A16 www.thegoldenstar.net
Wednesday, April 23, 2014 The Golden Star
Old courthouse building moved from Donald to Golden in 1900 At our regular monthly meeting of the Historical Society in March I delivered a short presentation on an amazing photo of Golden taken in 1912. And while we were going over the pic- Turning Back the Pages - ture, talking about (MJHP TZY \JJPQ^ Ć^JWX the various buildBy Colleen Palumbo
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ings the history of the courthouse was brought up. Some of our members were not aware that there was an Old courthouse before the present Old Courthouse. Here is some of the history of that building. The first government services building in our district was built in Donald in 1884 and served a wide area, so large in fact, that it wasn`t long before a modern building had to be erected to accommodate the growing needs of the area. The building was finally finished in 1890. The first Gold Commissioner was a man named A.W. Vowell who became quite well known throughout this area as well as the rest of the province. The courthouse stood in the main part of town near the library and icehouses on Beasley Avenue, giving it a very central location. After the railroad made its decision to
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The Old, Old Government Court House in Golden is pictured above. This building was moved here from Donald in 1900 and served the area until 1952 when the new old courthouse was built. Photo courtesy of the Golden Museum move their headquarters to Revelstoke, some discussion took place about the buildings left behind and in 1899 it was decided to move the Donald Courthouse to Golden. This was carried out in the early part of 1900. Unlike many of the buildings that were brought to Golden, the courthouse was partially dismantled, I believe because of its height. The sections were taken to the railroad by a team of horses and placed on flat cards for the trip to town. Once it arrived in Golden it was simply moved across the street to take up residence close to the railway station. The building was slowly going back together but had not yet reached the stage where the date the building was actually built was to go up over the door, when a traveler passing through Golden happened to notice the sate sign said 1890.
(The year was now 1900). The man shook his head and remarked to his companion that he had been in some interesting wilderness areas before but none that moved as slowly as Golden, which had taken nine years to erect a courthouse. Once re-erected in golden the offices were changed a bit, housing the courtroom, judge and jury rooms on the upper floor with the offices of the Gold Commissioner on the lower floor. The grounds were laid out with a profusion of flowers neatly cared for all along the walkways and the boardwalk that led to the main street. Behind this first court building was the jail complex and it was often the responsibility of the inmates of the jail to care for the gardens. And as part of the sentencing the judge would always ask the sheriff if there was enough work to
keep the men busy in Golden. They filled the furnace room in the basement of the courthouse with winter wood, and performed community service by chopping wood for widows and the elderly as well as shoveling snow. Many important trials were held in the old courthouse including at least one murder trial and the fate of many was decided not only from inside the courtroom, but also from the office of the Gold Commissioner. Mining recorder T.C. Lang built up a fine display of specimens taken from the district which, unfortunately, was in the old courthouse at the time of demolition. Not only did his collection include rock and mineral specimens but also some ``interesting`` eggs. It was decided in 1952 that the courthouse had become too small for the
needs of the people of the district and notice was placed in the local papers alerting contractors that bids for a new court building would be taken. The tender from the firm of Gabriel of Vernon was accepted on April 17, 1952 with his bit of $59,887. While the old court building was being demolished to make for the new one, the court services were moved into moved into the offices in the upper floor of the Thompson Motors building and carried on services there until the new building was ready. Work on the new building went smoothly and the construction was finished in the early part of 1953. At that time the building itself housed the Government Agent, Court Administrator, Sherriff, Conservation Officer, Probation Officer, Human Resources and Driver`s Examiner.