Minstrel Island is located just North of Johnstone Strait, near the entrance to Knight Inlet, overlooking Clio and Chatham Channels.
The island was named after a traveling theatre troupe, who performed in blackface, that traveled through the area in 1876 aboard the HMS Amethyst. Two of the characters in the performance, Mr. Bones (Bones Bay) and Sambo (a derogatory name for a person of African American descent - Sambo Point) also had landmarks named after them. Negro Rock was also named for the performers.
Also on board was Governor General Lord Dufferin, travelling North by ship to visit the village of Metlakatla.
The ship stopped at many small settlements and the theatre group also are believed to have performed for local First Nations.
Oscar Soderman and his wife Sydney were the first pioneers to take up residence on Minstrel Island. Soderman, a hand-logger, pre-empted a homestead in 1905.
In 1907 a hotel, saloon, and store were established on Minstrel Island.
Minstrel Hotel - 1940s
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The facilities catered to clientele who worked in the logging and fishing industries. Minstrel became a scheduled stop on the Union Steamship manifest, serviced by the steamship Cassiar.
Other businesses soon arrived, including a machinist, Clarence Cabeen, who moved to the island in the 1920s with his wife Nellie.
Due to its central location, Minstrel Island became a hub of activity and a centre for trade and transportation in and out of the area during the early 1900s.
On steamship day the population of the small community would boom as people from nearby communities came in to meet the ship.
In 1922, the Port Harvey Hotel was purchased and floated to Minstrel Island where it was winched on skids onto the shore. The building was known as "the hall," as the lower floor of the building was one large room which was used for dances and other community events.
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| Minstrel Island 1968 |
Hood and Alan MacDonald owned the hotel from 1930 until 1963. A brothel also operated in the community.
A new store and and a marine ways was constructed by Roy and Georgie Halliday in 1935. The ways serviced local boats for 30 years.
In 1944 a boarding school was opened on Minstrel by Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Herbison. Until the 1960s, Minstrel was the centre of the universe for many local hand-loggers and gyppo logging outfits.
People would come to the island to find work, get supplies, and for travel in and out of the area. The bar at the Minstrel Island hotel reportedly went through more beer than any other establishment in BC during its heyday, and thousands of beer bottles litter the ocean floor.
Forestry businessman Pearly Sherdahl was reported to have been refused service in the bar in 1963 because he already "had a couple." He reportedly flew directly to Vancouver, bought the establishment, flew back to Minstrel, and fired the manager who had refused to serve him. Another story, told by Jim Spilsbury, tells of the "working girls" at Minstrel, who at one point decided to take a day off and closed up shop. The irate loggers apparently got out their logging jacks and raised the building up, right off its foundation, only relenting when the girls again agreed to accept clientele.
i lived at the chatham channel b.c forestry station ,1963-65 , weekly trips to the island were the highlight of the week,many dances and parties
ReplyDeleteMy dad took my mother, brother and me to Minstrel Island on a steamship in the 1950's where he was the accountant and manager of a logging business. I remember walking on the dock and going down the steep ramp at low tide and across a ramp to our floating house that rose with the tide and sloped with low tide and I remember falling off the dock with all my winter clothes on and walking on the bottom up to the tide line ( I was 4 yrs. old and couldn't swim) and I remember the cook at the hotel, where the crew ate their meals, whose name was Flo and I still have a piece of furniture (a grand piano) in my possession that Flo used as an ironing board and my mom, who played piano, took with us when we moved back to Vancouver before we went to Gambier Island and then to Sechelt and then to Abbotsford and then to Massachusetts, New Hampshire and finally Florida and the piano is still with me, but it resides in storage at the moment. I also remember the forest fires that appeared above us and the sadness of my father when he lost one of his men to accidents in the forest industry. It is still one of nature's beautiful abandoned spots.
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