#53 - The John McLennan/Tavoso Cabin
In 2016 the Farish Family very kindly sold their cabin to John and Jenny McLennan and Richard and Leanne Tavoso, under the agreement that we would continue to take good care of the cabin and treat it with love and respect. The first things we did were to remove an internal wall to enlarge the living room and installed a hot water heater, which provides hot water for the newly installed kitchen sink and outdoor shower. Kelsey and Jameson, 12 and 16 respectively at the time, were mostly thrilled to have their own rooms for the first time after so many years of spending large chunks of their summer on the island in sleeping bags at their grandparents' or cousins' cabins. They got so excited that they got a gang of cousins together and renovated the boat shed, painting it and fixing it up, thinking they would use it as a clubhouse. They didn't quite get that far, so we expect the summer of 2017 to finalize their plans.
We are looking forward to spending many more summers in our lovely cabin and are so grateful to be part of the Bay community.
From the book written in 1998....
The Farish Family Cabin
Reminiscences from the hand written autobiography of Dr. James Revely Farish
The Spring of 1904 - your mother and I began to think seriously of trying to locate a nice spot for a summer home and it was through Dr. Burnett of Vancouver that I obtained a piece of land from Mr. Simson at Buccaneer Bay, about 32 miles up the coast. I remember very well going to the Bay with Dr. Burnett (who already had a home there) in February and picking out the choice site - slightly overlooking a beautiful sand beach. On my return to the city, I looked up an old Liverpool carpenter, who had been drawn to Vancouver by work during the boom days. I was fortunate to procure his services and arranged with him to build a house for me. He did so and it was finished about the first of June 1906.
excerpts from the Memoirs of Dr. James Revely Farish (Spoken in the summer of 1994)
The Farish house was the first one built on the bluff in 1906. The order of their construction (other bluff cabins) was as follows. The original building was put up in the first place by Mr. Fearing. The second house built by my brother Hazel and Harry, and I think that was approximately 1963. The next in order that is, I think was built by Dennis Debeck's family and the last one was built by Alec Macdonald and family. The house adjacent to ours on the bluff, was built by and for the late Dr. Nicholson. It is now owned by his grandson, Don Wright and family. The other house on the bluff, adjacent to Don Wright's was originally built by Mr. McCullough. He built it for Mr. and Mrs. Thompson and their family. That house I think was built in the early 30's or the late 20's.
I now go back to our house here. I remember my father saying that it was an old patient of his from Nova Scotia that did the carpentry work. In those days, the lumber had to be brought up from Vancouver via the Union Steamship Company. The lumber in those days was not what we call dimensional lumber. It was all random lengths, so every piece of lumber that was brought up the hill was carried on your back, and then cut to length. That was with hand saws, there were no power saws in those days.
Our boat house and float were also built by Mr. McCullough and they were built in the early 30's. The boathouse is the same original boathouse. Of course the ramp has been replaced and so has the float many times. The boat house when it was built, the pilings were again rather poorly thought out. They were just cedar trees that were cut from the back of the property here and eventually they of course rotted. They were then entirely replaced by Janet and myself, and a lot of the work was done by Joe Dunn. Janet and I personally beach combed all of the creosote logs from the Bay side of Rigg's Island and both sides and top end of Vaughn's Island. In fact we got enough pieces of sufficient length to redo the entire boathouse with pilings.