Goodfellow, John Christie, Reverend, Doctor of Divinity “Dr. John”
Isabelle Dalziel (Marshall) Goodfellow (1884-1965)
Uncle: Rev. Alexander Goodfellow (Orkney, Scotland)
Father: Stewart Goodfellow
Mother: unknown (Christie) Goodfellow
Brother: Stewart Goodfellow (1888-1955) (m.Jeanie Burr)
Sons: John Marshall Goodfellow “Jack” (1922-1998); Eric Goodfellow (1927-2023)
Daughter: Lois (Goodfellow) (John) Sclippa (1925-2015)
John Goodfellow was born on May 14, 1890 at Broughty Ferry in Dundee, Scotland. He married Isabelle Dalziel Marshall in 1917. He died on October 24, 1968 in the Princeton General Hospital. He is buried in the Princeton Cemetery.
John Goodfellow trained as a bookkeeper and came to Canada in 1908 as a Presbyterian student minister. He spent a year in Saskatchewan and then travelled to South Africa. He returned to BC in 1914 and enrolled in the Presbyterian Theological College (Westminster Hall) in Vancouver.
World War I
Goodfellow enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force (C.E.F.) on January 27, 1916, at Vancouver, BC. He served in England, Macedonia, Italy, Belgium and Germany. He spent sixteen months in France (September 1916 to October 1918) with the Canadian Army Medical Corps (3rd Field Ambulance) at Salonika. While there, an ear infection caused some permanent hearing loss in his right ear. C.E.F. attestation papers and service records: here).
He was granted permission at Liverpool to marry on November 16, 1917. He married Isabelle Marshall in 1917.
He returned to Canada in July 1919 and resumed his theology studies.
Church Life
When he returned from overseas in 1919, he completed his studies at Westminster Hall and the University of British Columbia. He was ordained in March 1923 and served the Presbyterian communities of Port Moody and Ioco from 1923-1925 and then as assistant pastor at the First United Church in Victoria from 1925-1927.
He came to Princeton on June 29, 1927, to serve as the pastor at St. Paul’s United Church, replacing Rev. H.E.D. Ashford. Isabelle Goodfellow and their three young children stayed behind in Victoria for the month of July as she was unwell (1927). His first sermon at St. Paul’s in Princeton was on July 1, 1927.
He travelled to Victoria in mid-July 1927 to bring Isabelle and the children to Princeton.
He not only served the community of Princeton, he also travelled to Allenby (where he held fortnightly services in the school house 1927; 1928;), Copper Mountain, Coalmont, Tulameen, and Jura.
He would also do an occasional pulpit exchange: in January 1928, he preached at the Union Church in Keremeos and in October 1928, he preached in Merritt. While in Vancouver attending the United Church conference in 1929, he filled the pews at the “leading Vancouver church,” Robson Memorial.
The first printed annual report of St. Paul’s Church (as reported by the Princeton Star, January 17, 1929) showed the church was flourishing, with a membership of 65 and being close to a time when “the mortgage can be burned.”
He was a leading religious figure in the community of Princeton. He baptized, married and buried countless Similkameen residents. He provided the funeral services for the eight miners killed in the Copper Mountain bunkhouse fire in 1928 and many of the Blakeburn miners following the explosion in August 1930.
When he retired in 1958, he “concluded a record-breaking pastorate of 31 years” (Vancouver Province, June 28, 1958, page 48).
“Historian of the Similkameen”
After arriving in Princeton in 1927, it didn’t take long for him to be recognized as an avid historian. In March 1928, the Similkameen Star described Goodfellow as being “in a sense the historian of the Similkameen.”
He was a frequent contributor to the Okanagan Historical Society Annual Reports (1935-1960) and the BC Historical Quarterly and had a lively curiosity about the history of the Similkameen and Okanagan as well as the history of the Presbyterian and United Church, First Nations totem poles, First Nations lore and the origin of local place names.
He served many years on the Board of Advisors (BC Historical Quarterly), on the Council of the BC Historical Association, as secretary for the Similkameen Historical Association and the Okanagan Historical Association, and a President and Vice-President to these same organizations.
Community
Rev. Goodfellow also was interested in providing leadership and direction to the community’s youth. Within a month of arriving in Princeton, he took (with J.F. Willway, the teacher at Ashnola) a group of nine Trail Rangers to camp at Tulameen Lake (1927; 1927). He was also an inaugural member of the committee to form a local Boy Scouts troop (1928) and attended Boy Scout camp at McKenzie Lake in July 1928.
He organized the annual Hope Trail Trek, taking a group of young adults over the Hope Trail annually until 1947. The first time Rev. Goodfellow hiked the sixty miles from Princeton to Hope was in August 1928. He was in the company of Dr. G.H. Kearney and Allen MacDonald.
He was also a community booster. He joined the Princeton Board of Trade in 1928 and was active in that organization for years. He was a strong advocate for the construction of the Hope-Princeton Highway (November 1928). He was present when the Princeton Library Association was formed in June 1928, canvassed for funds on behalf of the newly-formed Princeton Band Association (1928), and in May 1929, he attended a banquet of 200 people organized to promote Similkameen unity. In February 1935, he was elected President of the newly formed “Princeton Welfare Council,” a group with diverse community interests that would function as “co-operative, co-ordinative, emergency, and supplementary” for the promotion of community welfare. He served on the Princeton General Hospital Board (1935– )
In 1939, he took over as manager and editor of the Similkameen Star as a favour to Dave Taylor and he would remain in that role until 1947.
In the early years, he gave magic lantern slide shows in Princeton at the Princess Theatre, on November 1927 and a series of 100 travelogue slides in April 1928. He also travelled to Allenby (January 1928; April 1928, October 1928), and Copper Mountain (April 1928, October 1928).
He was an active member of the Orange Lodge and represented the Similkameen District at the Orange Grand Lodge of British Columbia annual meetings.
Before 1908: trained as an bookkeeper
1910[?]: travelled to South Africa
1916-1919: Canadian Expeditionary Force
1921: graduated University of Victoria
1923: ordained as Presbyterian minister
1924: research trip to BC Coast First Nations communities
1923-1925: Minister at Ioco and Port Moody
1923-1925: Secretary of the BC Synod (Presbyterian) Historical Committee
1925: Became Secretary of the BC (united) Historical Society, a position he would hold until 1950
1925: elected to the Council of the BC Historical Society (he often held this position through the years)
1927: member of the central executive committee of the Princeton Post, Canadian Legion
1925-1927: Assistant Minister First United Church, Victoria
1927-1958: Minister St. Paul’s United Church, Princeton
1927: elected 2nd Vice-President of the BC Historical Association
1927: Member of the Central Executive Committee of the Princeton Post, Canadian Legion
1928: member of committee to form Princeton Boy Scout troop
1928: Chairman of Canadian Forest Week, Princeton Committee
1928-1947: conducted annual Hope Trail Trek
1928 – [?]: member of the BC Art and Historical Society
1928: named at a board of five notable provincial historians tasked with writing a history of Greater Vancouver
1928-[?]: member of the Princeton Board of Trade
1931: Founder of the Similkameen Historical Association
1933: Elected Secretary-Treasurer of the Similkameen Historical Association
1933: travelled to the Chicago World’s Fair
1935: elected President of the newly formed Princeton Welfare Council
1935: elected director – Princeton General Hospital Board
1935-1936: Director, Okanagan Historical Society (OHS)
1935/1936-[?]: Advisory Board of “The New B.C. Quarterly,” a publication of the BC Historical Quarterly
1937-1954: on the Advisory Board to the BC Historical Quarterly (published by the BC Historical Association)
1939-1946: manager and editor of the Similkameen Star
1941-1942: President of the BC Historical Association
1943: Honorary President of the Society for the Furtherance of British Columbia Indian Arts and Crafts
1944: appointed to a Historical Committee at the Annual Convention of the BC Division of the Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association
1945-1955: Secretary of the OHS
1941-1943: First Vice-President of the OHS
1944: member of delegation to Victoria
1946-?: Convenor of the BC Conference (United) Historical Committee
1950: received an Honorary Doctorate of Divinity from Union College
1950-1957: Editor & Editorial Committee and the OHS
1953: elected director of the Okanagan Museum and Archives
1954: Princeton Board of Trade, Citizen of the Year
1945-1957: Elected editor of the Okanagan Historical Association Reports
1961: made Honorary Life Member of the OHS
1963: Elected to the editorial committee of the newly formed Similkameen Branch of the OHS
1961: made Honorary President of the Okanagan Historical Association
Princeton Our Valley, page 168, 354, 355; Princeton B.C. – Laurie Currie, pages 6, 23, 73, 76, 77, 81, 82- 84, 85, 87, 89, 90, 92, 101; Okanagan Historical Society Reports (1935-1969); The School on Vermilion, page 59; Princeton 100 Years, pages 73, 76, 81, 82, 87, 90; United Church photo album (Basement __5 __1.5 __1 Album 1, pages 3,4; Princeton Star and Similkameen Star (1927-1953)