The Stories That Brought You Here

Welcome to this very special project dedicated to the voices and stories of long time Southern Gulf Island residents, the second in this series continues with Connie Auchterlonie. While visiting Pender Island in spring of 1958 for the first time, she met her future husband, Dave Auchterlonie. After getting married and spending their first few years living in Vancouver, they decided to move to Pend...

Welcome to this very special project dedicated to the voices and stories of long time Southern Gulf Island residents, the first in this series begins with Harry Brackett. Raised on Pender Island from his year of birth in 1929, Harry spent his first twenty-five years of life on Pender Island. He will describe his experiences attending school on the island as a boy, fishing salmon with his father, a...

In this episode, Steeve will discuss how he and his wife, Dawnda were among the small group of people, who almost twenty years ago, created the much loved New Year's Eve Lantern Festival. He will describe growing up as part of a military family and living in Germany as teenager while his father was stationed there. He will also talk about his various artistic pursuits, how he first became involved...

In this episode, Amanda will detail her experiences as the former chef and co-owner of the beloved but now closed, Hope Bay Cafe. She will describe how she developed a passion for cooking, sailing and riding motorcycles. Amanda will also discuss being the proud new co-owner of Southridge Country Store, along with her husband, Rob. She will also let us know the story of how they first met.         ...

In this episode, Ewa will discuss her new-found love of photography and her philosophy behind trying to capture people as they truly are. She will speak about her life in Poland before moving to Canada and the working in the construction industry there. As well, Ewa will describe the bike trip she and her husband-to-be took nearly fifty years ago along the mountainous coast of Bulgaria and also ta...

In this episode, John will discuss how he wound up becoming the owner of Southridge Country Store and share details about the ups and downs of being a retail business owner on the island for over twenty years. As well, John will talk about his love of Paris, the unfortunate history of heart disease in his family and what made him decide to remain on Pender after he recently retired from the countr...

In this episode, Leslie speaks about being a young hippie growing up in Edmonton and eventually moving to California where she resided for close to three decades. She discusses the hosting duties she has been performing at the monthly Speakeasy for the past ten years, as well, she will also speak about the loss of her son Jordan, who sadly passed away just over five years ago and her subsequent in...

In this episode, Karl discusses how he ventured from Canada to New Zealand at the age of twenty and while living there he would begin a journey that would eventually lead him to creating his own business designing and manufacturing automatic case packer machines from his home on Pender Island and shipping them all around the world. Karl also details his passion for restoring and driving Hudson aut...

In this episode, John shares stories from his forty year career as a musician for the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, which along with performing a countless number of times nationally, also included traveling international many times to perform. John also speaks about his involvement with the Socrates Cafe-a local philosophical discussion group that regularly meets on the island. We also talked books...

In this episode, Andy explains how thirty years ago, he and a group of others on the island helped move and re-create the recycling depot into how we know it today. Andy also discusses his involvement with the Pender Solar Initiative 2020 group, which has worked towards placing solar panels on various buildings on the island. As well, he speaks about his passion for growing his own food, growing u...

In this episode, Lisa will share stories about mountaineering trips in the coastal mountains along with her husband, Peter. She will also detail the experiences they had building a log house on the island, discuss the book she wrote about her close friend, John Clarke and Lisa will also tell us some tales from her time growing-up in Lincolnshire, England.

In this episode, Sam pays homage to his great-grandfather, Bob Bugg. He talks about his experiences attending boarding school, which included many successes playing rugby and led to playing internationally with his team. Sam also speaks about his career in real estate, the close connection he has to Hope Bay, as well, he will detail how he met his wife, Rita.                   

In this episode, Angie talks about her time growing up in Regina, Saskatchewan, which for her included twelve years playing the sport - ringette. She later switched her athletic focus towards rowing and this eventually led her to the West coast. She will also speak about her involvement in the annual Pender fashion show  Zooislander, why she found it important to get her holistic nutrition certifi...

In this episode, Andrea discusses her experience writing and along with her husband David, performing on a Canadian children's television program titled, 'Storytime'. She will also share stories of their time as traveling folk music performers, describe in vivid detail parts of her youth spent growing up in Manchester, England. As well, Andrea will speak about how the island has changed in the pas...

In this episode, Tim discusses aspects of his coaching career that included everything from working with a young Terry Fox to having phenomenal international success with the Canadian Women's wheelchair basketball team. He also talks about how he and his wife, Gerry are involved with the volunteer organization, German Shepard Rescue of British Columbia. As well, Tim shares stories from his involve...

In this episode, Theresa discusses how she came upon the idea to create recipes based on the book series, Outlander. This led her to first creating a blog, then eventually developing that into a popular cookbook. She also discusses her time growing up in Vancouver, playing field hockey in those days, the experiences she has had at silent retreats and how she met her husband, Howard.

In this episode, Jo talks about his family immigrating from England when he was very young. He speaks about growing-up in Sidney, his love of playing basketball and recounts the details of one of his first jobs, a bingo caller. As well, Jo speaks at length about the outpouring of community support his family received in 2011 when his son was diagnosed with a serious illness.

In this episode, Shelley shares very personal stories about the profound impact the death of her brother had on her life and how it helped her on the path towards a career as a massage therapist. She speaks about her first job on the island, as an end of life care worker She discusses the amazing synchronicity involved with the two different houses she and her husband, Pete have purchased since co...

In this interview, Ben talks about his passion for music and some of the ways he has helped to foster the music scene on Pender Island. Ben also talks politics and describes his recent involvement with the First Nations community and how it has impacted his life.

In this episode, Ethan talks about his time working at The Empress Hotel in Victoria and his early career as a radio personality. He also discusses trying to make it as an actor in Calgary and speaks about his lifelong passion for competitive endurance sports. All this and so much more in a really jam-packed episode.

In this episode, Josephine talks about her three amazing siblings, Finnish saunas, her new job as a medical transcriptionist and she describes growing up in Vancouver and being into punk rock! That's right, punk rock with an explanation mark! Fun chat we had in this one...enjoy.

In this interview, Davy talks about living in San Francisco during the mid-sixties and how it was there, he began working with leather. As well, Davy discusses his over twenty-five year career working with solar technology and also tells his amazing story of dodging the Vietnam War draft in the sixties and how it eventually lead him to flee to Canada.

In this interview, Brent describes flying to Pender Island in a float plane during the late-sixties to purchase a lot in Magic Lake Estate, he discusses his background building boats, as well, Brent talks about his involvement, with a group of twenty-six other parties, in bringing the commercial space at Hope Bay back to life after it had burnt down.  Plus, I ask Brent where his very fitting nickn...

Two days before she was set to retire from her forty-one year teaching career, Helen talks about her experiences as the kindergarten teacher at Pender Islands Elementary School for the past nineteen years. She also discusses her family's lengthy history with Pender Island, her Scottish heritage, as well, she describes her connection with aboriginal communities she was lead to through her work and...

In this episode, I have arranged a compilation of excerpts from the first twelve interviews to give a opportunity for people to hear the sound of each person's voice while listening to a clip from their interview. Listed below are the names and start times of each person's segment with a direct link to make it easier to go to that person's interview page. I hope this makes it easier to choose whic...