© Michael Kluckner, 1998 - 2012

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Page last updated February 28, 2012

From Susan Ridington, 2012: I purchased this property some ten years ago from Bill Carson, of CRB Logging. He owned this as well as the five acre property down stream. His wife gave to me, upon transfer, the pedigree of this antique log cabin. The cabin is mentioned in the book 'Pemberton: History of a settlement'. Known as Lame Johnny's Roadhouse, this square hewn log cabin was built in 1862.

It was originally just a one room cabin (the portion to the right of the first photo- which now serves as the living room). At some point a square hewn log addition was added (and now serves as the kitchen). The logs are only about five inches in thickness and vary around the fifteen inches wide mark. I'm guessing the time frame, but i think around the mid 1960's a 10'X20' stick frame addition, with a small bathroom, wood furnace and large utility/bootroom, was tacked on. The entry to this addition is through the kitchen. The back porch rests on a generous concrete slab with a large overhang covering all. I assume the two attic style bedrooms upstairs were created around this same time period. Mine is a snug little log cabin, measuring a generous 1100 square feet.

There is a creek which flows year round, just a few feet from the cabin, to which I have the number one water rights (delicious). Lame Johnny's is situated on a well treed, half acre, along a dog leg of the Birken valley. The dog-legs' East-West orientation allows for sunlight all year round – even during winter Solstice; I wonder, is this perhaps why the cabin was built here?

In your work have you ever come across a cabin 150 years old that is still being lived in as a primary residence? I know Fort Fraser is some 200 years old, and presumably there may be an inhabited heritage cabin up there...? The Ward Cabin in Yale is a year junior to mine...

So, ... I am a fifth generation Vancouverite, who grew up on Dunbar Heights. My Mother, with her parents and grandparents, lived in the tallest house on Whyte Avenue in Kitsilano and can remember finding arrow heads in the garden. Having grown up in Vancouver, I left for the country/mountains after graduation and have since lived within the Coast Mountain Circle Tour: Whistler; Nahatlatch River; Pemberton; Birken; and Seton Portage. I love that there is so much history in my neck of the woods and I feel a sense of pride in owning one small part of our National treasure. 

As a  BC girl, I have a passion for our Provincial (and National) history and love to read first person narratives of early pioneer British Columbians.

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Artwork and text ©Michael Kluckner, 2001, 2002, 2003