Kilby Historic Site is a 1920s Fraser Valley living history site. This 3-hectare heritage farm includes the 1906 General Store Museum and Manchester House Hotel & Post Office, as well as costumed interpreters, friendly farm animals and an orchard playground. The focal point is the General Store, once a temperance hotel built on pilings and linked to the railway station by a ramp to its second storey.
Thomas and Eliza Kilby converted it to a general store in 1906, and their son Acton took over the reigns when Thomas died in 1922, managing the store until 1977. In 1926, automobiles began to appear at Harrison Mills, and the Kilbys installed gravity-fed gas pumps that served travellers till 1977.
It’s well worth a look through the restored boarding house, post office, and the general store to get a feel for life on the Fraser River at the turn of the last century, when steam wheelers linked small towns like Harrison Mills with the docks downstream at Mission and New Westminster.
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Situated on a flood plain, the General Store and other buildings were elevated and connected with boardwalks. Today, visitors can see a fascinating gallery of store products and enjoy first-hand involvement with the intriguing artifacts of the farm and its current livestock. There is a small admission charge to view the store, which is open seasonally, Easter until Thanksgiving
Harrison Mills is also home to the Kilby Provincial Park, located within walking distance of Kilby Historic Site on Harrison Bay at the confluence of both the Fraser and Harrison rivers. The park features a scenic 35-site, vehicle-accessible campground, with a day-use area, dazzling sandy beaches, nature trails and a boat launch that is open year-round. The setting is popular for swimming, waterskiing and angling, and Trumpeter swans and a thousand or more bald eagles come here to feast on the annual salmon run in late autumn.
Kilby Historic Site is located on scenic Highway 7 at 215 Kilby Road in Harrison Mills in the Fraser Valley, a few kilometres west of Agassiz and Harrison Hot Springs, both reached by Highway 9 north off the Trans Canada Highway, and about a 90-minute drive from Vancouver.
Contact details:
Kilby Historic Site
215 Kilby Road
P.O. Box 55
Harrison Mills, BC
V0M 1L0
Tel: 604-796-9576
Fax: 604-796-9592
Website: www.kilby.ca
