Sechelt Community Archives

Oral History


Home | About | Search | Donate | Order

Early Sechelt
--Interviews

   Billingsley, Gary
    Brackett, Sophie
    Connor, Peggy
    Crowston, Doris

    Hammond, Dick
    Hemstreet, Margaret
    Lemieux, Robert
    MacLarty, Nancy
    McCrimmon, Phyllis
    Nelson, Cay
    Ono, Tommy and Ruby
    Parish, Tom
    Redman, Lee
    Robilliard, Dean
    Robilliard, Dorothy
    Sim, Bert
    Swan, Dr. Alan
    Swanson, Bea
    Sweeny, Isabel
    Thompson, Morgan
    Wigard, Roy

    Wood, Alan



Voices of Early Sechelt -- Interviews

Interview given to Helen Dawe. Additional comments by Helen Dawe.


Isabel Sweeny

July 1973

Isabel Sweeny, nee Bell -Irving, 1889-1974, was one of ten children in a prominent and well-known Vancouver family. Her father, Henry Ogle Bell-Irving, emigrated from Scotland in 1882, and came to Winnipeg where he signed on to work as a civil engineer for the CPR as it pushed west. After he arrived in Vancouver, he formed the Anglo-British Columbia Packing Company. During some of her childhood summers, she and several of her siblings were sent to Sechelt with a servant, nanny and nurse to stay at Herbert Whitaker's hotel. In 1903, Isabel and several of her siblings travelled to England to be educated. During WW1 she was a nurse at St. George's Hospital in London. She married Ben Sweeny, son of a prominent bank manager in Vancouver. They had two daughters and two sons.


Transcript (PDF)

Audio (MP3)


 

Copyright © The Sechelt Community Archives