The pressure to establish a Home Economics course at the University of British Columbia began as early as 1923. By the mid-1920s, the Provincial Parent-Teacher Federation mounted a campaign to develop a UBC degree course. The organization initiated a fund to endow a chair, and by 1927 it had reached $11,000. The money came in small donations from across the province, and public demand for a program continued to accelerate. In response, the University instituted a Home Economics Degree Course in 1931. However, deep cuts in University funding the following year resulted in the course's temporary suspension. The Provincial Parent-Teachers Federation established a permanent committee in 1933 to oversee the development fund's use, which continued to grow. In addition, the committee provided bursaries to eight students who had begun the UBC program to complete their education at another university. In 1943, the Senate and Board of Governors approved the course's re-establishment at the earliest possible moment. The Parent-Teacher Federation turned over $20,000 to the University in 1945 to help finance the construction and furnishing of campus facilities.
Finally, after holding classes in the campus army huts and enduring a fire in 1948, the new Home Economics Building opened in September 1949. Dorothy Lefebvre served as the first head of the Department of Home Economics. She resigned within a few years and was replaced by Charlotte Black, who served as director until the 1960s. In 1951, the program's status changed as it became the School of Home Economics, part of the Faculty of Arts and Science. It moved to a new building near the UBC Bookstore on East Mall in 1982 and was renamed the School of Family and Nutritional Sciences in 1984. The School's administrative responsibility was transferred to the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences in 1992, following an earlier academic review that recommended that the dietetics and nutrition programs be relocated to a science-based faculty. There was strong support for the move. There were already several close links between the School and Agricultural Sciences, particularly between the School's nutritional sciences program and the Faculty's Department of Food Science and Animal Science programs. By 1992 the School was offering a Dietetics program leading to a BSc (Diet.) degree, a Family Science major leading to a BA degree, a Home Economics program leading to a BHE degree, a Nutritional Sciences major leading to a BSc degree, an MA in Family Studies, and MSc and Ph.D. degrees in Human Nutrition. The School was discontinued in 1999 -- the dietetics and nutrition programs remained within the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, while the family studies program transferred to the School of Social Work.

The UBC Bookstore is owned by the University and operated by University staff in co-operation with faculty and students to provide the campus community with course textbooks, reference works, and office supplies. The Bookstore is prepared to supply all course supplies required by students, including books, notebooks, instruments and all kinds of specified and general stores. Over the years, the Bookstore has expanded into a significant academic bookstore in British Columbia. It now regularly stocks a wide range of available and educational titles for the convenience of students, faculty, staff of the University, and the public.

Emily Faithfull was born in Surrey, England, in 1835. In 1860, she opened the Victoria Press in London and began publishing the Victoria Magazine in 1863. Faithfull is considered a pioneer for women's rights, particularly in relation to employment.

Thomas James Wise was born in Kent, England, in 1859. He became infamous as a book collector and forger.

Wilson Duff attended the University of British Columbia and graduated with a BA in 1949, and later received an MA in Anthropology from the University of Washington in 1951. Duff was the curator of Anthropology at the BC Provincial Museum (1950-1965) and later a professor of anthropology at UBC. He was also on the Vancouver Museum planning committee and a consultant to study the National Museum of Man in Ottawa. In addition, he served as the Vice President of the Museums Association of BC and was later the President of the association from 1963-1965. Duff acted as an unofficial advisor to several First Nations organizations in BC. In particular, he held a role as the advisor to the Kitwancool. In addition, he testified in the White and Bob case in Nanaimo and the Nishga, which were cases related to land claims.

The UBC Film Society was founded in 1936. Like all student clubs, it operates under the authority of the Alma Mater Society. Its objective was and continues to be to bring high-quality campus films of various genres and popularity levels that students may not otherwise have the chance to see.

The UBC Department of Classics initiated the Classics Club for its students in 1920. The first department head, Lemuel Robertson, was the Club's original sponsor, and meetings were often held in his home. Discussions were also held at the homes of Classics professors Harry Logan and O.J. Todd. Club activities included presenting papers by faculty and students, productions of Classical Greek plays, and social events. The Club was active through the 1920s and 1930s, then went into hiatus during World War II. It was revived when Logan became head of the department in 1949. It continued to flourish until the 1990s when undergraduate enrolment went into decline. The Club was dissolved in 1995. The Department of Classics was merged into the Department of Classical, Near-Eastern, and Religious Studies.

Laurenda Daniells, the first Archivist of the University of British Columbia, was born in Winnipeg in 1923. She graduated from the University of Manitoba with a degree in social work in 1945. Her first job was with the protection division of the Children’s Aid Society of Winnipeg. In May 1948, she married Roy Daniells, who was appointed as the head of the English Department at the University of British Columbia and moved with him to Vancouver. They purchased an empty lot on Allison Road in the University Hill neighbourhood, where they built one of the first homes in the progressive “West Cost Modern” style. They had two daughters, Susan and Sara, and the family travelled extensively to Europe and Africa. In 1959-1960, during Roy’s sabbatical supported by a Canada Council grant, she and the family spent a year in Europe. Laurenda also served three terms as a school board trustee and did a considerable amount of volunteer work. In 1969, Laurenda entered the one-year Library Science degree programme at UBC. Upon graduation, she continued with a six-week archival management course at the Public Archives of Canada. In 1970, she was appointed the first University Archivist at UBC Library’s Special Collections Division. In this position, Laurenda worked to bring some order to the institution’s historical records and eventually had established the University Archives on firm foundations.
During her time at UBC, Laurenda also served as the Faculty Association executive and the University Senate. She also did a one-year term as president of the Confederation of University Faculty Associations of B.C.In 1988, Laurenda retired with “University Archivist Emerita.” Afterwards, she continued her volunteer work, in particular, with the University Hill United Church. In her eighties, she enjoyed writing and began recording her life stories with the Brock Hall Life Writers Group. In 2016, these stories were collected in her published memoir, Royal Blood. Laurenda passed away on Wednesday evening, 4 January 2017.

David Frederick Measday was born in London, England, in 1937. He studied at King's College School, Wimbledon, before attending Wadham College, Oxford. There he earned bachelor's (1959) and doctorate (1962) degrees in physics. From 1962 to 1965, Measday was a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University in Boston. He then went on to work at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1965-1970. In 1970 he joined the Department of Physics (later to become the Department of Physics & Astronomy) at the University of British Columbia, working with the university's new particle accelerator TRIUMF. From 1970 to 1975, he taught as an associate professor, earning full professor's rank in 1975. He was awarded UBC's Senior Killam Fellowship, which enabled his 1977/1978 sabbatical studies at CERN and the CEA Centre at Saclay, France. In 1990 he became Associate Dean of Science and in 1998 was Dean pro tem. In this capacity, Measday aided with the departments' reorganization within the Faculty of Science included the shift to computer-centred laboratories. After his retirement, he continued to be active with the President's Advisory Committee on University Enhancement. In addition, he spearheaded the naming of the Davidson Arboretum.