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Congratulations to Barbara Johnson who, in a 1987 essay contest for seniors, won a gold medal as first prize for her composition. Except for a section on Hadden Hall which appeared in the September 1987 issue of History-onics, the essay following is as Barbara wrote it. GROWING UP IN A "PLACE OF EXCELLEt^CE" BY BARBAPxA HADV7IN JOHNSON We were a lucky family who came to West Vancouver in the early days! 1918, the war was over and my Dad, Fred Hadwin, filled with pioneer spirit, wanted to go west in search of adventure. He packed up his wife Janet, his son Tom, and his daughter Barbara, me, left Winnipeg, and westward we came. Dad heard of property at 11th and Mathers in V7est Vancouver. We came from where we v/ere staying in Central Park to inspect it, sailing on the "Doncella", a thrilling voyage. We didn't know at that time that "Doncella" was #3 in the progression of ferries to West Vancouver, the only direct transportation from the city. It followed the "West Vancouver" and the "Seafoam". We walked up 14th Street to Inglewood Avenue, wood-planked at that time, along to 11th and up a mere lane with trees meeting overhead, to oiir acreage. Dad fell in love with the whole scene, head over heels, and I only four years old, along with him, a lifetime affair. Dad and Duncan MacDonald bought the property between Kings and Mathers from 11th almost to 10th betv;een them, and we had the upper half. Every weekend Dad and my brother Tom and I would come over to West Vancouver and clear the land. They chopped down trees and burned stumps, while I played in the maples, swinging happily there. Soon Dad felt he must live closer to his new love and v;e rented a house at 11th and Inglewood, where St. Christopher's Church now stands. My sister Betty was bom in 1919 and we bought a goat Minnie, to provide good food for her baby digestive system. Not long after this a little house at 1046 Mathers, adjacent to our land, became available, was purchased, and we moved there. Many of the houses in West Vancouver were vrooden platforms v/ith a tent planted thereon, and the new home on Mathers was not much more than that: three rooms with only a kitchen stove to heat them. I remember only the chocolate boxes in the dugout basement, left behind by the former owner, that delicious smell, but not a chocolate left in the lot. Dad bought a cow in place of Minnie. "Klondyke Olive" was her regal name and Mother milked her. Betty and I delivered milk to the neighbors. One day Dad arrived home v/ith two small pigs, Samuel and Selina. "What a time I had", he said. He had set them down in their sack at the ferry wharf in Vancouver, they had escaped and assembled passengers-to-be had chased them all over the area, successful finally in returning them to their bag. Betty and I enjoyed the pigs until butchering time, when we left home for the day. Tom says they smoked the bacon in the wood smoke of the chimney. All I remember is how good that bacon and the pork chops and sausages were! Chickens and ducks added much to our menu, and fruit trees, berries, peas, carrots, onions, potatoes, com, turnip and cream from Olive, plus roasts from the pigs provided sumptuous meals. We had no electricity, no plumbing beyond a cold water tap in the kitchen. For Mother, coming from her modem home in Winnipeg, it must have seemed very primitive. Coal oil lamps were taken for granted by children and kitchen stove heat seemed no hardship. When we ventured forth at night we carried a "bug" for illumination of the dark streets. A jam tin, turned on its side, holding a candle, and carried by a wire handle, did the job. Occasional visits with neighbors plus Sunday school or school concerts were our main evening entertainment. We read aloud or listened to the "Victrola"