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June 1999 West Vancouver Historical Society Page 7 GIRL GUIDES IN LIGHTHOUSE PARK: THE PHYL MUNDY NATURE HOUSE By: May Loudon May Loudon began working with the Girl Guides of West Vancouver in 1967 "because my daughter's pack needed leaders. 32 years later she is still volunteering, having served as Tawny Owl, Brown Owl, Camp Helper, Camp Advisor, District Commissioner, Nature Advisor & Public Relations Person. In the following article. May shares her love of nature with us. In 1943 huts were built in Lighthouse Park for the army. One of these huts was used for nature training by the Girl Guides of West Vancouver in the 1960's and 70's. Each year during this time I wrote the Superintendent of Parks & Recreation in West Vancouver for permission to use "our" hut. (Most of the buildings in the park were in a sad dilapidated state, so it was always with some reluctance that we received permission.) The park caretaker at that time was Paddy Copeland who always put on a log fire for us to ensure our comfort when we held our meetings. We wished that the Guides could have their own nature house for use at any time and, after many discussions and meetings with the Superintendant of Parks and the Municipal and Girl Guide lawyers, a licence to occupy was granted. Once the licence was issued our real work began! West Vancouver Rotary helped with the physical clean up and painting; grants came from the West Vancouver United Church and from the Municipality, and we organised eight nature training sessions with many of the Vancouver Natural History Society resource people. From these sessions many helpers and Friends of Guiding continued to aid in the work of developing a nature room, installing a kitchen and generally making the building presentable and suitable for our use. At that time Phyl Mundy was Nature Adviser to the Girl Guides of British Columbia and I, together with many others, had the great pleasure of enjoying many excellent nature training sessions with her. She gave so many of us the inspiration to study nature, enjoy the outdoors and to share that enthusiasm with countless Guides, so when, in 1985 a name was to be chosen for our Nature House, I had no hesitation in asking permission of Phyl, (who was by then living in INTERPROVINCIAL GG CAMP- EXPO '86 PHOTO: WV GIRL GUIDE ARCHIVES with our plans: Philip Croft, author of "Nature Diary of a Quiet Pedestrian", who fascinated us with his wonderful talents: the Cannings brothers who handled 70 little girls on a birding session and said they were "very good and quiet": also A1 Grass who inspired us all to learn more about nature. During Expo 1986 we hosted people from all over the world, including many guiding groups, and these Sunday open houses still continue toda. Depending upon the availability of the Malaspina Nursing Home in Nanaimo), if we could use hers. This gave her great pleasure and she was most interested in discussing plans for the project The Phyl Mundy Nature House was officially opened in June 1985 with 70 or more people present. All the groups who had helped us over the years were represented - the WV Parks Board, Rotary, United Church, Girl Guides, Friends of Guiding and the Phyl Mundy Nature House Committee. We have been fortunate to enjoy many resource people over the years, but a few need special mention: Kay Beamish, Professor of Botany at UBC and coauthor of "Nature West Coast", (the Lighthouse Park book) was present at our very first meeting with Frank Kurucz, Director of Parks & Recreation, and helped volunteers to host them, the Nature House is open from 2 pm - 4 pm Still well used by the Guiding Community for all aspects of nature study, the Nature House regularly welcomes the very young "Sparks", Brownies, Guides, Rangers and leaders. We have hosted Provincial, National and International events. The work of the Phyl Mundy Nature House is of an on-going, hands-on type. Nature displays are being created and renewed from time to time. Having known Phyl, it is safe to say that she would be proud of what we are still doing for the youth of our community. *)|c«3|t)|c4c4c]|c*