Corrigan, Frederick Thomas “Fred”

Fred Corrigan was born on January 2, 1914 in Hedley, BC. He was the son of William Wirth Corrigan and Gladys Josephine (Brown) Corrigan. He married Rose Pryznyk. He died in Vancouver General Hospital on December 15, 1982. At the time of his death, he and Rose were living in Vancouver.

Corrigan was born and raised in Hedley. He attended Hedley Superior School and was in Grade 7 in April 1926.

He was working at Sterling Creek Camp in 1934. Perhaps he was a bit of a wild young man because in August 1934, the Similkameen Star reported that Fred Corrigan had gone to “play the ponies and pet the dolls” on a ten day vacation to Vancouver.

In late November 1934, he opened the Lucky Strike Cafe (Board, Room, Short Order) in Hedley. The last advertisement for the Lucky Strike Cafe appeared in the Princeton Star on July 25, 1935.

He was involved in a motor vehicle accident on the race track hill in Princeton July 1935 no one was injured and the car “not much damaged.” 

The Similkameen Star reported in March 1936 that he was still in Vancouver with medical issues. In October of that year, he came to Hedley to visit his mother (1936).

In the 1950s(?), Fred Corrigan was in charge of the company store and cafeteria at Copper Mountain. He said, “We did well here you know. The meals in the cafeteria were really good and cheap and we tried to keep the prices in the store pretty close to Vancouver.”