A colourful piece of Squamish history is finally falling into place now that the Squamish Historical Society has tracked down Ken Barbour, an 85-year-old logging cartoonist and historian whose family cleared some of the first roads in Brackendale. Over Squamish Days Loggers Sports weekend (Aug. 1 to 3) many of Barbour's witty cartoons were on display at the sports grounds and in store windows throughout downtown. The drawings capture the characters whose hard drinking and tall tales became the stuff of logging folklore in B.C. Harbour got to know the characters first hand while logging on Vancouver Island and sharing drinks with loggers in Gastown after he switched careers.Historical society member Eric Andersen knew of Barbour's cartoons and background. He had been searching for the former logger and marketing specialist for the past five years."Ken Barbour is kind of an underground legend as a cartoonist," said Andersen. "He's a direct line to the early history of the Squamish Valley from the 1900s when his father and uncles arrived here to well into the 1930s."Coincidentally, it was Barbour who made his current location known to Andersen. In June, Squamish resident Carole O'Brennan bumped into Barbour while visiting Gastown in Vancouver. Barbour spends several hours walking through the district each day handing out his cartoons and acting as a senior volunteer greeter. He created the position himself two years ago as a way of getting to know visitors and promoting the province he loves."I visit most of the restaurants downtown and they like me to come down and talk to them about Squamish and logging in the West Coast," Barbour said. "I am well versed on it not like a lot of the people who are giving tours down here. They're young, you see."After meeting Barbour, O'Brennan learned about his Squamish roots. She returned home urging Andersen to learn more about the former resident."Little did she know we'd been looking for him for yearswe were so grateful," Andersen said.Since then, Andersen and other members of the historical society have traveled down to Vancouver to meet with Barbour on several occasions.The group now has a stack of Barbour's cartoons, which were a popular sight during Loggers Sports. Characters such as Panicky Bell, Spooky Charlie and the High Rigger drew chuckles throughout the weekend. "We've had such a positive reactionthe Ken Barbour cartoons are now recognized for their quality. We will now make an archive and make them available to the public," Andersen said. "Our project will be to give the Ken Barbour collection a home in Squamish."He said the cartoons would initially be posted online but ideally could be exhibited in a public space in the future.But Barbour's value as a historian goes well beyond his drawings of the "good old days" of logging. He also has a keen memory of Brackendale during the '20s and '30s. His father, Al Barbour, was a pioneer logging operator in the Squamish Valley. His company Barbour Bros. logged with oxen and then horses in the Brackendale area in the 1900s, and used a flume at Cheekye in 1907. Current roads such as Depot and Cottonwood road were first created by the Barbour Bros. Al credited much of his success to members of Squamish Nation who helped him log. According to Barbour, his father would often say that he "could not have been a success, without the friendship of the Squamish Indians." Several Squamish Nation men worked with him over many years, including Chief August Jack, Chief "Long" George, "Skookum" Charlie Douglas and Dominic Charlie.However, after losing his booms in a disastrous flood in the 1920s, and a few difficult years, Al was forced to retire from logging. His family left Squamish in 1928 when Barbour was just six years old.Barbour continued to spend many of his summers in Brackendale, visiting family friends such as the Armstrongs.These days, when he speaks to B.C. residents in Gastown, Barbour said he is sure to suggest a trip to Squamish - a place he envisioned as a tourist hub back in the '50s.During this period, he said he could see that the Squamish and Whistler area would soon become a resort community."I knew Squamish was a cinch in the very beginning because having been involved in tourist business down south," he said, referring to his days promoting tourism packages in California. "I knew that Squamish was near an international airport, near a big city, easy to get to. It had more of an advantage than any city in the world I saw there was potential all over the place. Nobody was promoting it."Barbour said he has never had the money to carry out his ideas for Squamish and Whistler. But he is more than willing to share his ideas with those who will listen.He said the key to a successful tourism industry in Squamish is differentiating the experience from Whistler, noting the community should highlight its rich history and offer hotel stays and dinners that are more economical than its neighbour to the north."Out up in front of your [adventure] centre, you should put that spar tree right in front and put a mannequin of Panicky Bell standing on top of the spar tree," Barbour said. "He'd be waving in the wind up there. Something different, nobody does that."Now a member of the Squamish Historical Society, Barbour said he'd be paying a visit to Squamish soon.
