Welcome to Lake Flashback. Reporter Lexi Bainas has been combing through oldnewspaperswiththeassistance of the Kaatza Station Museum and Archives so we can jog your memory, give you that nostalgic feeling, or just a chuckle, as we take a look at what was making headlines this weekaround Cowichan Lake in years gone by.
This week around the Cowichan Lake area…
10 years ago:
According to the Lake Cowichan Gazette of Jan. 30, 2008, ‘There wasn’t much new said at the public hearing into the rezoning of the J.H. Boyd property, with the overwhelming majority opposed to the application.
“The property is owned by School District 79 and developer John Kelly has a contract to purchase it if he gets the required zoning to put in 15 duplexes on two acres and 56 single family homes on 9.8 acres.
“Kelly said the duplexes will be marketed to seniors, with no specific target group for the single family homes. He said he has no intention of putting in modular homes, even though a new zoning would allow for that, and he would even put a covenant to that effect on the property. The main access to the development would be from Oak Lane to MacDonald Street and he admitted traffic would be a problem.
“He said he would build some show homes so there would be no surprises for the buyers and estimated it would take up to seven years to complete the development, depending on the market. Kelly said that once the development is completed there would be about $200,000 a year in taxes to the town, with jobs for skilled workers during construction.
“The ratepayers have done a good job in opposing this development,” he said. “I somehow doubt that the school district will miraculously not sell it if this proposal is turned down. The site doesn’t seem to be used at all.”
25 years ago:
Under the headline, “Mo Shah – the mystery continues”, readers of the Feb. 3, 1993 edition of The Lake News were asked if anyone knew anything about the disappearance of a 34-year-old Lake Cowichan man, who had been missing six months.
“Mo Shah, 34 years old, rode down the Skutz Falls road on an early summer evening at 8:30 p.m. Aug. 13, 1992 and hasn’t been seen since.”
Family was still wondering, the story said.
What is perhaps more frustrating to both police and the family, is that there is no more information now than there was at the time of the disappearance. Mo’s brothers, Hukum Khan and Ayaz Shah, are haunted day and night by the disappearance and the silence.
“Sometimes I just want to walk down the road and yell: Mo, where are you?” Hukum says.
“Both brothers complain of recurring dreams.
“Yeah, I’ll dream that I’m driving and I see him hitchhiking,” Ayaz says.
It’s well known that Mo enjoyed mountain biking. He owned more than one mountain bike. On the evening he disappeared, he was seen by more than one person, as he parked his pickup truck, and rode away down Skutz Falls road on his bike. Since that evening, neither Mo nor the bike have ever showed up.
40 years ago:
In the Jan. 25, 1978 issue of The Lake News we see that plans to move the train station were moving towards fruition.
“The Kaatza Historical Society will launch a campaign this week to begin preparing the building site for its new museum. At a meeting last Thursday the society endorsed a move by the members of the Save Our Station committee to begin a letter writing campaign seeking the aid of gravel truck owners and drivers.
“It is estimated that about 3,000 cubic yards of fill will have to be moved to the site, located on land recently donated to the village by B.C. Forest Products near the Cowichan River weir. The village will donate the fill for the project from the Meade Creek site and from an excavation projecct near Elk Road.”