Planning is underway to bring Pemberton’s pioneer history to the forefront in the Village core, thanks to a proposal from the Pemberton and District Museum and Archives Society for a series of heritage signs that will identify nine local landmarks and their historical background.

Last year, the museum put out a brochure offering a Pemberton Heritage Walk, which describes the history behind sites such as the former Pemberton Co-op Building, currently the Animal Barn; the Pemberton Hotel, part of whose original section was built around 1914; and the Village Works Building, which was once the water reservoir for steam trains that started passing through the valley in 1914.

After seeing a historical walk in a visitor guide in Lillooet, Pemberton Museum curator Niki Madigan said museum society president George Henry helped her identify nine sites around the downtown core, and tourists started snapping up the brochure at the Pemberton Visitor Centre and the museum itself.

“That Heritage Walk brochure just kept on disappearing,” Madigan said. She estimated that the museum distributed somewhere around 50 and 75 copies and produced probably another 100 copies for the visitor centre, which is a lot for the museum as a brochure product.

Now they are seeking to give the historical significance of these sites more prominence for locals and visitors alike by putting durable and interesting interpretive signs at each spot, featuring a photo and information about the building’s background.

“Currently there are few recreational opportunities that keep tourists in the downtown core. The Heritage Walk could improve the tourist experience and serve as a source of community pride via promotion of heritage elements in the downtown core,” states an application from the society to the Village of Pemberton, asking for funding for the signage project.

The Village’s mayor and councillors approved a grant of $1,200 for the program at their last meeting, and the society will contribute $1,300 worth of in-kind work on the project.

The proposal also suggests creating 20 small signs, stating historical dates and facts such as the founding of Port Pemberton in 1858, and placing them along an area such as the covered stairway leading up to Greenwood Street to create what Henry described as a “historic climb” up toward the Benchlands.

Henry said the signs can help foster community pride “by creating an awareness of the past,” such as the interesting history of the landmark Pemberton Hotel as the social hub of the community. He said the museum society has been actively pursuing ways to identify and protect local historical sites.

“One by one, they’re disappearing,” Henry said.

From an advocacy standpoint, Madigan said visibly identifying the sites will help preserve them in the future, as leaving them unmarked leaves them at risk of being bulldozed or lost. She said she thinks Pembertonians are proud of their town’s roots, and the signs would be one way of displaying that while helping newcomers to learn more about the community background.

The project and the town’s history could “become a talking point between somebody that’s maybe grown up in Pemberton with somebody that’s new to Pemberton,” Madigan said.

She said there’s been interest from Tourism Pemberton members in having an activity like the walk to keep visitors in the downtown core longer. While she’s not sure how big an impact it could have in terms of tourism dollars, Madigan said it’s within the museum society’s mandate to have such information available year-round.

In the future, she said, she would hope the museum could offer guided walking tours, as Whistler does, to truly make the history come alive.

Madigan said she and the museum society are excited to move forward with the project, since the Village has supported and saw value in it. In March they plan to approach the owners of the sites that are private businesses to talk about possible signage placement. She said they hope the owners of the sites will support the proposal.

The list of nine sites also includes One Mile Lake, the original trailhead for the Pemberton Trail, the former British American Oil Station and Gulf Station (now Black’s Hot Wheels), the RCMP and Pemberton Valley Dyking District office, the museum and Patenaude’s Corner at the Agerton townsite that was planned in 1911.