Annual General Meeting, Wednesday, October 17, 2007, 7:00 p.m., Cedar Heritage Centre

Report by Judy Burgess.

Society members and other visitors gathered at the Cedar Heritage Centre for the Society's fourth Annual General Meeting. All eagerly anticipated Tom Paterson's talk, "On Track to Saving the Kinsol: Lessons Learned that May Apply to Morden Colliery." With necessary business taken care of , we sat back and enjoyed Tom's insights.

Tom rejoiced that it looked as if historic Kinsol Trestle, as a result of the efforts of an army of volunteers, was now headed for official preservation. He drew many parallels with the Kinsol struggle as inspiration for the successful preservation of Morden.

A sampling:

• Tom pointed out the importance for Kinsol of its location on a recreational cycling trail. Morden too is located on part of a developed trail, the Regional Dictrict of Nanaimo's Morden Colliery Regional Trail. Further extension of this Trail would be of great benefit in promoting Morden.
• The Kinsol group had 200,000 hits on their web-site! Tom emphasized the vital role in promoting Morden that our web-site should play , as well as the necessity for adequate signage. Morden is only five minutes from the trans-Canada highway but has no highway signage to direct potential visitors to the site.
• Friends of Morden Mine will not be able to raise sufficient funds to pay for the necessary preservation of Morden's structures unless it combines with other groups interested in preservation of existing coal mining sites and in development of a regional plan for the promotion of an Island wide "Coal Mining Trail".
• The centre for this coal mining trail should be in Nanaimo, because Nanaimo is where the first successful coal mine was established in B.C. A monument to coal miners in the centre of Nanaimo would be most appropriate, not only to draw attention to the significance of coal mining to the Nanaimo area but to the whole Island's development.

Tom had many more insights to share, which led to a lively discussion following his talk.

At the end of the meeting, the offer by David Gogo on behalf of his father, Mike Gogo, to donate lumber for necessary shoring of parts of Morden's structure, was greeted enthusiastically.