John Morton was born in Yorkshire to a family of experienced potters. In his twenties, he heard about the Cariboo Gold Rush in British Columbia and decided to emigrate there with his cousin, Samuel Brighouse, by crossing the Atlantic on the Great Eastern.
Not too long after setting foot in BC, he, along with his cousin and another companion, William Hailstone, bought District Lot 185, the area now known as the West End. The trio, dubbed “the Three Greenhorns” by the public who thought lowly of them, then built a cabin on their newly acquired plot of land. Out of the three of them, Morton spent the most time in the cabin. Because he lived in the cabin more often than his companions, his able to form friendly and pleasant relationships with the First Nations living in the area. The interactions between Morton and the First Nations people were good-natured and neighbourly. For example, the First Nations people would use his grindstone and repay him with fish and meat. Even though he maintained his peaceful relations with the First Nations, Morton was occasionally quite shaken by some of their traditions. On one occasion, Morton witnessed a First Nations woman being punished for killing another woman’s child. The First Nations’ public hanging method of punishment even scared Morton into reporting the event to government officials. Later on, Morton used a First Nations trail to get through the dense forest around him to reach present-day English Bay. That was where Morton built his new home, Morton Lodge. |
In 1878, Morton went back to his homeland of England. During this visit, he got married to Jane Ann Bailey, who coincidently, was also from the same hometown as him. In the following year, the newlywed couple had their firstborn. While their first son was born in the UK, their second son was born after the family returned to BC, in 1881. Morton’s wife soon died from complications after giving birth to their second child.
Even though Morton owned a huge portion of the West End, he wasn’t as prosperous as one might think. Before the CPR came to Vancouver with all the new wealthy people that would buy his land and make him wealthy, Morton was suffering from great poverty. At one point, he even had to dig trenches on Lulu Island just to make a decent amount of money to keep him going. His sons had to be adopted by other families because he barely had enough to support himself, much less two young sons. Morton remarried in 1884, to Ruth Mount. The couple later bought a farm in Mission. Later in his life, when he was finally a rich old man, Morton was able to donate lots of money to the Baptist Church. He also help fund the construction of the Ruth Morton Memorial Church in South Vancouver. Morton died in 1912 in Vancouver at the age of 78. Even though he has long passed away, his legacy lives on. Morton Avenue, the shortest street in Vancouver, was named after him as well as Morton Park. The church he helped build through donations, the Ruth Memorial Church, also helps ensure his contributions to the development of Vancouver will never be forgotten. At one of the church’s services, a large piece of coal was displayed on the altar to remind everyone of what caused the chain of events that would one day give us the area we now call the West End. Written by Emily L. |