Last year, I took the position of CEO at the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce. At the time I thought this was an out-of-the-box move, but after discovering the following connection, I鈥檓 thinking it may be in my genes.
In the official year of sa国际传媒鈥檚 confederation, 1867, the Victoria Chamber of Commerce was three years old and its president was James Lowe.
He had arrived in 1860 after a few years of running a business with his brother Thomas in San Francisco. When Thomas joined James in 1862, they opened Lowe Brothers and sold a wide array of goods from groceries to French wines and cigars.
This was the second time Thomas had landed in Victoria. He first arrived on June 3, 1843 with Sir James Douglas to found the new Fort Victoria, after a number of wildly adventurous years working for the Hudson鈥檚 Bay Co.
In addition to his Chamber work, James had political aspirations. He ran for premier against the legendary Amor de Cosmos in 1869 opposing Confederation, probably because he benefited from the dominant north-south trade routes of the times. He lost and I don鈥檛 suppose he celebrated when sa国际传媒 joined Confederation in 1871.
Lowe Brothers grew rapidly by supplying Esquimalt warships and whaling companies and purchased land and a hotel. Regardless, they wrapped up business in 1874. James died in 1879, but Thomas retired and returned home to Coupar Angus, Scotland, where he lived until his death at 87 in 1912.
In his old age, he would have known his great nephew, my grandfather, Robert Lowe. He must have dazzled Robert with his West Coast adventures because Robert veered from the well-worn family path of the eldest son becoming a doctor, and set out for British Columbia. He left sa国际传媒 to serve in Egypt during the First World War and, on his return, had his own sa国际传媒 adventures as a land surveyor on the Hope-Princeton Highway, Highway 16 from Prince George to Prince Rupert and Highway 97 through the Interior.
Robert and my grandmother Bertha Robinson had five daughters, including my mother, Patricia Anne. They eventually settled in Duncan after his career building highways and my grandmother's career teaching in one-room schools throughout sa国际传媒
I was born and raised in the Lower Mainland and moved to Ontario and the Yukon before arriving in Victoria 25 years ago and did many different things before taking the Chamber of Commerce position.
I'd like to know what James Lowe would say about this surprising family connection: He as president of the Chamber at Confederation, and me as CEO
in sa国际传媒鈥檚 150th year. He probably wouldn鈥檛 expect his great-great-great-grand-niece to have the job. 鈥� Catherine Holtl