The Story of Dunbar: Voices of a Vancouver Neighbourhood draws on interviews with more than 350 local residents, including recent arrivals, descendants of pioneer settlers and the aboriginal inhabitants. Their personal accounts are woven together with information from diaries, records in the City of Vancouver Archives and carefully chosen published sources to form twelve chapters that explore different aspects of community life. The arts, churches and schools, how people shopped and how they got around, where they lived and relaxed are all described. This is a story of the past century—from the settlement of the West to the development of a modern world-class city—brought to life through the experiences of people living in the neighbourhood of Dunbar. Includes over 240 b&w photos "The Story of Dunbar is a wonderful effort by a community to capture its own history and has set the standard for all others to follow." —John Atkin, co-author of Heritage Walks Around Vancouver

Peggy Schofield was born in the United States. She and her Nova Scotia-born husband Wilf Schofield arrived in Vancouver in 1960, settling in Dunbar in 1965 to raise three daughters. After many years of involvement in the arts, the Dunbar business district an the Dunbar Residents' Association, Peggy became interested in local history when the City of Vancouver led a “visioning” process to find out what the community wanted for its future. It occurred to her that knowledge of local history was the best foundation for decisions about the future. She made a commitment to the “Documenting Dunbar” project and subsequently, despite a serious illness, served as the volunteer coordinator until her death in January 2005. Afterward, the committee pulled together to complete the project in her memory. Contributing writers, all local residents, are Pam Chambers, Vivien Clarke, Shelagh Lindsey, Beryl March, Angus McIntyre, Larry Moore, Margaret Campbell Moore, Peggy Schofield, Helen Spiegelman and Joan Tyldesley.

P. Schofield's profile page

• BC Historical Federation Award

“a valuable, scale-specific perspective on the dynamics of community building . . . Every neighbourhood deserves such a carefully crafted record of its beginnings” — Canadian Literature