AUE Heam Cho was born in China on October 15, 1920. He arrived in St. John's, Newfoundland in 1934 at 13 years old, sponsored by his uncle, AUE Sum, to join him. He would be known in Canada as Hamme.

Hamme was the eldest child in his family. His parents and siblings stayed behind in China to work the land. Times were hard for the family; it was fortunate that Hamme was sent out of China as he ended up being the only child to survive.

In St. John’s, Hamme helped his uncle Sum at his laundry business. By 1942, Hamme ran a restaurant on Water Street. He returned to China to marry on February 21, 1947. The arranged marriage would result in seven children (three sons and four daughters).

From 1949 to 1952, Hamme moved around quite a bit. Besides St. John’s, NL; he spent time in Trenton, ON; Killarney, MB; and Winnipeg, MB.

His wife and oldest son joined him in Winnipeg in 1952. In 1954, the couple returned to Newfoundland and settled on Bell Island, opening a snack bar/confectionary store on Main Street known as Hamme’s Store. In 1960, he bought a restaurant and downsized the store.

In the mid-1960s, he went to Grand Falls for work, while his family stayed at Bell Island.

By 1969, his entire family moved back to St. John’s where he ran the restaurant at Ashton Motel until 1972. They also opened the Pleasant Street Restaurant where his family lived until 1989. His wife ran the Pleasant Street Restaurant while he ran the Ashton Motel Restaurant. All their children helped out in both restaurants.

His eldest daughter, Rita, recalls, “My most prominent memory of Dad was how hard he had to work to support his family of 7 children. Therefore, we all had to do our share to support each other… [A]t times Dad would call for my help and I would have to go, hoping that it would not be dark before I would arrive there. The main reason for my assistance was to have an extra pair of eyes to watch the cash register and the restaurant’s inventory so that nothing would get stolen or vandalized while Dad would go out to board up the large windows for the night… [W]e were often taunted by the neighbourhood boys… who would often throw tomatoes or rotten eggs when Dad would go out to board up the windows. The extra pair of eyes would help to identify the trouble-makers. If boarding up the windows was not done, inevitably the windows would be trashed during the night...”

From 1972-1991, Hamme owned and operated the Mei Mei Restaurant at the Goulds, a rural neighbourhood within the outskirts of St. John’s proper. And between 1991-1997, he helped out at his oldest son’s restaurants, the Hot Shoppe and New Moon Restaurant.

Over this period, Hamme and his wife made many long visits to Oakville, Ontario where many of their children lived.

Hamme's wife helped found the present-day Chinese Association of Newfoundland Labrador (CANL). The couple hosted families who were immigrating or transitioning into their new lives in NL.

Hamme Chow Aue passed away on July 13, 2001.

AUE Sum (known as Sam to his customers) was born in China on December 19, 1894. He came from [開平 Hoiping / Kaiping], a coastal town in the province of Guangdong.

Sum landed in Port aux Basque, Newfoundland in July 1921 and paid its head tax. He may have arrived in Canada previously at a different port of entry, possibly working on the railway in British Columbia.

In 1934, he sponsored his 13-year-old nephew, Hamme Chow Aue (aka Oue Heam Choo) to live with him in St. John’s. Sum arranged for a Mr. Hong to escort Hamme, as his nephew was too young to travel alone.

Sum was a “married bachelor”; he wed in China at a young age but never returned to visit his wife and have children. Sum lived the life of a single man in Canada.

In St. John’s, Sum earned a living running a laundry, perhaps with other business partners. There were workers doing different jobs, including deliveries. But Sum stayed at the laundry serving customers, wrapping laundry in brown paper, and other shop tasks.

One grandniece, Marie, recalls, “As a child, I remember Sum Aue as a very short man with a bald head who worked very hard, non-stop at the laundry. He was always very stoic. He always spoke to us in a matter-of-fact tone, and only occasionally smiled with a twinkle in his eye.”

Another grandniece, Rita, recalls, “[M]y grand-uncle would walk to the dock of St. John’s harbour near Water Street where the local fishermen were selling their daily catch and processing it with cod heads heaping in piles below the dock. [He] would buy a large cod and… drag it home with its tail just barely touching the ground. We would have poached cod with stewed tomatoes, vegetables and rice that afternoon. Then at times, my grand-uncle would give me a nickel to buy a bag of chips or a dime to buy a bottle of coke at the convenience store next door.”

In 1969, upon closing and selling the laundry, he was invited to move in with his nephew’s family on Pleasant Street. Having lived a life as a bachelor, he declined to give up that lifestyle. He continued to live on 5 Bates Hill, known as the Tai Mei Club (a.k.a. the Aue/Au/Oue/Ou clan house). Anyone who was an Aue/Au/Oue/Ou could stay there freely and would enjoy the support of the clan. There, he lived with other bachelors, and enjoyed playing mah jong and sharing news and stories from his fellow clan relatives and friends.

Sum Aue passed away on August 26, 1980.

Bill Backman is a retired forester who worked for Bloedel, Stewart and Welch. He has also served as president of the B.C. Forest History Association.

Ronald "Ron" James Baker was the first faculty member hired by President Patrick McTaggart-Cowan for the new Simon Fraser University (SFU) in 1964. Baker served as the University's Director of Academic Planning and as the first head of the English Department. He remained at SFU until 1969 when he was appointed the first president of the new University of Prince Edward Island.

Baker was born in London, England, on August 24, 1924, to James "Jim" Herbert Walter and Ethel Frances Baker (née Miller). He served with the Royal Air Force (1943-1947), during which he trained in Manitoba. After the war, in 1947, he immigrated to Canada.

He married Helen "Jo" Gillespie Elder [ca. 1947]; they would have five children (Sharon Ann, Lynn Frances, Ian James, Sarah Jane, and Katherine Jean). In 1975, he married Frances Marilyn Frazer (1932-2010), with whom he had one son, Ralph Edward "Ted."

Baker graduated from the University of British Columbia (UBC) with a Bachelor of Arts in 1951 and a Master of Arts in 1953, both in English. He went on to do graduate work in the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London (1954-1956). Baker had lectured in English during his undergraduate degree at UBC and returned to the University to become an associate professor in 1962. While at UBC, Baker was involved in the production of John B. Macdonald's report, Higher Education in British Columbia and a Plan for the Future (1962), which led directly to the development of a second university (SFU) in the Lower Mainland.

In 1964, Baker became the first faculty member of President Patrick McTaggart-Cowan for the newly created SFU. Baker served as University's Director of Academic Planning and as the first head of the English Department. He remained at SFU until 1969 when he was appointed the first president of the new University of Prince Edward Island (1969-1978). He continued to teach there as a professor until 1991, when he retired.

He served on numerous councils and committees throughout his career, including the Canadian Association of University Teachers (1954-1969), the Royal Society of Arts (Fellow, 1971-1990), the Royal Commonwealth Society (1964-1966), the National Defence Strategic Studies Committee (Chairman, 1986-1998), the Canadian Executive Service Organization (CESO) (Volunteer Advisor to First Nations Groups, 1988-2004), and the Canadian Citizen Court (Presiding Officer, 1996-2004).

Baker was made an Officer of the Order of Canada (1978) and received numerous awards and honours, including the Queen's Silver Jubilee Medal (1977), a Canada 125th Medal (1992), and Queen's Golden Jubilee Medal (2002). He also received honorary law degrees from the University of New Brunswick (1970), Mount Allison University (1977), University of Prince Edward Island (1989), and Simon Fraser University (1990).

William Bamford (b. 3 June 1826) was born in England and immigrated to Canada in 1860. On 26 August 1862, Bamford married Lydia Ann Blackley in Belleville, Ontario. Blackley was a descendent of American Loyalists who fled Boston, Massachusetts, in 1785 and settled in Picton, Prince Edward County, Ontario. William Bamford and Lydia Blackley lived in Ancaster and Burlington, Ontario, where Bamford worked as a manufacturer and later as a store keeper and merchant. The couple had three sons that lived to adulthood: William Blackley Bamford; Charles Harry Sydney Bamford, who became the director of Ashdown Hardware Company; and Thomas Henry Lord Bamford, who was a merchant of the firm of Hicks and Bamford.

William Blackley Bamford (10 Sept. 1863-29 Aug. 1946) was a railroader, beginning his career in 1880 as a telegraph operator. In 1889, he married Henrietta Odell in in Sherbrooke, Quebec, and had at least one son, William Blackley Stanley Bamford, and one daughter, Florence Odell Bamford (d. 7 July 1918). Bamford served as a Canadian Pacific Railway operator, station agent, and later traveling freight agent and district freight agent in several Ontario cities and towns. He moved to St. John, New Brunswick, in 1910 to act as a division freight agent before returning to Ontario in 1916. In 1920 he was transferred to the Kootenay and Boundary Division at Nelson, British Columbia. Bamford’s retirement from the CPR became effective 31 December 1928 after 48 years as a railroader.

William Blackley Stanley Bamford (24 Jan. 1890-9 Oct. 1966) was born in Elora, Ontario, and enjoyed a long career in the banking industry. In 1908, he secured his first position with the Traders Bank of Canada in Tweed, Ontario, and in 1917, he obtained a job as a temporary clerk with the Bank of Montreal. He continued with the company in various roles and through a transfer to Vancouver, British Columbia, until his retirement in April 1952. Bamford married Amy Lauretta Huestis on 26 December 1929 at St. Mark’s Church in Vancouver. The couple had one son, William Huestis Bamford.

William Huestis Bamford (17 Sept. 1930- ) was at born in, Vancouver, British Columbia. After completing his schooling in Vancouver, Bamford worked briefly in the British Columbia forestry sector before joining the Canadian Army. Bamford acted as a driver mechanic, attaining the rank of Lance Corporal, and spent one year overseas in Korea before leaving the service in April 1954. Bamford then worked briefly as a taxi driver before becoming an employee of Canada Post in June 1956. Bamford served as a letter carrier and later as a supervisory letter carrier in Richmond and Vancouver until his retirement. Bamford married Esther Adelina Lasell Blyth in July 1957 in Vancouver. Bamford was step-father to his wife’s four children from a prior marriage: Lynne, Sharon, Roy, and Verne.

William Blackley Bamford, William Blackley Stanley Bamford, and William Huestis Bamford were all avid diarist and kept line-a-day or page-a-day diaries for most of their adult lives.

Amy Lauretta Huestis Bamford (1 Jan. 1893-21 July 1960) was born in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, to Lewis Wright Huestis (30 June 1844-1931) and Loreno “Lorraine” Van Iderstine (10 July 1856-18 Jan. 1943). Bamford had three siblings that survived to adulthood, including Helen May Huestis (3 Nov. 1889-17 May 1978), with whom Bamford lived prior to her marriage. Bamford attended Prince of Wales College and Normal School in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, and received a public school teaching license from the PEI Department of Education on 26 May 1911. After serving as a provincial school teacher in Prince Edward Island, Bamford moved to Saskatchewan and received a Third Class Teaching Certificate from the Saskatchewan Department of Education on 23 February 1920. She taught for a time with the Fairbank School District in Sceptre, Saskatchewan, leaving her position in December of 1923. Bamford received a Permanent Second Class Teaching Certificate from the Saskatchewan Department of Education on 7 July 1925, in view of the favourable character of the reports received of her work in the classroom from the inspector of schools. Later, after moving to British Columbia, Bamford was a principal at Sperling Avenue School in Burnaby, until her marriage to William Blackley Stanley Bamford on 26 Dec. 1929 in Vancouver. The couple had at least one son, William Huestis Bamford. Bamford died at Vancouver General Hospital of breast cancer and is buried at Ocean View Burial Park, Burnaby, B.C.

Esther Adelina Lasell Bamford (5 Feb. 1917-8 Jan. 2008) was born in Wainwright, Alberta, to Grover Cargill Lasell and Ettie Sewell. She attended Wainwright High School before moving to Vancouver Island, where she married Walter John Blyth, a logger, in Cobble Hill, British Columbia, on 15 October 1938. The couple lived in Duncan, British Columbia, and had four children, Lynne, Sharon, Roy, and Verne, before Blyth’s accidental death on 5 November 1945. Bamford’s employment history included work at Clancy’s Sky Diner in Vancouver until 1948, work as a waitress in the dining room of a hotel on Lonsdale Quay in North Vancouver, a position as a dispatcher for North Shore Taxi, and a position as a postal clerk beginning in the mid-1950s. It was while working as a taxi dispatcher that Bamford met William Huestis Bamford, who was a taxi driver at the time. The couple married on 15 July 1957 while both were working for Canada Post. After retiring from Canada Post in 1965, Bamford spent time cooking, working on various home improvement, craft, and garden projects, reading, and caring for her grandchildren. Bamford suffered from rheumatoid arthritis and underwent a number of treatments and surgeries as a result, starting in the early 1980s. At the time of her death in 2008, Esther had six grandchildren and one great grandchild.

Henrietta Odell Bamford (6 Sep. 1861-14 Oct. 1936) was born in Sherbrooke, Quebec, to Thomas Odell (b. 1822) and Martha Long. She was married to William Blackley Bamford and had at least one son, William Blackley Stanley Bamford, and one daughter, Florence Odell Bamford (d. 7 July 1918). She died in Nelson, British Columbia, and is buried at Nelson Memorial Park.

William Blackley Bamford (10 Sept. 1863-29 Aug. 1946) was born in Belleville, Ontario, to William Bamford (b. 3 June 1826) and Lydia Ann Blackley (b. 18 Mar. 1836-d. 1910). Bamford had two brothers that lived to adulthood, Charles Harry Sydney Bamford and Thomas Henry Lord Bamford. A 1932 newspaper article about Bamford’s career states that while working as a teamster for at a flour mill in Caledonia, Ontario, Bamford studied telegraphing at night, which led to him obtaining a position as a night telegraph operator at Burlington on the Northern and Northwestern Railway. An earlier article published in 1929 states that he obtained his first railway position in 1880 with the Credit Valley Railway as a telegraph operator. When the Canadian Pacific Railway took over the Credit Valley Railway in 1883, Bamford continued with the organization. He was subsequently a relief operator at the Lampton Mills, Brampton, Ontario, and then an operator at Ingersoll, Ontario. Around 1886, Bamford was appointed as a CPR agent in Corbetton, Ontario, where he opened a station for the Toronto, Grey and Bruce Railway at a time when the area was just being settled. Two years later, he was appointed as an agent in Elora, Ontario. In 1889, Bamford married Henrietta Odell in in Sherbrooke, Quebec. The couple had at least one son, William Blackley Stanley Bamford, and one daughter, Florence Odell Bamford (d. 7 July 1918).

In 1892, Bamford became a station agent at Peterborough, Ontario, where he remained for ten years. Bamford was instrumental in the establishment of a Quaker Oats plant in the area, as well as promoting the Trent Canal Locks. In 1902, Bamford became a traveling freight agent out of Toronto. While in this position, Bamford recommended the creation of train cars with end doors for machinery shipments, the implementation of staggered car doors for shipping automobiles, and later the design of a special car for automobiles, as well as other innovations. Four years later, Bamford was appointment as a district freight agent at London, Ontario. Bamford was named division freight agent at St. John, New Brunswick, in 1910. Six years later, he was made district freight agent at Toronto, and in 1920 was transferred to the Kootenay and Boundary Division at Nelson, British Columbia. Bamford’s retirement from the CPR became effective 31 December 1928 after 48 years as a railroader.

Bamford was extremely active in community activities. While in Peterborough, he was a warden for All Saints Church, a representative of the church on the board of the Nicholls Hospital, and a member of the town charity board and the school board for five years. In Toronto, Bamford was a warden of Christ Church Deer Park. While in Nelson, Bamford served as an Alderman on the City Council, was a member of the rotary club for more than 20 years, and was an honourary president of the Associated Canadian Travelers. In addition, Bamford was heavily involved in the Nelson Board of Trade, acting as vice-president before being elected president in 1935. Bamford served as president until 1938 and was then made honourary president, a position created especially in tribute to him. He was also a member of Associated Boards of Trade of eastern British Columbia and was an associate member of the Vancouver Board of Trade. Bamford was also at various times a member of the Union Club of St. John, the Empire Club of Canada, the National Geographic Society, the United Empire Loyalists’ Association, and the Nelson Club. He was also on the board of directors for the Kootenay Lake General Hospital Society. Bamford was a Freemason and retired from the Sovereign Great Priory of Canada with the rank of Knight Templar. Bamford was an avid diarist and kept line-a-day diaries for at least 36 years. Bamford died at Kootenay Lake General Hospital in Nelson at the age of 82 and is buried in the Masonic section of Nelson Memorial Park.

William Blackley Stanley Bamford (24 Jan. 1890-9 Oct. 1966) was born in Elora, Ontario, to William Blackley Bamford and Henrietta Odell. He enjoyed a long career in the banking industry. In 1908, he secured a position with the Traders Bank of Canada at the Tweed, Ontario, branch. He later began employment with the Bank of Montreal as a temporary clerk on 21 December 1917, continuing with the company until his retirement in April 1952. Bamford did take a yearlong leave of absence from the Bank of Montreal beginning in May 1923, spending the year with his parents in Nelson, British Columbia. While with the Bank of Montreal, Bamford held various positions in Toronto and later Vancouver, including manager of the discount main office.

As a young man, Bamford was involved with the YMCA. In August 1921, with another member of Central YMCA, he paddled from the foot of York Street in Toronto across to Niagara-on-the-Lake in a 16-foot canoe in 7 hours and 50 minutes. Bamford’s community involvement also included membership in the Point Grey Amateur Chrysanthemum Association, the American Nature Association, and the Vernon Club. Bamford was also heavily involved with St. Mark’s Church in Vancouver and the United Empire Loyalists’ Association of Canada for which he served as vice president of the Vancouver Branch. Due to physical considerations, Bamford was unable to join the armed forces. Bamford was a hobby gardener, known for his roses and raspberries. He was also an avid diarist and kept line-a-day diaries for at least 45 years.

Bamford married Amy Lauretta Huestis on 26 December 1929 at St. Mark’s Church in Vancouver. The couple had one son, William Huestis Bamford. Bamford died at Amherst Private Hospital in Vancouver at the age of 76 and is buried at Ocean View Burial Park, Burnaby, B.C.