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Page last updated May 1, 2004

The house from above the bell-pepper field, looking down toward the orchard, more or less in a southerly direction, back toward Spences Bridge, late on a September afternoon.

There is a map showing this area on the Pokhaist page.

Hilltop Gardens is the biggest of the surviving fruit stands along the Thompson River, across from Toketic several kilometres north of Spences Bridge on the Trans Canada highway. The quality of the produce sold there is indicative of the heat of the summer sun in the Thompson canyon and the plentiful water from the river. Most of the other fruit stands, including the one that used to be attached to the orchard south of Spences Bridge, have closed, in part due to the decline of tourist traffic through the area since the opening of the Coquihalla Highway in 1986. The Morens/Teit house is a bit run down and has a covering of stucco but nevertheless shows its 19th century lineage--a wraparound porch with carved brackets and a very interesting sunburst in the main gable (sketches of these will be posted here soon!). It is very historic, situated on an 1873 preemption by Pierre Morens; he also obtained the lot on the bench below the highway (at that time the Cariboo Road) in 1880, at which time John Jane, the surveyor, noted this large house on this site. (Source: Cariboo Road Heritage Conservation and Tourism Development Study, Alan Ferguson Regional Consulting Ltd., v. 2, 1989). There is no question it is one of the oldest buildings in this part of the Interior. The Morenses were related to the Guichons [WSp71], whose cattle empire included the land around the Quilchena Hotel and the small ranchhouse on the old Aspen Grove road. (Tidbits on the Guichon ranch and family members; interview with Gerard Guichon by Imbert Orchard, 1964. There are genealogy websearches going on seeking descendants of the Guichon, Morens and Rey or Reyd families by Danielle Rivas, etc.) Pierre Morens married Francoise Rey in Victoria in 1878--apparently both were from the Savoie.

 

James Teit and his second wife Leonie Josephine Morens, at the time of their marriage in 1904. (Photo courtesy of Wendy Wickwire via Sigurd Teit)

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Thanks to Steve Rice of Hilltop Gardens for the access to the property. "HW" references are from "James Teit--Pioneer Anthropologist," by Don Bunyan, originally published in "Midden," republished in Heritage West, Fall 1981, pages 21-2. "WS" references are from Widow Smith of Spences Bridge, by Jessie Ann Smith, Sonotek Publishing, Merritt, 1989.