The Oak Bay EncyclopediaTM
T . H . E . . E . A . R . L . Y . . Y . E . A . R . S

A listing of noteworthy
people, places and things from
Oak Bay's early years.

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Click on any letter, above, to visit specific section of encyclopedia


F

Fair Street
see Street/Place Names section

Fairclough, Miss M Grocer
2559 Estevan Avenue (...1930–1934... phone books)
Miss Fairclough's grocery story would evolve into Estevan Grocery and Confectionery during the 1940s and 1950s before transforming into Estevan Fish and Chips, aka Willows Galley.
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Falkland Road
see Street/Place Names section

Ferguson, Mrs Margaret Confectionery
2204 Cadboro Bay Road (...1930... phone book)
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Ferriday, W E
Oak Bay's taxi and transport czar
W.E. Ferriday started his transporting empire with Oak Bay Transfer and expanded his enterprise to include Oak Bay Taxi, Willows Taxi, Ferridays Taxi, Uplands Taxi, Jubilee Cabs, Acme Transfer, Ferriday's Transfer and Ferriday's U-Drive.
Click on the MEMORABILIA button to view or contribute recollections, photographs and artifacts

Ferriday's Taxi
2013 Oak Bay Avenue (...1946–1947... phone books)
2019 Oak Bay Avenue (...1948–1959... phone books)

ad in 1947 phone book
Ferriday's Taxi operated in the 1940s and 1950s out of the same building that once housed Oak Bay's historic Avenue Theatre at 2013 Oak Bay Avenue.
The vacant lot next door, at 2019 Oak Bay Avenue, served as the taxi stand for several W.E. Ferriday enterprises: Oak Bay Taxi, Uplands Taxi, Jubilee Cabs, Acme Transfer, Ferriday's Transfer and Ferriday's U-Drive in the 1950s
see W.E. Ferriday
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Ferriday's Transfer
 2019 Oak Bay Avenue (...1949-1954... phone books)
FOR YOUR NEXT MOVE
MOVING, PACKING, SHIPPING
BAGGAGE DELIVERED
2019 Oak Bay. . . . . . . . . B eacon-5311
— ad in 1949 phone book
FOR YOUR NEXT MOVE – MOVING, PACKING
SHIPPING – BAGGAGE DELIVERED
Residence 2-3215
2019 Oak Bay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-5311
— ad in 1954 phone book
see W.E. Ferriday
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Ferriday's U-Drive
 2019 Oak Bay Avenue (...1948–1949, 1953–1954... phone books)

1952 AD COMING
see W.E. Ferriday
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Ferris Grocery
2517 Estevan Avenue (1957... phone book)
Subsequent location of Prior's Grocery
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Fisher's Confectionery
2205 Oak Bay Avenue (...1959... phone book)
FISHER'S CONFECTIONERY
SCHOOL SUPPLIES
SMOKING SUPPLIES
YOUR FAVORITE CANDY
2205 Oak Bay Avenue. . . . . . . . . . .EV 5-6633
— ad in 1959 OBHS "Oak Leaves" yearbook

"People throughout Canada and a large part of the United States suddenly learned that there was such a place as Oak Bay.
Fisher's Confectionery on Oak Bay Avenue had a large cat named Smokey which frequented the store, usually being perched on a showcase or the counter. It was a great favourite with customers, especially children, and when the Medical Health Officer issued an order that the cat was not to be permitted on the store premises the resulting furore spread across the nation.
Newspapers as far east as St. John, New Brunswick, carried the story and pictures of Smokey. It was also covered by a private television station in Vancouver. The CBC gave the story nation-wide coverage on radio and television.
Following a personal discussion with Mrs. Fisher by the Reeve, it was agreed to keep the cat out of the store and the furore died down."
— George Murdoch, History of the Municipality of Oak Bay
Former location of Usher's Confectionery Store
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Flora and Fauna
Back yards once teemed with life
Monarch Butterfly
Bumble Bee
Two-striped Grasshopper

"In the 1950s we had great adventures without wandering too far from home. Our back yards offered an immersive wonder-world of butterflies, garter snakes, grasshoppers, dragonflies and bumble bees.
We used to play with these little creatures — catch them, study them, and then let them go, sometimes with a splat of "tobacco juice" on our hands courtesy of an irate grasshopper.
We would dare each other to catch a bumble bee in our bare hands. Although they could sting, they weren't too aggressive. But unlike other bees, the bumble bee stinger was not barbed, so it could sting many times. You had to be careful.
The most common butterfly was the monarch butterfly, and these delightful creatures were everywhere. But every once in a while we'd encounter a truly magnificent butterfly. These never ceased to amaze.
But today, I have to stop and stare whenever I see a butterfly — a poignant reminder that we now live in a very different world.
As kids in the '50s our sense of wonder and adventure was provided by the natural world — trees, ponds, vacant lots. Today our sense of wonder and adventure is electronic and digital. Sure we can now see a butterfly in high definition. But it's not the same thing as watching this delicate creature fluttering its wings on your finger.
The connection is gone."
— Gary Wilcox, OBHS class of 1960
see frog ponds
* * *
"Garter snakes, California quail, pheasants and Fawn lilies were common in Oak Bay in the 1940s and 1950s. When I was a child, living on Oak Bay Avenue near the Village, they were there for the looking, just outside the door..."
— Erica Fowles
Your recollections are welcomed

Florence Street
see Street/Place Names section

Fort Victoria
Strategic move puts HBC fort on Vancouver Island in 1843
RBCM(A-00903)
Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River had been headquarters for Hudson's Bay Company operations in the Pacific Northwest since 1825, but America's westward expansion was weakening Britain's claim on the Oregon Territory* at this latitude
In a preemptive move to consolidate Britain's claim north of the 49th parallel prior to the Oregon Treaty of 1846, the HBC moved its headquarters north and built Fort Victoria at the southern tip of Vancouver Island in 1843.
First called Fort Camosack, then Fort Albert (Queen Victoria's consort), the HBC's new, more-northerly fort was finally called Fort Victoria after Britain's reigning Queen.
Hudson's Bay Company people, John Tod, Isabella Ross (wife of Chief Factor Charles Ross), William McNeill, Joseph Despard Pemberton — and the Company itself — were Oak Bay's five original landowners.
* The Oregon Territory extended from California to Alaska, and was claimed by many countries including England, America, Spain and Russia.

Foul Bay
see Street/Place Names section

Foul Bay Road
see Street/Place Names section

Fowl Bay Farm
Isabella Ross' property at foot of Foul Bay Road
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Frank's Low-Cost Food Market
2002 Oak Bay Avenue (...1959... phone book)
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Frog Ponds
After the last of the exhibition buildings had burned down or had been demolished by the late 1940s, the former Willows Fairgrounds lay dormant for several years before it was subdivided in the early 1950s
In this interim, nature began to re-claim the land and soon there were meadows, small groves of trees and ponds full of life. Of particular interest to young boys in the early 1950s were the frogs and tadpoles in these ponds.
Click on the MEMORABILIA button to view or contribute photographs, artifacts or recollections of the frog ponds

Frost's Corner Store
2000 Oak Bay Avenue (...1946–1959... phone books)
Popular confectionery 1940s —1960s
"Frost's Corner Store was the best place to buy comics, under the watchful eye of Mrs. Frost. Some of the boys used to sneak a peak at the "adult" magazines which were placed high up on the magazine rack. The magazine rack was in the corner of the store, on the left as you walked in. I seem to remember the old floors creaking as you walked from the rack to the counter on the right, to add some candy and dubble bubble gum and pay for it all — probably for under a dollar in those days."
— Erica Fowles
Former location of Jones' Corner Shop and Henderson's Corner Store
Stuart Stark's wonderful book, Oak Bay's Heritage Buildings: More Than Just Bricks And Boards, informs us that a house once stood on this corner lot at Oak Bay Avenue and Foul Bay Road. In 1930 it was moved around the corner (1547 Foul Bay Road) to allow for the construction of a commercial building which housed several retail stores.
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Fuller, Alfred Dixon
Early Oak Bay landowner and developer
Shortly after John Tod's death in 1882, Fuller had acquired much of Tod's land in the Estevan area. On an 1890 map, the main access road to his property was Fuller Avenue, now Dalhousie Street.
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed

Frederick Norris Road
see Street/Place Names section

Frederick Norris Place
see Street/Place Names section

"Fury and the Woman" (aka "Lucky Corrigan")
1936 movie produced by film studio in Oak Bay
see Willows Park Studio
Photos, artifacts and recollections welcomed



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The Oak Bay Encyclopedia™
Contents copyright © 2004-2012 Gary Wilcox Studios Incorporated.
Selected material may be used for research and non-commercial projects with proper credit given.
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