Kaehn Michael - The Hot Springs Cove Story

Michael Kaehn

The
Hot Springs Cove Story

The Beginnings of Maquinna Marine Provincial Park

Ivan became engaged to Mary Isobel Mabel Stephen the year after the second newspaper article appeared about his life at Refuge Cove. Ivan and Mabel had grown up in the same part of Victoria and she was living with her parents there when he sent for her to join him at Refuge Cove. They were married aboard the Princess Maquinna in January 1935 on what turned out to be an extremely wintry day.

On Monday, January 7, 1935, in Victoria, thirty-year-old Mabel attended the Womens Benefit Association local review, Queen Alexandra Review No. 1, where the new officers for 1935 were installed. Prior to the installation of officers, a business meeting was held at which three applications for new members were received. After the financial report was read, the review extended best wishes to Mabel, who was leaving that week for the west coast.

A few days later, on the evening of Friday, January 11, Mabel boarded the BC Coast Service SS Princess Maquinna by the old-fashioned gangplank at dock level. Her family and friends were permitted to roam the ship at will until about five minutes before sailing. At about 11 p.m., the Maquinna pulled away from her inside berth at the Canadian Pacific Steamship dock on Belleville Street in Victoria for west coast points. The trip north to Ahousat would have cost her about $10.50, which would have included her stateroom and all of her meals, starting with a free midnight supper. Afternoon tea was also free. A stewardess took care of the female passengers as well as the children on board.

The Maquinna had about twenty-six northbound scheduled stops, with Port Renfrew being the first and then Clo-oose and Bamfield, as well as miscellaneous logging camps, canneries and fish reduction plants along Barkley Sound until they reached Port Alberni, where the passengers had several hours ashore. On the second day, there were ports of call at Ucluelet, Tofino, Clayoquot and Kakawis before Mabel arrived at Matilda Creek.

Ivan couldnt have picked a worse day to get married. The west coast of Vancouver Island had been hit hard by zero-degree weather and heavy snow. As the Maquinna only stopped at Refuge Cove when there was cargo to drop off, and because there wasnt a minister at the cove, Ivan had to take his gas-powered freight boat to Matilda Creek, on the west side of Matilda Inlet, to meet the Maquinna. With his suit safely packed in his suitcase, Ivan stowed his luggage away as best he could, probably covered in a tarpaulin for added protection in his open boat. In the freezing cold with poor visibility in the blowing snow, it would have been a very miserable trip down to Matilda Creek. In the early evening of Sunday, January 13, the Maquinna would have tied up at the old Gibson Brothers wharf at Matilda Creek.

On that Sunday in 1935, aboard the Princess Maquinna, docked at Matilda Creek, just north of the village of Ahousat, Ivan was married for his second time.

Reverend Joseph Jones of the Ahousaht Presbyterian Mission did the honours at Ivan and Mabels wedding. The master of the Maquinna, William Thompson, gave the bride away. Witnesses were Mary Livesley of Ahousat and Donald MacRaild from Victoria, who was the chief engineer on the Maquinna.

The Maquinna more than likely remained tied up to the old Gibson wharf for the night, and Ivan and Mabel would have reserved Mabels stateroom for their first night together. Unfortunately, it would have been a short night, as the Maquinna would have backed away from the wharf very early the next morning.

Ivan and Mabel were married aboard the Maquinna on January 13, 1935. They made their home together in Refuge Cove until Mabel's death in 1964. Their daughter Patsy would remember Mabel as the work shoes and brains of the factory, she was the one that kept the place going. Major George Nicholson Collection/Ken Gibson Collection

Although Mabel and Ivan had lived in the same area of Victoria while growing up, she had gone to the old Kings Road school and Ivan had gone to Spring Ridge School, and then Hillside School. Afterwards, though, they went to high school together. While living with her parents, she had been working as a salesperson for Stevensons Chocolates just before leaving Victoria. By coincidence, at that time, Beatrice Clarke was working at the nearby Peggy Page Chocolates, formerly the world-famous Barrington Chocolates owned by chocolatier Emily Barrington Elworthy, Harolds only sister.

Within a few months of arriving at Refuge Cove in 1933, Ivan had built a log cabin about 16 feet by 16 feet (55 m), using 6- to 10-inch (1525-cm) diameter logs, and then a long float, using larger logs, more than likely with the help of George Rae-Arthur. By November 1934, he had built a wood-framed addition on the north side of the log cabin and an enclosed lean-to on the back of it. He had felled about twenty large trees and many smaller ones to open up a rough clearing around his store, which would have supplied him with the logs to build his cabin, logs to build his float and a supply of firewood to last a very long time.

Business at Ivan's general store was good, and within a matter of months he built a log cabin to replace his canvas tent. Major George Nicholson Collection/Ken Gibson Collection

The following year he built a store and two wood-frame houses, one for him and Mabel and one for his mother, Annie Emma Clarke. Annie Emma had followed Ivan to Refuge Cove soon after his arrival. At age 75, having been widowed in 1931, finished with raising her own children and being from tough pioneer stock, she moved to Refuge Cove to raise her twenty-fifth grandchild, Raymond, and to make sure Ivan did not waste the money that she had lent to him. In a July 1934 letter to her granddaughter, Beverley Clarke (Rays sister), Annie Emma mentions how dangerous it was for small children at Refuge Cove. She tells of how Raymond stayed away from the banks, because if he fell over he would be badly hurt among the large rocks and boulders.

To build the store and two houses in 1935, Ivan used lumber he salvaged from an abandoned copper mine at the mouth of a creek at the end of Stewardson Inlet, an arm off nearby Sydney Inlet, and he also salvaged some from abandoned buildings at Rileys Cove, 6 miles (9.6 km) away, by boat. Out of necessity, having little capital, Ivan had gone green, recycling building materials and other supplies, many years before it became the popular thing to do. Afterwards, he added to the original main building at irregular intervals.

Ivan's mother, Annie Emma, moved to Refuge Cove at the age of seventy-five to raise Raymond, her twenty-fifth grandchild. The wood-frame home that Ivan built for her was constructed using salvaged materials. The repurposing of building supplies would prove to be a constant feature of life at Refuge Cove.

Backing onto Ivans Lot 1372 was the 77-acre (190-hectare) Ahousaht First Nation Openit No. 27 Reserve established in 1889, with water frontage on Swan Cove on the western shore of Sydney Inlet. By this time Robert Wyllie, a commercial agent for Canada Overseas Agency and the son of an international merchant/importer, owned the southern lot on Openit Peninsula containing the hot springs. Up to at least the early 1920s, the springs had been referred to as Sharp Point Hot Springs. Sometime after that they became known as Ramsay Hot Springs, possibly named after Roberts wife, the former Eloise Mae Ramsey (note the two spellings). Ramsay Hot Springs was first recorded in the 1953 BC Gazetteer and formally adopted on December 31, 1966, on 92E/8 as listed in 1966 BC Gazetteer. The origin/significance of the name had not been recorded.

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