West Lawn

Sol Cameron

2010-01-11T22:44:00.000-08:00

Northport smelter

Thompson building 1895

I have recently found out considerably more about Solomon Cameron,the contractor for West Lawn. Previous historians said that he came to BC from PEI, in 1902-3. How wrong they were, he actually was very actively building in Washington,Idaho and BC in the early 1890's. He actually built some of the first building at Washington State University 1892-4, one is still standing the, Thompson building and has federal government heritage status and had over 23 million spent on it a number of years ago. He also built the Northport smelter, and numerous building in Spokane.
More to come as I wade through the numerous piles of information that I now have about him and find the time to edit it all. Cheers

West Lawn panorama photos 1915

2008-12-19T16:03:00.000-08:00

Breakin problems

2007-12-06T09:08:00.000-08:00

The buildings have been under continual assault by scroungers, pilfering the metals from especially West Lawn, so a few months ago, bars and screens were placed over many of the lower windows, but they left a few areas undone which were quickly found. So now they have cleared away some of the shrubbery, and finally almost completed the job of sealing the building from future attacks on its integrity. Hopefully in the coming years, new uses will be found for this stately building.

Names,names,names

2007-09-03T17:10:00.000-07:00

At first known as; "The hospital for the mind at Mount Coquitlam", It was renamed as Essondale, in 1913 after Henry Esson Young, then Provincial secretary. The site was then renamed as the "Essondale Branch Hospital". The Male Chronic building, was started in 1909, and opened for business on April 1st,1913 when 340 patients were transferred from New Westminster Asylum, by the years end there were 453 residents. It was renamed as West Lawn in 1950. It has not been used since 1983.