The Trustees of the Chilliwack Museum and Historical Society are pleased to announce the appointment of Vivian Walker, a Life Member of the Society, as its newest Board Member. The Board may appoint members of the Society in good standing as Trustees to contribute to the work of the organization, or they may be elected by the membership at its Annual General Meeting.
The Museum has come a long way since its permanent collection was assembled in 1958, when the first Chilliwack Museum opened in a room in the local police station. The founders of the historical society had deep roots in the community. Brothers Oliver Wells and Casey Wells were the grandsons of A.C. Wells who settled on a farm in Sardis in 1865. As amateur historians and anthropologists they left us with our foundation collection, biographies of early settlers, interviews with Sto:lo elders, oral histories from a wide variety of people and much more.
Vivian Evans Walker was born in Chilliwack and grew up as the 5th generation to live on the Evans Farm off Yale Road West. She was surrounded by history, from the old Evans log cabin (thought to be built by Royal Engineers in the early 1860s) to the 1888 horse barn, to routinely finding arrowheads as a child while walking the back part of the farm along Atchelitz Creek. Her father, John Evans, was one of the early leaders in the Historical Society’s quest to build a Museum in Chilliwack, working alongside the Wells Brothers. Vivian’s keen interest in learning about local history, however, was spurred by the locally-developed history course “GB11,” taught by Birch van Horne at Chilliwack Senior in the early 1970s.
Vivian Walker, shown supporting the good ole’ Vancouver Canucks, is the newest addition to the Chilliwack Museum & Historical Societies Board of Trustees. She is a real “champion” of local history!
After graduating from UBC, Vivian and her husband Tom lived in many parts of North America and are happy to back in the Lower Mainland. Their two sons, alas, live in Waterloo and Montreal. After a career spent as a library technician, she now works full-time for the Vancouver Public Library Foundation in fundraising and is completing her Associate Certificate in Fundraising Management at BCIT.
Vivian is a champion of Chilliwack’s history, and a strong a supporter of heritage education. The Museum & Archives is delighted to welcome her service to our community.
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