Milner Church can be seen in the centre of the photo dating from around 1910. The J. Graham General Merchant building is to the left. The Community Hall is being built behind the church and to the right. The telephone office is on the far right, and the church manse is beside it.
The B.C. Telephone Exchange (B.C. Telephone Office) (Milner) Building was located at 6802 Glover Rd. and was built in 1909. It was not included in the 2004/2005 Heritage Listing; and was torn down around 2008.
Milner Community Hall is now the site of a gas station complex; the Milner Community Hall is a two-storey building built in 1912. The ground floor was used for various commercial enterprises; including the Bank of Hamilton. The upper floor had a hardwood floor and was used for dances and other community events. From 1922 to 1924; the Milner Co-operative Society leased two ground floor rooms to the Langley School Board.
Milner Methodist Church (later Milner United Church) was built in 1886 by Thomas Turnbull on property donated by James M. Johnson. It was originally known as Langley Prairie Methodist; but at 25 years of age was renamed Milner Methodist; and in 1925 the congregation joined the newly formed United Church of Canada. At that time the church hall and kitchen were added to the rear of the structure. It was designated a Municipal Heritage Site in 1983; and moved to its new location at Milner Park, just south of the original location, in 2006.
(From the Langley Centennial Museum files)
This week in Langley history:
Eighty Years Ago
October 26, 1939
- Langley Board of Trade pressed for use of the local airfield as a training camp. The Department of Transport noted that $100,000 had been spent on the field, and it’s use would help repay the treasury. The board also noted that Langley was situated in the centre of a district settled by “British-minded people.”
Seventy Years Ago
October 27, 1949
- Liberal Bill Mott won the federal by-election to replace former Liberal MP Tom Reid, who had been appointed to the Senate.
Sixty Years Ago
October 22, 1959
- Langley City passed a bylaw banning trading stamps.
- The Township looked into registering its crest with the College of Arms in England.
Fifty Years Ago
October 23, 1969
- Township council finalized a bylaw limiting the use of fireworks to the week before Halloween, except by permit for special occasions, and prohibited sale of fireworks to anyone under 14 years of age.
- Langley City council discussed the increasing numbers of drug prosecutions in Langley courts. Most cases had arisen from either the Aldergrove rock festival or people bring drugs through the Aldergrove customs port.
Forty Years Ago
October 24, 1979
- A rumour that the provincial cabinet might reconsider its earlier decision to remove 626 acres of land from the Agricultural Land Reserve to make way for Gloucester Estates industrial park was emphatically denied by Langley MLA Bob McClelland’s executive assistant Carol Gran.
- A group of Langley business people questioned City council about the location chosen for the new provincial courthouse.
Thirty Years Ago
October 25, 1989
- A Langley resident spent four days in hospital after he was hit by a car while assisting in putting out a burning vehicle at Fraser Highway and 200th Street.
- BCGEU employees at the Willowbrook 6 cinema were among Famous Players union members who walked out after an 82 per cent strike vote.
- Gail Anderson received the BC Hydro Award as the year’s top senior 4-H member in Langley.
Twenty Years Ago
October 26, 1999
- Local police were geared up for a zero-tolerance policy on use of illegal fireworks for Halloween.
- A convicted rapist involved in the infamous kidnapping and sexual assault of a young woman who was snatched off a Langley street by two men in a van while she walking with friends was awarded a new parole hearing after having been denied parole in April. The victim had been stabbed in the back and left for dead after the 1991 attack. The convict seeking parole was scheduled for statutory release in February, 2000, when eight years of his 12-year sentence would be served.
- A poll commissioned by independent mayoralty candidate Kurt Alberts indicated that more than half of Langley voters were leaning towards an independent mayor, rather than one running as part of a slate.
October 29, 1999
- Cpl. Nancy Wilson, Langley police officer and local hockey coach, was named the RCMP’s National Coach of the Year by the Coaching Association of Canada.
- Gary Tupper, a key backer of Township mayoralty hopeful Councillor Heather McMullan, removed himself from her campaign after listening to a recording of a telephone conversation between herself and Dean Drysdale. Tupper was convinced that the tape had not been altered, as McMullan was claiming.
- A new study indicated that Aldergrove was less affected by drug abuse than much of the rest of the Lower Mainland.
