St. Nicholas Roman Catholic Church at Spahomin, dedicated 1889, sketched 2002

It was designed and constructed by Father LeJeune, explaining why the design seems odd, the tower disproportionately large. Barry Downs, Sacred Places, p. 42: "Father Jean-Marie Le Jeune, who later worked among the Indians of [the Thompson River-Kamloops] area, encouraged them to build on their own lands, often to his own architectural designs. In 1900 he undertook extensive renovations to the log church of St. Joseph on the Kamloops Reserve, facing the city from the north bank of the South Thompson River. Here at the turn of the century passion plays were held in the wide street fronting the church. Behind the same church was the small room in which Father Le Jeune developed and printed his unique Chinook shorthand, which he used in his teachings and for his newspaper, the Kamloops Wawa. On its pages were found village and world news, lessons, religious instruction and the good priest's editorials, all of which were cirulated at one stage to over three thousand readers." An exhibition of the Kamloops Wawa, including these and other nearby watercolours from this set, took place at the University of Saskatchewan library in February and March, 2004.

The "Wawa," Chinook for "chat" (image from University of Saskatchewan library collection)

Barry Downs, writing in the late 1970s, described "The abandoned church of St. Nicholas, at the Indian village of Spahomin near Douglas Lake, is a fine example of Romanist buidling in the late 1800s. There were earlier log churches in the Nicola district, but active missionaries and devout converts, often enlisting the help of ranchers in the area, soon erected larger frame buldings with steep roofs and prominent towers. Churches of similar proportions at Shulus and Quilchena are still in use."

The Spahomin band was considered very advanced in their housing and their stock-raising by a turn-of-the-century Indian agent. "They are well supplied with farm implements--ploughs, harrows, wagons, sleighs, harness and saddles, mowers, horse-rakes and reaping machines." A traveller mainly sees the vast operations of the Douglas Lake Cattle Company, an enterprise of the Woodward family whose department store chain was a western Canadian icon until its financial collapse in the late 1980s.

Note from Dave Robertson, linguist, University of Victoria:" I write as a researcher, which is unusual, so let me explain briefly. I'm a linguist who is focused on the Chinook Jargon as it was used in Interior BC, especially in connection with the Kamloops Wawa newspaper (with its odd shorthand writing). Since you've painted a number of scenes of mission churches in the Interior, I wonder whether you may have ever noticed, and perhaps photographed or drawn, any strange-looking graves found in the adjoining cemeteries. Particularly in the areas on Lillooet, Bridge River, D'Arcy, Clinton, and Seton Portage, but also possibly elsewhere in Shuswap, Okanagan, Thompson, and Lillooet native territory, these unusual graves have existed. They form an important part of my research, but most of them were simply carved on pine boards, and have disintegrated by now. So I'm curious whether you may have been around these graves before some of them fell apart.

"The Kamloops Wawa 'Chinook writing' is what I'm looking at here. Any and all photographs of these graves from years gone by will be very useful for my research. Since they were carved on soft pine planks around 100 years ago, most have fallen apart. Many others have been 'cleaned up' by zealous cemetery-keepers. (And were burn . . . sigh . . . ) "

Can anyone help here?

Note from Carole Myers: We are developing a gazetteer of St Nicholas churches from all over the world on our comprehensive website devoted to the good saint. In order to do that we need help, as it simply isn't possible to visit them all and take our own photos. . . . St Nicholas Center, a non-profit with US tax-exempt status, exists solely to spread the word about St Nicholas and to help people understand who Santa Claus/Father Christmas really is. We provide information about the saint, customs from around the world, and a large variety resources for churches, schools, and families to use to celebrate his feast day. There is also a section for children with on-line activities. Following our launch in October 2002, the site has been very well-received--this past December alone we had over 135,500 visits from 144 countries.

The Spahomin church on this site

Note from David Watkins: My grandmother, great grandmother and great grandfather worked for Father LeJeune at St Joseph's in Kamloops. I am going into 4th year first nations at Malaspina in Nanaimo and my BA grad project is the Kamloops WaWa. It's interesting that you use water colours. The impact is nostalgic and freshness. I am learning Chinook and WaWa Chinook and I make videos. Last year I received my first BA at Emily Carr and my final was ... a 10 min piece on the Kamloops WaWa, my grandmother, and Father LeJeune.