Interviews with Ken Farquharson and David Stirling (Part 1 of 2)

Part of a collection of video oral history interviews with park pioneers, as well as some events, created by EKOS Communications in partnership with the Elders Council for Parks of British Columbia to commemorate the 100th anniversary of BC Parks in 2011. The Elders Council is an independent society, whose members are retired parks system employees and conservation advocates who have dedicated a significant portion of their lives to parks and protected areas in BC. These interviews served as source material for the documentary BC Parks: Celebrating 100 Years of Recreation and Protection. Standard questions were used in most of the interviews and included dates of employment/association with BC Parks, parks worked in, greatest challenges, accomplishments and regrets, lessons learned, hopes for provincial park system today and mentors.Part of Elders’ Council for Parks in British Columbia oral history interview series, collected for the documentary "BC Parks: Celebrating 100 Years of Recreation and Protection". Rick Searle interviews with Ken Farquharson and David Stirling. Farquharson speaks about his involvement with BC Parks and protected areas from the 1960s, including work with the Save Cypress Bowl committee, the Run Out Skagit Spoilers (ROSS) committee, the Sierra Club of BC, the Forest Land Use Liasion Committee, the Outdoor Recreation Council of BC and the Wilderness Advisory Committee under the Bill Bennett government. Farquharson recounts memorable times spent in various parks and lists some of his major accomplishments, such as his perseverance in Skagit Valley; his work with the Wilderness Advisory Committee, Khutzeymateen and Tatshenshini; and the establishment of the Wilderness Act. Farquharson goes on to talk about his biggest challenges, namely natural resource industries' interests and aboriginal interests. If he could do things differently, Farquharson says that he would revisit his work in Cypress Bowl. He speaks about lessons learned, including need for persistence in creation/designation, as well as his hopes for the future through funding, park management, advocacy and a stronger public constituency. Farquharson lists Bert Brink as a mentor, and counts milestones such as major expansion in the 1970s and grass roots movements. He ends his interview by touching on issues around resorts in parks. Camera shots show Ken Farquharson outside on a patio with a plant in the background. Sometimes see interviewer. In part 1 of his interview with Searle, Stirling speaks about his employment with BC Parks (ca. 1959-1980) and his interview focuses on his work with the park naturalist and interpretation programs. He lists his most memorable experiences as working with park naturalists and representing parks at the BC Nature Federation. Stirling goes on to recount his major accomplishments and he speaks of the challenges that grew out of working with BC Parks workers with different ideas about the importance of nature interpretation in the system. Stirling talks about how he met those challenges and the lessons he learned about cooperation at the branch and ministry levels. In terms of future hopes, Stirling discusses how he would like to see interpretation program come back to BC Parks; how he would like to see parks kept as natural as possible; how he would like to see more and all benefits government could realize from this investment. Camera shots show David Stirling outside with shrubs in the background.

In Collection:

• Elders Council for Parks in British Columbia

Creator

• Elders Council for Parks in British Columbia
• EKOS Communications, Inc.

Contributor

• Searle, D. Richard (Donald Richard), 1951-

Subject

• Farquharson, Ken, 1935-
• Stirling, David
• Conservation of natural resources
• Conservation of natural resources--Societies, etc.
• Wildlife conservation
• Nature conservation
• Nature conservation--Societies, etc.
• Wilderness areas
• Biodiversity conservation
• Natural areas
• Parks--Conservation and restoration
• Parks
• National parks and reserves
• National parks and reserves--Management
• Parks--Employees
• Parks--Employees--Attitudes
• Parks--Management
• BC Parks
• Oral histories

Language

• eng

Date created

• 2006

Resource type

• Moving Image

Rights statement

• In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Extent

• 00:57:05

Alternative title

• Ken Farquharson and David Stirling [part 1] interview
• Ken Farquharson and David Stirling [2006:1] interview

Geographic coverage

• British Columbia--Cypress Provincial Park

Coordinates

• 49.39556, -123.20336

Additional physical characteristics

• The Farquharson interview runs 00:00:00-00:33:20 and the interview with David Stirling runs 00:33:20-00:57:04. The Stirling interview continues in "Interviews with David Stirling (Part 2 of 2) and Yorke Edwards".

Physical repository

• University of Victoria (B.C.). Library

Collection

• Elders Council for Parks in British Columbia

Provenance

• Donated to the University of Victoria Archives on October 20, 2008 by Rick Searle (EKOS Communications).

Provider

• University of Victoria (B.C.). Library

Genre

• oral histories (literary genre)
• reminiscences
• video recordings (physical artifacts)
• interviews

Archival item identifier

• Accession Number: 2011-006

Fonds title

• Elders Council for Parks in British Columbia / EKOS Communications video history collection

Fonds identifier

• AR447

Is referenced by

• Archival Finding Aid: https://uvic2.coppul.archivematica.org/elders-council-for-parks-in-british-columbia-ekos-communications-video-history-collection

Date digitized

• 2011

Technical note

• Migration metadata from UVicSpace to Vault by KD, Summer 2024.

Rights

• This item is under copyright and made available on this site for research and private study only. Commercial use is prohibited. For all other uses please contact UVic Libraries' Special Collections and University Archives.

DOI

•  https://doi.org/10.58066/0zxt-d593