Joy Kogawa House Facing Bulldozer – Press Release Oct 27, 2005

The residence at 1450
West 64th Avenue, former childhood home of author Joy Kogawa, now
marked for demolition plans. – photo by Don Montgomery

– For immediate release    –

 “Joy Kogawa House Facing Bulldozer”

October 28, 2005

Only a week after writers from across Canada and around the world were
celebrated at the Vancouver International Writers and Readers Festival,
the childhood home of Vancouver- born Joy Kogawa, one of Canada’s most
eminent authors, is in increased danger of being bulldozed into the
ground.

Gerry McGeough, Senior Heritage Planner in the City of Vancouver
Planning Department, has confirmed that the current owner of Kogawa's
former childhood home on 1450 West 64th Avenue has drawn up
architectural plans for the redevelopment of the site including
demolition of the Kogawa house. Processing a development and demolition
application by the City takes less than four weeks.

McGeough will recommend to the Vancouver City Council Standing
Committee on Planning and Environment on November 3 that City Council
recognize the heritage value of the Marpole property and issue a
120-day demolition delay order as allowed by section 591 of the City
Charter. The meeting is open to the public. The Save Kogawa House
Committee, formed when the home first went up for sale in September of
2003, will also ask the Planning and Environment Committee to urge City
Council to pass the 120-day demolition delay order.

The Committee has contacted professional writers organizations across
Canada to support the drive to save Kogawa's childhood home as a
Vancouver literary landmark and convert it into a major
writers-in-residence centre for Canadian and international writers.
This support from eight associations, representing several thousand
professional writers, will be released shortly. For Kogawa, the 1450
West 64th Avenue property became a symbol of lost hope and happiness
after she, at age six, and her family were removed from their home in
1942 as part of the forced evacuations and internment of over 20,000
Japanese-Canadians during World War II. The house is featured in the
award-winning novel Obasan and the children’s story Naomi's Road, which
premiered on September 30 as Vancouver Opera's second-ever commissioned
original work and is now touring to 140 schools and community centres
throughout B.C.

“The destruction of the Kogawa home would be a great loss of cultural
heritage for Vancouver, for British Columbia, and for Canada,” Margaret
Atwood declared at the Vancouver International Writers Festival on
October 13. “Although Canada scored high on the recent all-nations
report card, it scored low on culture, history and heritage. Why
destroy more of this precious asset?”

The Save Kogawa House Committee reactivated when it was alerted on
September 21st that a demolition application was expected.  Two
years ago the committee tried to raise funds to buy the house and
persuade the federal government to protect the cultural landmark, but
became dormant when the owner made no plans for demolition at the
time.  The committee seeks to preserve the Kogawa House as a
Canadian and international writer’s centre, similar to the Pierre
Berton House in Dawson City and the Margaret Laurence House in Neepawa,
for the cultural heritage of future generations.

“There is only one literary monument erected in Vancouver for a
Canadian author,” says BC Bookworld publisher Alan Twigg, “It is the
Pauline Johnson memorial in Stanley Park.” Johnson died in 1913.

Kogawa is the recipient of many awards including the Order of Canada in
1986. Roy Miki, Simon Fraser University Professor and 2003 Governor
General's Award Winner for Poetry, has called Obasan the most important
literary work of the past 30 years for understanding Canadian
history.  In 2005 Obasan was selected by the Vancouver Public
Library for its One Book One Vancouver program, encouraging all
Vancouverites to read this single book. 

Mayor Larry Campbell and members of Vancouver City Council will plant a
cutting from Joy Kogawa’s cherry tree from the childhood home featured
in Obasan in the garden of City Hall November 1 to commemorate the
experience of Japanese Canadians during the Second World War. Paul
Whitney, City Librarian of the Vancouver Public Library, James Wright,
General Director of Vancouver Opera, and Joy Kogawa will also
participate. The public tree planting ceremony takes place in the City
Hall garden, north of City Hall, 453 West 12th Avenue.

If City Council passes the demolition delay order, the Save Kogawa
House Committee will raise funds to purchase the property.  The
Vancouver Heritage Foundation has set up a fund to save the Kogawa
house and will issue charitable receipts for donations. All donations
to the Joy Kogawa house rescue receive a tax receipt for the full
amount of the donation. Cheques should be made out to “Vancouver
Heritage Foundation” and mailed to the Vancouver Heritage Foundation,
844 West Hastings St., Vancouver, B.C. V6C 1C8. Donors are asked to
indicate on the cheque memo line: “Save Kogawa House.” Donations can
also be made on-line on the Vancouver Heritage Foundation’s website
http://www.vancouverheritagefoundation.org/kogawa.html
 
If the Vancouver City Council does not vote to delay demolition, the
house may be demolished within weeks.  It then becomes the latest
casualty of Vancouver's short-term memory in a climate where arts,
history and culture are left to fend for themselves. 

To prevent demolition, the Save the Kogawa House Committee is seeking
community support and volunteers in Vancouver and across Canada in its
drive to convert the house into a major writers centre. The Committee
is also asking supporters to email the Vancouver City Council at
mayorandcouncil@vancouver.ca urging Mayor Campbell and City Councillors
to prevent the demolition of the Kogawa House.

–30–

Photo credits:

The attached Dan Toulgoet Kogawa House_1519 Vancouver Courier 9 28
05.jpg of Joy Kogawa in front of her childhood home can be used by both
non-profit organizations and commercial media. The photo credit must
be: “Photo-Dan Toulgoet, Vancouver Courier”.
The photographer can be contacted at 604-630 3514 or at dtoulgoet@vancourier.com
The Don Montgomery 3.jpg can be used by non-profit organizations. The
photo credit must be “Photo: © 2005 Don Montgomery”. Commercial media
are asked to contact Don Montgomery at 604-878 6888 or
don@asiancanadian.net

For further information contact:

Ann-Marie Metten, Vancouver Co-ordinator, Save Kogawa House Committee 
604-263 6586; ametten@telus.net

Todd Wong, Vancouver Committee spokesperson
604-240-7090; toddwcan@yahoo.com
 
Anton Wagner, Committee Chair
416-863-1209; awagner@yorku.ca

Gerry McGeough, Senior Heritage Planner, Planning Department, City of  Vancouver
604-873-7091; gerry.mcgeough@vancouver.ca

Diane Switzer, Executive Director, Vancouver Heritage Foundation 604-264-9642; diane@vancouverheritagefoundation.org

Nikkei Voice asks Japanese Canadian community for support to preserve Kogawa House

Joy Kogawa at Kogawa House, the house she left at age 6, never to return. 

Katherine Mika Fukuma, the English Editor of the Nikkei Voice, has come
out strongly in favor of the effort to save the Joy Kogawa House in her
October 2005 “Editor's File” column. The Nikkei Voice is the national
forum for Japanese Canadians.

Katherine's editorial, “The JC community is again in need of your support,” is nearly half a page long. It reads in part:

“As you may have already read in the Globe and Mail (Sept.24) or in the Vancouver Courier (Sept. 28), the house of Obasan (Joy Kogawa homestead)
is currently in danger of being demolished. According to sources, the
owner of the Marpole, West 64th Avenue house–in which Joy Kogawa lived
until her family was relocated to Slocan Valley when she was six years
old–applied to the city of Vancouver for a demolition permit in
late-September.

The news came as a disappointment and a shock despite the fact that the
city of Vancouver will be planting a cutting of the cherry tree from
the backyard of the Marpole home on city hall grounds this fall as a
way to commemorate the experience of Japanese Canadians during the
Second World War.

Other joyous news for Kogawa this year included her book Obasan chosen as the Vancouver Public Library's One Book, One Vancouver selection for 2005, as well as the premiere of the Vancouver Opera's World Premiere production of the opera for young audiences and their family, Naomi's Road.
The Vancouver Opera presented four public performances before the
production embarks on a province-wide tour, visiting more than 140
schools and community venues throughout B.C. between October 25 and May
2006.  

Furthermore, there was discussion at the September 19, 2005 meeting of
the City of Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation of the possibility
of naming the new Park for Marpole (at West 72nd Avenue and Osler
Street and Selkirk Street) “Joy Kogawa Park.” This park will be a
neighbourhood park, with a design element representing a Japanese theme
to reflect the history of the area.

Now, wouldn't all these events create more than enough meaning to
declare the property, or the house as a historical landmark? If it is
impossible to purchase the entire property, at least the house itself
should be saved, before it is too late.

The house represents more than just a literary icon's childhood home.
It is packed with a historical essence of the kind of lifestyle of the
prewar Japanese Canadians and may be the last of its kind. Once it is
declared a historical landmark much can be done. (Of course, it
shouldn't end up as just a museum!)

I surely hope that Vancouver councillors are smarter than those in Toronto…Preserve our nikkei history and heritage and help educate our future generations.”

Nikkei Voice, 6 Garamound Court, Toronto, ON, M3C 1Z5
Phone: 416-386-0287
FAX: 416-386-0136
E-Mail: nikkei1@bellnetc.ca

Publisher: Frank Moritsugu
Owner: Nikkei Research and Education Project of Ontario
Circulation: 3000  Subscription: $35.00  Frequency: 10/year

Yusuke Tanaka, Japanese Editor/Advertising Manager
E-Mail: nikvoice@interlog.com

Kogawa House: Can we save the house? Can we move the house?

Lots of developments happening…

Monday, we met with Vancouver Heritage Foundation, and discussed
strategies to save the house, and create a way for the present owner to
donate the house to the VFH.  To preserve  the house at its
present location will mean a purchase price of around $700,000. 
To move the house will mean $50,000 + building a $200,000 foundation
later.  What is cheaper?

The owner has not been willing to sell, so trying to save the house
from demolition and move it seems the best idea.  There is a
proposed park that will commemorate the Japanese Canadian community at
Selkirk and 72nd Ave.

To avoid the demolition of the house, we have planned to go to City
Council to ask for a stay of demolition, due to the Heritage quality of
the house.
Initially that would have been Oct 20 – but the demolition application has not been submitted yet.

But yesterday, the owner may have had a change of heart…  Gerry
McGeough, senior planner for City of Vancouver, may have brokered a
deal where the owner will delay demolition for 120 days, allowing us to
raise funds to purchase the house. 

This is great news.  The house may not be destroyed yet… and it gives us time to raise monies.

Because of these latest developments, Joy will not be interviewed for
CBC Radio Early Edition on Thursday morning. CBC wants to wait and see
what happens next!

A Writers Literary Landmark and Writers-in-Residence Centre for Vancouver


The following is a message from Anton Wagner, of the Save the Kogawa Homestead Committee:

Dear Todd,

Thank you for the great article “How important is saving Kogawa House?
What other literary landmarks are in Vancouver?” on the
http://www.gunghaggisfatchoy.com website.

I totally agree with Alan Twigg's suggestion to Ann-Marie that we also
focus our campaign to save Joy's former home on Margaret Atwood's
recognition of Vancouver's cultural desert of literary landmarks. As
Alan writes in his entry on Pauline Johnson in the BC Bookworld Author
Bank, “The Pauline
Johnson memorial in Stanley Park, above Third Beach, is the only
literary monument erected in Vancouver for a Canadian writer during the
20th century.”

Johnson died in 1913.

Other provinces and much smaller towns have established and supported
such literary landmarks and a few writers-in-residence programs:

The Manitoba Department of Culture, Heritage and Tourism maintains the
Margaret Laurence House in Neepawa as the Manitoba Provincial Heritage
Site No. 25
http://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/hrb/prov/p025.html

In St. Boniface the non-profit corporation La Maison Gabrielle Roy Inc.
operates the Gabrielle Roy House as a museum for the Franco-Manitoban
writer with project grants from the federal, provincial and municipal
governments and corporate, foundation and individual donor support. To
date 105 women and 37 men have donated $1,000 each to the House.
http://www.maisongabrielleroy.mb.ca

In Eastend, Saskatchewan, the Eastend Arts Council owns and operates
the Wallace Stegner House as a writer/artist's residence. Rent is $250
a month, including all utilities. The furnished house, built in 1916,
contains a kitchen, dining, living room, study, two bedrooms and a bath
and can accommodate two adults and one child. The house is funded in
part by the Saskatchewan Heritage Foundation, the Writers' Development
Trust, provincial, federal and civic government grants, and individual
donations.
http://www.dinocountry.com/stegner_house.html

In Dawson City, the Yukon Arts Council and the Klondike Visitor's
Association and the Dawson City Libraries Association operate the
Berton House Writer's Residence Retreat. Initiated by Pierre Burton in
his former boyhood home, the Writer's Residence Retreat enables
professional Canadian writers to
write in the remote Northern community free of charge.

One item of great interest in your

http://users.yknet.yk.ca/dcpages/bertonhouse/story.html link is the
last April 2001 item on that page, “Canada Council to support Berton
House writers.” It reports a grant of $100,000 from the Canada Council
over a three-year period to the Berton House Writer's Retreat Society
to enable four Canadian or
international writers to be in residence in the house for three months
each, with a monthly fellowship of $2,000 and travel cost assistance.
This would be a great precendent for us in seeking financial operating
assistance from the Canada Council.

But again, no such writing centre and literary landmark exists in
Vancouver.The Federation of BC Writers operates a small writing cabin,
gifted by George Fetherling, the Horsefly Manor Writers Retreat on
Quesnel Lake in the Cariboo.
http://www.bcwriters.com/horsefly/

Lorna Crozier has informed us that the Haig-Brown House in Campbell
River, operated by the non-profit conservation organization, the
Haig-Brown Institute, has just opened its doors to writers, with Don
McKay being the first writer-in-residence.
http://www.haigbrowninstitute.org
 
Vancouver, one of Canada's most dynamic cities and our gateway to the
East, needs a writers-in-residence centre as has been proposed for the
Joy Kogawa House so that Canadian and international writers can observe
and write about the unique evolving multi and intercultural society
that is developing
in Canada.

Anton Wagner

How important is saving Kogawa House?  What other literary landmarks are in Vancouver?

Alan Twigg, author and publisher of BC Book World, says that Vancouver
only really has one literary landmark, and that one was controversial
and created under protest – the gravesite of poet
Pauline Johnson. Ann-Marie Metten, was talking with the
author of First Invaders: the literary origins of British Columbia and Aborginality which detail the first
writings about British Columbia. 

If we can save and preserve the Kogawa Homestead, then we have the real
life equivalent of the fictional Anne of Green Gables House. 
http://greengables.tripod.com/locations.html
With the new Vancouver Opera creation of Naomi's Road, then we now have
the West Coast equivalent of the ever popular Anne of Green Gables
musical.

The Save the Kogawa Homestead Committee would like to preserve the
former Kogawa House as a writer's retreat, where the house could serve
as a temporary home for visiting writers, immersing themselves in
multicultural Vancouver, while providing a historic landmark to the
thousands of Japanese Canadians who once made up the fishing community
of Marpole neighborhood, but were uprooted from their homes, branded as
enemy aliens, and interened at re-location camps away from the Pacific
Coast.

There are few historic houses preserved in BC.  Our history is
still young, and many of our residents are immigrants with little
knowledge of BC's history.

Only a small handful of the homes of Canada's greatest Canadians or
writers are preserved or acknowledged.  Pierre Berton was born in
a cottage in Dawson City, Yukon.  Berton spent $50,000 to buy the
house to donate it to the Dawson City community where it is now a
historic landmark known as Berton House.
http://users.yknet.yk.ca/dcpages/bertonhouse/story.html

Other BC homes have been turned into historic landmarks or
museums.  But none that I know of are by writers, nor homes that
were confiscated from Japanese Canadians during World War 2.  In
addition to becoming a writers' retreat, Kogawa
House would also represent the tragedy of the upheaval and internment
of the
Japanese-Canadian community and how we overcome our prejudices by
recognizing it and turning it into an important community landmark.

Haig-Brown House Education Centre
2250 Campbell River Road,
Campbell River
B.C. V9W 4N7
http://www.britishcolumbia.com/attractions/?id=67

Rodde House Preservation Society
1415 Barclay Street
Vancouver, B.C.
Canada
V6G 1J6
(604) 684-7040
http://www.roeddehouse.org/

Emily Carr House
207 Government Street
Victoria
B.C. V8V 2K3
Telephone: (250) 383-5843
Fax: (250) 356-7796
http://www.britishcolumbia.com/attractions/?id=63

Irving House
302 Royal Avenue,
New Westminster
(604) 521-7656
URL: http://www.city.new-westminster.bc.ca/cityhall/museum/
http://www.discovervancouver.com/articles/irving-house.asp