photograph
Artwork
Accession Number
2008.008.002Description
A black and white photograph of a boy on a horse in front of the Wellington Colliery manager's house. To the immediate left is a girl in a white dress and a boy in a white shirt wearing a bowtie. To the horse's right is another boy in a white shirt with a long tie. In the background is a balding man sitting on the verandah railing.Narrative
This photograph depicts the the two-story wooden colliery manager's house at Wellington. On the back of the photograph is a piece of paper taped to the cardstock with a typewritten inscription.The house was used by various members of the Dunsmuir family, but was never the principal residence of Robert and Joan Dunsmuir.
After the Wellington Colliery was decommissioned, the house became the residence of the Dunsmuir family’s Wellington Farm estate manager. James Wallace Loudon (1857-1932) and his wife Ellen Sharpe Loudon (1866-1953) lived here from 1889 to 1919. In this photograph James Wallace Loudon is sitting on the porch of the verandah railing of the residence. On the lawn are four of their five children: from left is presumed to be Robert Gordon Loudon (1903-?); Jeanne Hunter Loudon (1895-1978) in a white dress; on horseback is William “Bill” Drummond Loudon (1897-1980); to the horse's right is James Wallace Loudon (1901-?)
The house was situated on the west side of Diver Lake, north of Nanaimo, on a street known today as Jingle Pot Road. There is no concrete evidence that the Dunsmuir family named this house "Ardoon" despite the fact that the name is ascribed to it in many publications produced in the 20th Century. That name was used by Robert and Joan Dunsmuir for their principal residence which was situated at the corner of Albert & Wallace Streets in downtown Nanaimo.
