Santa sails into Steveston Village by boat to Fisherman’s Wharf this weekend, as a more ‘recent’ tradition that happens each December during Winter in the Village. Look for his arrival on Sunday December 7th at 1pm, then follow him to the Gulf of Georgia Cannery National Historic Site, to take photo with him (bring your own camera!) from 2 to 4pm. (Photo: Santa on a Sled in Steveston c.1940, City of Richmond Archives 1978 23 12)
Winters in Richmond’s early years looked a little different from the ones we know today. During the coldest winters, parts of the Fraser River were known to freeze sometimes as far south as Richmond. Local stories tell of children skating from along the North Arm of the Fraser from Sea Island (where the airport now sits), all the way to New Westminster and back again. Kids even played hockey under the Fraser Street Bridge (where the Knight Street Bridge now stands).
During those deep-freeze winters, farmers swapped the wheels on their wagons for sleigh-runners and travelled between Richmond and Vancouver over the frozen river, ignoring the nearby bridges!
David Jelliffe, in Childhood in the Old Days of Richmond, shares a favourite Richmond childhood memory of “travelling with your father over the ice, watching the clouds of breath from the horses, and listening to the deep cracking sound of the ice as the floes shifted and bent from the pressure of the ice up River.”
His short booklet, printed long enough ago that it carries no publication date, recalls a time when “the stretch of water between Steveston and Steveston sandbar (now called Shady Island) usually freezes in winter allowing children to skate or play hockey.”
Those days of skating on the Fraser River are long gone, but one thing about Richmond childhood remains unchanged, even today. As Jelliffe puts it, “there was no skiing or sledding of any consequence for Richmond children because there were no hills in Richmond.”
Thankfully, the river rarely freezes now in Steveston, allowing Santa to arrive by boat to the delight of everyone who gathers each year to welcome him. However, when the temperature freezes in Steveston, locals know to head to Garry Point Park with their ice skates for a game of outdoor hockey! How do you celebrate the wintry weather?
Check out these archival photos and wonder whether we’ll be seeing snowy scenes like these this year.
