Lee Redman

May 31, 2007

Allena (Lee) Redman was born in Vancouver in 1912. Her father was a tug boat operator and was often away. She and her mother lived in Vancouver but spent the summers camping in West Vancouver near Dundarave pier. She learned to swim there and twice won the B.C. Championship and once the Pacific Northwest Championship. After leaving school Lee worked for the B.C. Telephone Company and then for the Vancouver Sun Newspaper Private Exchange until she married John (Jack) Redman in 1937. After the war, Jack and his uncle, Stuart Killick, went into business together. They bought a store for sale in Sechelt in 1946 and ran their Sechelt Service Store, later renamed The Red and White Grocery Store, on the north side of Cowrie Street until 1962. They moved to a new location on the south side of Cowrie Street until 1972, when the store changed hands. Lee and baby Bruce moved up with Jack, first to a cabin Jack's father had built on his property in West Sechelt, then to the basement in their first store and finally to a house in Selma Park. Lee regularly worked in the store until she and Jack retired in 1972. She was president of the Sechelt Hospital Auxiliary, started the May Day celebrations in Sechelt and was a founding member of the Sunshine Coast Golf Club. She also helped start Sechelt's first public library.