"When the going gets tough, the tough get going."
These words sum up the lives of Eve Forrest Gulliford and Nel Coyle Forrest, two remarkable and durable women who met and became friends, then family, during some often difficult times.
Eve's parents Samuel and Hilda Forrest came to Port Coquitlam from Annacis Island in 1916, towing their float house - along with their children - and settled near the foot of Pitt River Road.
It was here Sam found work at the shipbuilding yards before they shut down after the First World War. He built his own vessel, the Harvie W, named after Eve's younger brother, and went into the log-towing business. When Samuel died in 1935, siblings Eve and Harvie, still in their teens, took over the business of working the river during those tough economic times, with Eve having to quit school to do so.
They managed to find an engine for their second boat, Old Faithful, and soon after, both brother and sister could be found working the river, where Eve became one of the first women in B.C. to earn her master mariner papers in 1941.
Soon after, Eve decided to pursue a career in medicine, and was in her first year pre-med at UBC when she met Nel Coyle.
Nel was born in Okotoks, Alberta, where her father Frank and mother Nellie had a farm before moving to Calgary so their three daughters could go to school. Nel took advantage of her schooling opportunities over time to complete a three-year university degree in Home Economics. She was teaching in Calgary when she decided to take a break and accepted a job with the Student Christian Movement office in Vancouver at UBC in 1943.
That's where Eve and Nel met, later to be sisters-in-law and lifelong friends.
Eve's stories about her life on the river finally convinced Nel to come out for a visit to Port Coquitlam on New Year's Eve 1943, a fateful trip that would change her life. She met Eve's brother Harvie, although if first impressions were important, things might have been very different. He had been working on an engine and was covered from head to toe in black grease and soot, albeit with a big grin on his face.
As she recalled: "I wasn't sure whether this was a human being or not."
Six months later, on June 26, 1944, Harvie and Nel were married in Calgary and returned to the float house on the river, where turbulent times lay ahead, including flood, fire and financial ruin.
Eve Forrest transferred to Queens University and completed her doctor's degree in 1949. She married Campbell Gulliford, also a doctor, and the couple had five children, although the marriage did not last and Eve was left to raise her family on her own. She was a family physician in Salmon Arm for 40 years, beloved by all and very involved with the community. Eve passed away in March 1997.
Eve Forrest Gulliford and Nel Coyle Forrest came from different backgrounds but shared a bond, that of the river, that one constant in their lives that endures to this day.
There's was a sisterhood of the travelling river.
Your History is a column in which, once a month, representatives of the Tri-Cities' three heritage groups writes about local history. Bryan Ness is a member of the Port Coquitlam Heritage Society.
