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P00393 – In the distance on the left is Sinclair Ice Storage, with Sinclair's Store in the centre. At the time this picture was taken, the store was being run by the Charlton family. To the right of the store is a barn.

P01150 – Portrait of Temple F. Sinclair from circa 1890.

Sinclair's Store

In the 1870's, T.F. Sinclair built the first store at the foot of 224th Street, on the banks of the Fraser River. The general merchandise store serviced customers from across the river and passengers on the steamboats travelling up and down the river as well as the early settlers in the Port Haney area. Mr. Sinclair had promoted the idea of preserving salmon for shipment with Fraser River ice, and this brought about construction of the large, barn-like building known locally as the "Freezer".

The store changed hands over the years, and in 1893, the B.C. Directory refers to "Sinclair & Carr" and in 1902, the Directory lists "Charlton" as the merchant. The municipal council minutes from 1901 state that the store license was transferred from Mr. Carr to A.L. Charlton.

The Maple Ridge Museum has a ledger from Sinclair's store, and came upon it quite by accident. A young local boy was exploring an old, abandoned building when he discovered a book concealed in a rotting wall. It is a ledger with a day-by-day record of the transactions from 1888 in the Sinclair store. The book has suffered water and insect damage, but for the most part, is in quite good condition considering what it went through throughout the years. There are many well-known pioneer families recorded in the ledger as customers of Sinclair's, which allows us to see the purchases of local families, and helps us to figure out when renovations happened, family visited, and other special events.

As a general store, it sold many items, such as tobacco, matches, pipes, bacon, rolls of wall paper, tacks, tea, onions, lard, soda, lemons, candy, peaches, butter, jam, sugar, shirts, caps, socks and overalls, just to name a few.

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