local “Long Lake,” which eventually became Kalamalka Lake in the 1930s. Mather observes that the name was first used for a hotel in Vernon in 1892 and was said to be based on the name of a Syilx chief. He next mentions that the Syilx people themselves “maintained that Kalamalka had been a family name in their territory for many years” and, finally, notes:

But there are some historians who argue for a different origin. They maintain that the first Kalamalka was the son of a Hawaiian, Louis Peon, who worked for the fur-trading North West Company and married a Syilx woman. Peon names their son Kalamaleka (Hawaiian Ka, “the”; La, “sun” Meleka, “America”) meaning “The Sun of America.”

Mather then moves on to the settlement history naming key individuals and describing their pursuits. Charles Frederick Houghton, an Irishman born in 1839, served in the British Army and, then, headed to British Columbia in 1863 with friends. Along with others such as Forbes George Vernon, he acquired land. According to government wishes, they were settlers “of a good type” and qualified for land grants. The Coldstream Lake House was, thus, part of the British colonial presence in the Okanagan and the Coldstream Ranch, which was purchased by Lord and Lady Aberdeen, is part of the colonization of the “last, best west.” Mather continues: “With the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1885, there began a rush for land in the fertile Okanagan Valley. Over the next few years, huge amounts of land were obtained, much of it for speculative purposes. The expectation was that, with the railway bringing in thousands of new settlers, land prices would soar.” That they did! As the CPR headed west, large ranches were established in the Northwest Territories (later Alberta and Saskatchewan) as well as southeastern British Columbia. Among the owners were second sons who went out to the colonies to make their fortunes as well as people of all classes who wanted to improve their economic conditions. Generous homesteading policies on the part of the federal and provincial governments made this possible.

The Coldstream properties were blessed not only by beautiful landscapes but also fertile land, lakes, rivers and streams; they almost begged to be developed for a range of purposes including as farms and orchards. The families who owned Lake House were part of the colonization of this desirable area of the Dominion of Canada and had aspirations to being part of the upper middle class that placed its imprint on the land through the erection of impressive residences. Mather notes: “Coldstream was becoming ‘one of the cloistered, elite communities’ established throughout the world by ‘British gentlefolk.’” In Chapter 2, he describes the “Coldstream Estates,” “The Long Lake Subdivision,” and the individual who built the house – Rupert Charles Buchanan. The Buchanan family resided in Lake House from 1910 to 1925. Like the other houses being erected in the area, they were “aspirational” in nature – they signalled not only the class of the owner but also the life style they desired to and hoped-for standing in the community.

Buchanan was a Montreal businessman who decided to settle in Coldstream and hired prominent architect Robert Findlay, also from Montreal, to design his home, which was built in 1910. Donald Luxton and Associates in their 2002 Mackie House Concept Plan, First Draft describe the house as follows: “an unusual style that combines Arts & Crafts elements with a high Chateau roof . . . The exterior is clad with stucco and board-and-batten siding, with distinctive bellcast roof edges supported on scrollcut brackets” (23). Mather notes that the house had the most up-to-date features that money could buy at the time and this included a 2,000-gallon tank in the attic to supply water for bathing and cleaning (the floor had to be reinforced to hold it), three bathrooms and a coal-fired furnace in the basement. Wood panelling, stained glass windows, fireplaces, and an impressive main staircase signalled that it was a gentleman’s residence. The house also had a barn and carriage shed among the outbuildings as well as a small cottage. It also had a small orchard.

Having set the context, Mather devotes the majority of the book to recounting the lives of the inhabitants of the house. This is both haunting and compelling. While all the families had “privileged lives” based on their economic and social standing, they were subject to the joys and sorrows of ordinary living. On the upside, they enjoyed the rich social life including tennis and polo as well as the round of dinner parties that included musical and theatrical entertainments. On the downside, they were affected by the First and Second World Wars, the Great Depression of the 1930s, divorce, diseases, and death (including several suicides). On August 6, 1914, the Vernon News reported that Europe had become an armed camp in preparation for war. Charles Buchanan was appointed the Sub-District Intelligence Officer in Vancouver and young men from Coldstream rushed to serve “King and Country.” Many did not return and the postwar hard times affected the community and many could not make a living as fruit growers or farmers. While Buchanan had not been a serious fruit grower, he left with his family for Vancouver and other business opportunities. The family was badly affected by the Depression and in 1931, son Keith died at the age of 28.  

The next residents were Gordon Shakespear Layton and Ann Layton from Norfolk, England, who purchased the house in June, 1925. They were proud of their supposed linkage with the famous playwright and kept his surname in the family. Gordon was a mechanical engineer and inventor who was involved in the First World War. After the war ended, he developed tuberculosis and, in 1924, with his wife and family moved to Canada, settling in Coldstream. Mather notes that they likely brought some furniture with them. Their son Michael, who was 11, was sent to the Vernon Preparatory School (VPS) run by the Reverend Austin Mackie and his brother Hugh and sister-in-law Grace.

Modelled on the minor British boarding schools, it was intended to educate young Canadians in the British tradition. This would bring the Layton and Mackie families together and, ultimately, the house would be sold to the Mackies. Layton became a pillar of the community and, in 1932, was elected to Coldstream Council. While his tuberculosis became latent and ceased to be a concern, Layton was affected financially as were many other businessmen by the Great Depression. Daughter Elizabeth brought honour to the family by serving as Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s secretary in the Second World War. She was also a great friend of Paddy Mackie. The senior Laytons divorced and this precipitated the sale of the property to the Mackie family.

The Mackies were a well-educated English family in which the primary occupation of the males was as clergymen and educators. In 1913, Austin and Hugh followed other family members to Canada and they settled in Vernon where they set up the Vernon Preparatory School (VPS), which was a boarding school for boys aged seven to 15. They were joined by Grace who also assisted in the running of the school. The account of the struggles to make the school successful and overcoming difficulties such as outbreaks of measles and other contagious diseases that endangered the lives of the children and staff in the insular boarding school environment is fascinating. The situation was similar in residential schools modelled on the British boarding school model. Mather’s accounts outlines their challenges, hardships and also the sheer amount of hard work required to survive in the new land. Austin was the champion of the school and corresponded with parents and also created a newsletter to keep in touch with “old boys” and their families. He took his duties very seriously and was committed to inculcating virtue as well as the knowledge and skills required to get ahead. He was devastated when one of the boys was bitten by a rattlesnake and died, and then embarked on a vendetta killing rattlers until virtually the end of his life.

Hugh and Grace had their share of tragedies: their youngest son, six-year-old Peter was killed in 1918 when he and a friend found a tin can full of “treasure” and threw it against the wall of an empty shack and it exploded. It had been full of detonation caps. The school struggled through the Great Depression when enrolment dropped dramatically but it would be the Second World War that would devastate the family. Son Geoff, who had enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force, was killed in a training accident in February 1921. Two months after Geoff’s death, his brother John was killed in action over Greece.

This left Paddy as Hugh and Grace’s only living child. He served in the Royal Canadian Navy and took the opportunity to visit literary sites in the UK and also to become proficient in French. After he was discharged, he returned to Canada and began to teach in the family school as well as registering in a general arts program at UBC beginning in 1948. His majors were French and Social Studies since he intended to teach but he also studied Spanish and Russian as well as English Lit and Canadian history. At university, he began to keep diaries and Mather observes that they reveal a rich social life and love for beer (one can understand why a war veteran would crave care-free student life); apparently, he also made some trenchant remarks about others throughout his life so much so that the Vernon Archives has restricted access to these materials. After finishing his studies at UBC in 1951, he studied French at the Sorbonne in Paris. In 1953, he returned to UBC to take teacher training courses. He began teaching at W. L. Seaton Secondary School at the junior high level and excelled at teaching French; he taught there for 25 years. Paddy also studied at the Ontario College of Art and became an accomplished painter of watercolours (in particular, landscapes). He also studied pottery and examples of his work can be found in the house and the miniature kiln is located in the basement.

Back home change was afoot for the older members of his family. By 1949, Austin, Hugh, and Grace were ready to retire from VPS and to enjoy Lake House which they had purchased in 1940 and inhabited in 1946 (they had continued to live in the residence associated with the school until then). Sadly, the headmaster they had hired W. B. Ingram was discovered to be abusing the older boys and had to be replaced. In 1953, VPS was incorporated as a non-profit under a board and, by 1958, the elder Mackies effectively retired.

Paddy, who had lost all of his siblings, felt honour-bound to support his parents in the best way that he could and moved into Lake House in the summer of 1955. This weighed heavily on him and Mather notes some of the less than generous statements that this witty and urbane man made about not only his parents but also his friends. By 1971 with his father’s death, he and his mother were the only occupants. Lake House became his sanctuary and a part of his identity as he purchased English antiques to beautify it and make it the proper home for an “English gentleman and educator.” He was an international traveller and, when at home, was grounded in the community. Paddy was a member of the naturalists club, the French circle and also supported the art gallery and museum. He was a gifted educator concerned about his students. He was also, on the surface, the perpetual bachelor (a cover for a closeted gay man). His home was a gracious retreat where he entertained friends and invited students out for an annual visit at the end of the school year.

Sadly for Paddy, time moved on and the population of Canada became more diverse and, in 1988, the Government of Pierre Eliot Trudeau passed the Multiculturalism Act. Paddy remained in a kind of “time warp” of British gentility; Coldstream and Vernon society had changed dramatically and it was no longer the community of his youth. Mather observes someone questioning his “plummy English accent” and noting derisively that he was born in Vernon! Mather devotes Chapter 5 to “Patrick Fylton ‘Paddy’ Mackie,” the Lake House owner from February 1969 (his parents were still alive at the time) to his death in 1999. He describes him as a “Renaissance Man” which in the last years of his life was not an advantage but rather evidence of how out of sync he was with the times. Paddy worried about money and what would become of his beloved home. After his mother’s death and a fight with one of his best friends Sveva Caetani in 1978, he appears to have had periods of depression. After a trip to Europe with his younger cousin Richard Mackie in July 1999 and a car accident, he became severely depressed. According to friends, a lawyer frightened him telling him that the victim of the accident could sue him and he could lose everything. Unable to face this, he committed suicide.

While his death was tragic, the saving grace was that he had set in motion the preservation of his beloved home. The account that Mather provides is a summary of the challenges of preserving historic properties in Canada. By Paddy’s calculations, in 1973, his net worth (house and investments) was more than half a million. This reassured him that he could look after the property until his death but he worried about what would happen after that. He followed with interest the establishment of the Heritage Canada Foundation in 1973 with a federal endowment of $12 million. In 1974, Paddy wrote to its first chairman, R. A. J. Phillips about possibly donating the house. They were interested but wanted no encumbrances and he would have had to remove his second cousin Richard Mackie from his will and make the foundation the sole beneficiary.

Over time, he began to worry about the Heritage Canada Foundation’s capacity to maintain his house as he would wish and also even operate a music school there. In June 1976, a delegation from the foundation visited Lake House; however, at this point they began to question whether they could acquire heritage properties as their counterpart in the UK, The National Trust could. This was very unsettling for Paddy and he looked at alternatives including the possibility of gifting the house to the municipality. It turned out they had even less capacity than the Heritage Canada Foundation and that municipal designation would not include the interior.

At Richard’s suggestion, Paddy next turned to the BC Heritage Trust and provincial designation. This occurred on December 10, 1987 when an Order in Council was passed. A press release stated: “The historic Lake House near Vernon has been designated a Provincial Heritage Site under the Heritage Conservation Act, Tourism Recreation and Culture Minister Bill Reid announced today.” In the end, Paddy, rather than leaving the property to Richard, chose to establish a non-profit society registered in BC (September 7, 1993) and a federally-registered private charitable foundation (1995) with oversight for the management of the property making it and its collections accessible to the public in perpetuity. The name of the foundation was changed in 1999 to the “Mackie Lake House Foundation.”

Mather concludes the book by noting that the story of Lake House and its inhabitants is only one of the many stories of those who have lived on the shores of Kalamalka Lake. The Indigenous past is shared through the education programs, though, first and foremost, its interpretation is focused on over 100 years of colonialism in this part of the world. As such, it is a living history museum; these became popular in the latter half of the twentieth century and some even made use of costumed interpreters.

Today, such facilities are being challenged not only because they are exponents of colonial history but also because their interpretive programs can seem tired and dated to children and families used to not only television but also multimedia games. Having said this, I believe that Mackie House and other such sites can be viewed as sites for reconciliation in which Indigenous and colonial narratives can be explored to create a new Canadian narrative of nation building that is more equitable.

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Adriana A. Davies, Order of Canada and Cavaliere d’Italia recipient, was born in Italy, grew up in Canada and has BA and MA degrees from the University of Alberta, and a doctorate from the University of London, England. She has worked as a writer, editor, curator, fine and decorative arts specialist, and cultural executive director.  She was science editor of The Canadian Encyclopedia and also created the Alberta Online Encyclopedia (www.albertasource.ca), comprising 84 multimedia websites (33 with Indigenous content). She was involved in the Canadian Museums Association and Assembly of First Nations Task Force on Museums and First Peoples; implemented three Alberta Museums Association symposia on the same subject the last being, “Re-inventing the Museum on Native Terms”; and created three internships to engage Indigenous young people in content creation for the Alberta Online Encyclopedia.  Publications include The Dictionary of British Portraiture (two volumes); From Realism to Abstraction: The Art of J. B. Taylor; The Rise and Fall of Emilio Picariello; The Frontier of Patriotism: Alberta and the First World War (co-editor and contributor); From Sojourners to Citizens: Alberta’s Italian History; poetry anthology Changing My Skin: Dark Elegies and Other Poems; and memoir My Theatre of Memory: A Life in Words. (Editor’s Note: Adriana Davies recently contributed an essay on the subject of Sveva Caetani centered around an exhibition of her work at The Caetani Centre in Vernon.]

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The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors, 2023-26: Trevor Marc Hughes (non-fiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an on-line book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

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