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Page last updated October 28, 2003

Due to the amount of material, there are 4 North Bend pages: Highline Houses, the Harry Lee house, Mountain Hotel and this one.

 

A 1992 painting from British Columbia in Watercolour of one of the last old commercial buildings in North Bend. It had been the town's cafe in recent years, but in 1992 it was used only for storage for a river-rafting outfit. It burned down some time in the mid 1990s.

From C.B. Peters: "This picture is of the old store owned by Mr. and Mrs. Elmer Carlson. The lunch counter, owned by Jack and Mrs. Venus was on the other side of the road a short block down from there toward the tracks. From your vantage point, where you stood to paint this picture, the lunch counter and the "Pig's ear" would have been to your left. When Elmer and Nina retired and closed the store, a cafe was opened."

Many years ago, Nina Carlson told Clarke Peters that she had and her husband had moved the store across the tracks to its final location. There is some confusion, then, as the photos below seem to show the store on its final location, on Station Street, at least since the 1920s (before the Carlsons owned it).

 

Note from Linda Reid: The WE Ford is William Edward - he was my mother in law's father and had the store from 1921 to 1928, I believe. The other one says J&E Lyons - one of William Edward's siblings, Louisa, married a Lyons - I'm not sure if they owned the store before or after the Ford's. (Photos courtesy of Linda Reid)

The essential North Bend, as it was in 1980 (map from Lillooet-Fraser Heritage Resource Study, Heritage Conservation Branch, Victoria). The old Mount View (originally the Mountain) Hotel building still exists but is abandoned. The Harry Lee house stands on the first set of lots across from the "CPR hotel," which has been demolished. Neither of the old foreman's houses still exists, unless they've been altered substantially.

North Bend about 1910, with the hotel on the left, looking north. Photo courtesy CPR Archives

The original CPR Hotel in North Bend, about 1890, when it was run by Miss Jean Mollison (later the proprietor of the elegant Hotel Glencoe in Vancouver) and her sister. It burned down in 1927. Postcard courtesy of Greg Sahaydak

The second CPR Hotel in North Bend, built in 1929 and since demolished. Photo from Lillooet-Fraser Heritage Resource Study (which apparently only survives as a photocopy).