Award-winning author Rita Moir and Slocan Valley Heritage Trail Society president Rory Lindsay will be jointly recognized next month with the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee medal for outstanding community service.
Moir, a Vallican resident who came to the West Kootenay in 1975, covered the area for the Nelson Daily News, Globe & Mail, and CBC Radio.
Her works include a travel diary, Survival Gear (1994), Buffalo Jump: Woman’s Travels (1999), which won the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize in 2000, The Windshift Line: A Father and Daughter’s Story, and The Third Crop (2011), a photo history of the Slocan Valley.
Lindsay, who lives near Slocan City, was instrumental in an initiative to commemorate the Japanese Canadian internment in the valley. Two signs were unveiled last summer at Lemon Creek and Popoff farm.
Both will receive their medals at a ceremony at the Vallican Whole on Saturday, February 9.
They join 45 other recipients from our area to date. The medals mark the 60th year of Queen Elizabeth II’s reign.
West Kootenay Queen’s Jubilee Medal recipients
Appledale: Corky Evans
Balfour: Josh Smienk
Burton: Gail Detta
Castlegar: Bev Maloff, Gladys Manahan, Dr. Rebecca McDonnell, Gerry Rempel, Ron Ross, Geoff Yule
Creston: Muriel Buhr, Harry Haberstock, Chris Luke, Jason Louie, Henry Schoof, Lew Truscott
Fruitvale: Libby Nelson
Grand Forks: Deb Billwiller, Marjean Fichtenberg
Greenwood: Marge McLean
Kaslo: Aya Higashi, Bruce Walker
Midway: Bob Hatton, Jim McMynn
Nakusp: Bea Anton, Dr. Norm Lea, Milt Parent, Rosemarie Parent
Nelson: Bob Adams, Donna Macdonald, Joan Reichardt
New Denver: Agnes Emary, Gary Wright
Pass Creek: John Voykin
Rossland: Jackie Drysdale, Bobbi LaFond
Salmo: Lawrence Bond, Dorothy Hearn
Silverton: Vern Hartman
Sirdar: Shannon Nickish
Slocan: Joanne Ellis, Rory Lindsay, Jean Patterson
Taghum: Gordon McGregor
Trail: Ray Furlotte, Robin Michelle Legare, Audrey Urquhart
Vallican: Rita Moir
Ymir: Hans Cunningham
MP Alex Atamanenko and MLAs Katrine Conroy and Michelle Mungall also automatically receive the honour by virtue of their offices.