The Basin Record Newsletter Vol.2 Issue 3

Basin Biography Did you think that Cranbrook has destroyed most of its early built history? Well, think again! Yes, some wonderful buildings have disappeared, but many more are hiding in plain view under vinyl siding. And even for some of those that have gone, such as the Bucket of Blood or Commercial Hotel, the stories linger. This 50 minute self-guided walking tour brings downtown Cranbrook to life. It talks about the vision of some of the early business people, about their resolute faith that if they built their hotel, store, pool hall or café – the public would come. The stories these buildings hold are meant to be celebrated. That is why we have a downtown, and AGuide To Cranbrook’s History Fee Hellmen was born March 9 th , 1918, in a little log house at Wardner, B.C. There was no doctor in attendance, simply two mid-wives who proceeded to get drunk. Fee survived and began school in Wardner. The Hellmen family left when the Crows Nest Pass Lumber Company mill shut down in 1932, moving to Ta Ta Creek. There they occupied an abandoned log house and lived there, working their way through the Depression as best they could. Fee began constructing a new house for his parents in Ta Ta Creek when he was eighteen, completing it when he was twenty-two. During those years Fee learned to hunt and track. “I was free to do what I wanted in the Depression, so mostly I hunted. It was good on the farm. There was lots to eat but clothes were a problem. A patch is honourable, but patch upon patch is beggarly.” He worked on the highway paving through Ta Ta Creek, and then cleared land for the military airport near there, earning 40¢ an hour. On July 28 th , 1941 he married Alta Goodwin (see When I Was Small…) and they began a life together in Marysville, where Fee worked for the C.M.& S. dairy until he asked the Department of Labour about working conditions. He then took employment as a logger. The job took them to Edgewater and, finally in 1951, back to Cranbrook where Fee and Alta bought a house. Fee became an assistant guide with Jimmy White and Harry Bjorn in the Wild Horse and Top of the World, before finally acquiring his own guiding territory at Lumberton. Around 1958 Fee secured employment with the Farmer’s Co-op Store in Cranbrook, eventually becoming manager of that operation on 9 th Avenue. “After three years I had to choose between guiding and working in the store. So I sold the territory to Wally Faiers for $1,000 - $500 cash and an old broken down car. He got the territory and my Jeep.” Among his other accomplishments Fee is the author of a very entertaining volume titled Kootenay Country and, more recently a slim volume of reminiscences he wrote with his wife Alta [see article elsewhere in the newsletter]. At 88 Fee still continues to tell stories and enjoy life in Cranbrook. Fee Hellmen Deer hunting at Ta Ta Creek (1939) Just Married, Fee and Alta, July 28, 1941 we owe that much to the early visionaries and scoundrels who made Cranbrook work. And also to those who still do! Find out the up-to-the- minute story behind the clock tower time piece, and who still sets it. This is the first in a series of tour books from the Columbia Basin Institute of Regional History. All of them will examine the promise our downtowns held, and still do possess today. Take the tour – you will never see downtown Cranbrook in quite the same light again. AGuide To Cranbrook’s History WALKING TOUR #1 A50minute selfguided tourof Cranbrook’shistorical downtowndistrict. 0017.0039 0032.0015 0019.0012 Walking Tour #1