Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/170490
mine • below: Thepeopleemployed nearly 1,100 during STUArT THoMSoN/CITY oF VANCoUVEr ArCHIVE- CVA99-3600 peak years. BrITANNIA MINES- BMM#11585 or gramophone, take the rowboat for summer picnics, attend ballet lessons, watch Abbott and Costello movies or local theatre productions, and head to Vancouver on special shopping trips. The May Day festival was held in spring, with one lucky girl being crowned the Copper Queen. After living near the Beach for a year, John gray was transferred to the general store at the Townsite and the family moved inland. reaching the Townsite entailed climbing 347 steps before boarding the "Skip," a cablefed incline railway, which chugged at 12 kilometres an hour, climbing an additional 427 metres before offloading. Passengers leaned at a 30-degree angle and wheels clicked like a grandfather clock. once off, passengers then boarded a narrow railway into town. The community was concentrated along a slim valley between two steep mountainsides and saw little sun and lots of snow from about November to May. Despite the harsh weather, the Townsite was lively as residents created their own entertainment and children had the freedom to explore and play. "It was the ideal childhood," Town recalls. "We were not in a big city so we didn't have constraints. You had the forests and mountains around you, open to adventure." The fully functioning Townsite mirrored the amenities at the Beach. Both communities even had ecumenical churches in identical buildings—and in both, Protestant and Catholic services were held in separate parts of the buildings. The Beach had the ice skating pond at Browning lake but the Townsite had the high school, outdoor heated swimming pool, bandstand, and snow-covered mountain slope. As could be expected, there were also friendly rivalries between the Townsite and the Beach, particularly when it came to their baseball teams. Despite turnover as workers and their families came and went—"one crew working, one coming, one leaving" was a common saying—those that were there together became close quickly. "In the city, we knew only a few of our neighbours," wrote Town, "Britannia is completely different. There, everyone knows everyone else. It's like having a huge extended family." As the war drew to an end in 1945, Town's family returned to Vancouver. Two years later a road from Britannia Beach to Squamish was built and in 1953 another was completed to the Townsite. Five years later in 1958, the same year the highway was built, the mine closed temporarily and the Townsite was abandoned. In 1963 the operation was sold to the Anaconda Copper Company. For some, the highway, the loss of the Townsite, and the new ownership all marked the end of an era of community togetherness, thought to be another disaster and tragedy in the history of the mine. But for many, including Marshall Tichauer, the strong community spirit lived on for decades to come. In 1965, at the age of 18, Tichauer landed a job in Britannia as a sampler, working underground collecting "muck" samples after each blast. "Everyone was invited to everything—parties, dances, picnics," he said in an interview. "Everyone knew each other and looked out for each other." Tichauer worked at the mine until it closed in 1974, and after a career in logging came back to work above ground as a guide at the mine, now a National Historic Site and museum. "It was the best community," Tichauer recalls. "one of the reasons I came back." Info • Britannia Mine Museum (britanniaminemuseum.ca). The National Historic Site is open seven days a week, from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m; 45-minute underground tours are offered throughout the day. B r IT ISH C o lU M B IA M AgA Z IN E • FA l l 2 0 1 3 59