My Family History

August 8, 2023 By: Jared Daumont

My family has lived in Terrace British Columbia for over 3 generations. My grandparents were both born in Terrace in 1944 and have lived their entire lives there. My grandfather, Donald, was born the son of a soldier that had served in the military during WWII and was stationed in the military base in Terrace. Donald’s father helped to build the highways East and West of Terrace.  Don grew up on a farm where he was responsible for tending to the animals and maintaining the land. He would wake up every day, put on his boots, and head out for the day to clean and maintain. His father was strict and “old-fashioned,” but my grandfather took the lessons from his father and grew to value his family’s well-being above all else. Don was an extremely respectful man who always took the people and things around him into consideration. When my grandfather became an adult and could move out on his own, he began work as a highway maintenance worker, among other trades. With the growth that Terrace was experiencing around this time, he seized the opportunity to support his family. He worked on the main drag of Terrace, helped build many of the interconnected roads throughout the town, and contributed heavily to the overall infrastructure of the town. Eventually he would meet my grandmother, Sharon, and marry. Sharon stayed at home most of the time and took care of the kids, being my father and his siblings, and gardened. Sharon had a deep love of gardening and enjoyed nature.

My father was born in 1966 and grew up on a big plot of land with his parents in Terrace. They didn’t have a farm like my grandfather grew up on, but they had deep forests on every side of the property and large grass fields. My grandmother maintained a beautiful garden that my father would often help with. Eventually, when my father became 14 years old, he went to work with his dad in a grader in Bob Quinn. My father worked as a heavy equipment operator for 30+ years. Within those years, he also worked as an EMT, blast technician, and highway foreman. At the age of 34, he would meet my mother, marry her, and soon enough have myself and my 3 siblings.

My mother was also born in 1966 and grew up in Terrace. She lived in an urban area and lived an urban lifestyle. She grew up with 3 siblings, all of which had vastly different interests and hobbies. My mother went to school here for a few years before eventually moving to Alberta for a period. In Alberta, my mother lived the city lifestyle. With the experience of the city life, my mother decided she felt happier and more fulfilled in a more “outdoorsy” area. She moved back to Terrace at the age of 28 and settled. Being back in Terrace, my mother grew to enjoy the outdoors and fell in love with camping. She would often spend her weekends in a tent at Ferry Island with her siblings and friends. At 34, she married my father and together they built a family.

I was born in 2001 to a loving and caring family. I have grown up in an urbanized area nearby Terrace called Thornhill. Much of my childhood was spent outdoors with friends and family, we rarely played inside. My area has a park and baseball diamond that I would spend hours with friends at. We regularly visited my grandparents at their home, the same one my father grew up in, up until it was sold following the passing of my grandfather. I camped, and still do camp, often with my parents and various other family members. Throughout my teenage years I became more involved in technology, eventually working directly with it. If I were to think critically on the history my family has with the environment we have developed in, I would say that there has always been a strong connection to it. My grandparents both had a strong appreciation for the environment as they were the ones who helped develop it. However, as generations have passed, I would argue that it has become quite difficult for myself to truly appreciate the environment the same way that my grandparents did. I was born into a modern age and grew up in a very urban area. Despite the amount of time I have spent outdoors in my life, I can’t say that I can truly comprehend its importance the way my grandparents did, as they were the ones who built the community and shaped the environment. Luckily, my parents were quite close with their parents and have given me a much stronger sense of responsibility for the environment around, teaching me how to care for it and maintain it.