Up the hill from the big box stores on Lougheed Highway, a beautiful white church stands as testament to the determination of Coquitlam’s original francophone community to preserve its culture.
Located at 830 Laval Square, the Our Lady of Lourdes Church and the surrounding square, have been recognized through B.C.’s recently honoured Francophone Historic Places Recognition Project.
“For me it was a very proud moment when we gave it the OK,” said Joanne Dumas, executive director of La Société francophone de Maillardville, who was a member of the committee that vetted 180 sites to designate 23 as B.C.’s historic francophone places deserving of recognition.
The church was built in 1910 by francophone labourers who had left their homes in Ontario and Quebec for employment at nearby Fraser Mills and was an important centre of life in the community.
Prior to their arrival, the mill owners created a mill town of 20 houses, a store, post office, hospital, office block, barbershop and pool hall.
In 1909, rapid growth at the mill resulted in the recruitment of more than 100 French-Canadian mill workers and their families, and with more workers following in 1910, Maillardville was born, named for Father Edmond Maillard, a young Oblate from France.
Dumas said it took five years to get the province to consider recognizing francophone places of heritage and the importance of the francophone community to the development of the province.
Maillardville, including the church and square, is now firmly entrenched as an important historic place and will be included in the BC Register of Historic Places and submitted for inclusion in the Canadian Register of Historic Places.
Other important places include the Old Fort Langley site (1827-1839), which is valued as the first location in southwest British Columbia where voyageurs over-wintered. The site is the predecessor to what remains of the current Fort Langley, later built by the Hudson’s Bay Company after the original site was abandoned in 1839.
Dumas said it was a “no-brainer” to add Maillardville to the list because of its longevity, impact on the development of Coquitlam, and the fact that is was the only organized francophone neighborhood in B.C.
Maillardville had a credit union, a grocery store, schools, its own police and fire brigade, scouts, baseball and hockey teams, a band and bingo nights and many cultural events, many of them supported by the church community.
Today, the square around the church, known as Laval Square, is an important landmark, Dumas noted, the only such square of its kind in the province.
The original church, however, burned down in 1912, the second was built shortly after and survived until a newer church was built in 1938-39.
According to the Maillardville Heritage Inventory, the church at 830 Laval Square provides the focus and spiritual core for the French Canadian community of Maillardville while the square shows the role that religion played in the formation of Maillardville, and the transfer of an eastern town planning model to the west.
In other news, the province has declared next Wednesday, March 20 as B.C. Francophonie Day.
The following weekend, March 22 to 24, Festival du Bois will be held in Mackin Park, in Coquitlam, featuring music, dance, traditional food, shows for the kids and other activities.
More information, including a schedule can be found here.
