I grew up on a ranch just north of Cochrane. I went to school in Cochrane including the high school in Cochrane Heights.
I was away for many years and moved back a handful of years ago. Della is from Williams Lake and we spend a fair bit of the year there.
Now that we’re back, we walk a far bit. I’ve climbed the hill to the high school and now the area where we live, thousands of times.
As Cochrane grown, it’s 33 thousand now and surrounded by rural subdivisions, traffic has gotten pretty bad. A lot of road construction is going on now. Traffic will improve, but so the character of the town will change. The character of the town changed along time ago so it’s not new.
The part that disturbs me is that in my mind, we forget our history. Our area was built by amazing people who have some incredible stories. To often, I believe they are forgotten.
On the plus side there are a couple of organizations that work to save that history. CHAPS operates the Cochrane Historical Museum is one, the Stockmen’s Memorial Foundation that operates the Bert Shepard Library is the other.