アボッツフォードから追放された (45)

Abbotsford, on the traditional territories of Stó:lō Peoples, became a Fraser River Gold Rush site in 1858. More than 30,000 non-Indigenous miners arrived, prompting construction of the Yale–New Westminster Road and growth of the settlement. Most miners left by 1859, but some stayed in the area and began establishing farms.

By the late 1860s, local production included butter, milk, and tobacco. Canneries that later employed Japanese Canadians opened along the Fraser River in the 1880s. The Canadian Pacific Railway connection to Seattle was completed in 1891. Abbotsford was laid out beside the track in 1889 and officially incorporated in 1924. The BC Electric Railway arrived in 1910, connecting Abbotsford and Chilliwack. By 1912, the Abbotsford Lumber Company at Mill Lake was a major employer and remained so until the mid-1930s. Fishing on the Fraser River was banned in 1922.

Abbotsford’s first Japanese settler, Kiyu Ogata, arrived in 1907. In the 1920s, many Japanese Canadians turned to farming in response to the fishing ban. By the 1940s, more than seventy Issei families had settled in the area and many helped establish the Fraser Valley’s berry farming industry. The Japanese Canadian community in Abbotsford was centred in Peardonville, Mount Lehman, and along Downes Road (Clayburn). At least three Japanese language schools and temples served the community—two on Downes Road, the other on Ross Road in Mount Lehman. Before internment, thirteen Japanese Canadian families lived in what is now Abbotsford’s downtown core.