OBJECTS OF WONDER
A window back in time
ARGILLITE CHEST
On top of this argillite chest by Charles Edenshaw, a human is caught in a moment of transformation into a raven, the bringer of light to the world. The transforming figure is above a shell out of which human faces emerge. It’s a visual illustration of a Haida creation myth and the inspiration for the much better known version by Bill Reid called Raven and the First Men at UBC’s Museum of Anthropology.
Martha Black, curator of ethnology, said Edenshaw’s work shows that despite the loss of traditional indigenous culture due to colonialism, aboriginal people adapted to the arrival of explorers and settlers. Haida artists such as Edenshaw, for example, sold argillite works to tourists and collectors. The cherished black slate argillite is found only in Haida Gwaii.
“In 150 years of our country, we think about transformations and change especially with First Nations trying to move ahead with truth and reconciliation,” Black said.
“It’s all wrapped up in this piece.”
PYGMY SHORT-HORNED LIZARD
When it’s threatened, a pygmy short-horned lizard puffs itself up and opens its mouth to look intimidating. Also known as snow lizards, they can survive in the cold up to about 2,000 metres.
But does the lizard, which hasn’t officially been seen in B.C. for about a century, still crawl around in the gravel and rocks in desertlike areas of the Okanagan?
Gavin Hanke, curator of vertebrate zoology, thinks the lizards might still be here. They are so small and so well-camouflaged that they may simply have gone unnoticed, he said.
Since they are found south of the border in Washington, Hanke thinks their disappearance in B.C. probably isn’t due to climate change. It may relate, instead, to loss of habitat due to the spread of orchards and vineyards.
Hanke chose the lizard as significant because it illustrates the loss of biodiversity the province has seen during the past 150 years.
“A little lizard like this is now extirpated and found nowhere else in Canada — and who even noticed?” he said. “Pretty much no one.”
DOUGLAS COMMISSION
Besides its three kinds of ink, including iron gall, which was used in official papers in Europe for more than 1,000 years, the Douglas Commission stands out because the great wax seal of Queen Victoria shows the monarch in a long robe. The seal is in a round container called a skippet.
Archivist Frederike Verspoor said the document invested James Douglas as governor and commander-in-chief of the new colony of British Columbia when it came into effect on Nov. 19, 1858. The commission represents the start of colonial government and the application of English law in this part of the world. Amazingly, this key document was lost for many years.
After the Second World War, a secretary was asked to clear out a subterranean vault in London, England of the B.C. Land and Investment Agency. She saw the skippet in a paper bag and realized it was something valuable. She recognized the names James and John Douglas, the governor’s grandsons, who were still clients of the agency. After being lost for about 80 years, the Douglas Commission was returned to Lieutenant-Governor Clarence Wallace at a ceremony on July 20, 1953.
WESTERN RED CEDAR
To indigenous people, Western Red Cedar was more than just a tree — it was a central part of their cultural and economic life.
Uses included shredding its bark to make clothing and ceremonial hats and cutting the wood into planks for housing. Whole logs were carved into ocean-going canoes and smaller pieces were steamed and shaped into bentwood boxes.
Post-contact, settlers prized the rot-resistant wood for use outdoors as shingles, siding and decks.
Plus, said Ken Marr, curator of botany, Western red cedar helps make a walk in the woods a wonderful aesthetic experience.
Research has shown the tree is a relative newcomer to B.C. Based on pollen counts, Marr said, western red cedar headed north after the last Ice Age and likely only became abundant about 6,000 years ago. It is now found along the coast and in wetter sections of the Interior such as the Kootenays and Rocky Mountain Trench.
WALL FRAGMENTS
In a cell in the Immigration Detention Hospital in Victoria, a Chinese immigrant bemoaned being jailed after sailing “over here on the choppy sea” because he wanted to get rich.
“If only I did not need to labour for money,” he wrote on the plaster wall, “I would already have returned home to China.”
The fragment was one of several saved in 1977 when the building was demolished. Written in ink and etched in plaster between 1909 and 1923, they are a remarkable record of the thoughts and feelings of everyday immigrants held in limbo between China and Canada, according to Tzu-I Chung, the museum’s curator of history.
“These are the very rare firstperson accounts of the immigrants’ first experiences,” she said.
The fragments are documentary evidence of B.C.’s role as a historic gateway between AsiaPacific and the rest of Canada, and a counterweight to the usual story of Canada as a country settled from east to west.
“These artifacts speak to B.C.’s role in shaping Canadian history,” she said.