Westminster Abbey

The historic place is the land assembled by Tashiro Hashizume in Mission, B.C., for the purpose of farming. Today, the site is home to the Benedictine Mission known as Westminster Abbey.

The Hashizume Farm historic place has historic, cultural and social value as a site representing the important participation of Japanese immigrants in the farming sector as part of the pioneering settlement of Mission and Maple Ridge.

The historic place is an important testament to the industry of Tashiro Hashizume, who arrived in British Columbia from Hawaii in 1903, and who, like many Japanese immigrants, worked in fishing, mining, business and logging before purchasing 28 1/2 acres of uncleared land near Mission in 1910.

Hashizuma is quoted as saying "By farming, you can expand according to your own efforts." He cleared and successfully farmed the initial acreage, expanding the farm with subsequent purchases. At the time of his passing in 1938 he owned 80 acres and employed many farm labourers.

The historic place is valued as representative of the history of the confiscation and sale of Japanese Canadian owned property during the World War II, and the forgetting of Japanese Canadian ownership and history of these confiscated and sold sites. Confiscated in 1942 by the Custodian of Enemy Properties, the land was sold by the government to the Benedictine order of the Roman Catholic Church in 1948, a purchase that illustrates the extent to which respect for the property of Japanese Canadians was disregarded. One of the original Hashizume farm buildings is used today as a chapter house for the Boy Scouts of Canada.

Source: Province of British Columbia, Heritage Branch

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