Peter Faminow (1917-2002) was born in Alberta to Russian-born Doukhobor parents, Sam and Elizabeth Faminow. He received his grade school and high school education in Lundreck, Alberta, and attended Willamette University in Oregon before studying law at University of Saskatchewan and University of Alberta. He met his wife, Frances Sopp, at Willamette. While studying law, Faminow became actively involved in the Doukhobor youth movement. He would later help organize the 1958 Conference on Peace through Non-violence, author a column called 'Dasha' in the Doukhobor publication Mir, and serve as the secretary-treasurer of the Union of Doukhobors in Canada. He was also a member of a fact-finding mission to the Doukhobor residential school in New Denver, and was part of a committee of Doukhobors to recommend a resolution to that issue. After relocating with his wife and daughters (Sarah, Polly and Megan) to North Vancouver to practice law, Faminow served as a councillor and alderman for the District of North Vancouver between 1960 and 1974 and ran once for Reeve. He also ran once as a New Democrat in the Federal election of 1963. In 1987, Peter Faminow filed a case in the B.C. Supreme Court regarding the issue of secondary suites in North Vancouver, B.C. and succeeded in having the bylaws for allowing the rental of secondary suites changed.