What It Was Like Picking Hops in Agassiz, BC in the 1930s

Agassiz, British Columbia is a farming community near Harrison Hot Springs and where the hop industry began in the 1890’s when A. St. George Hamersley converted over 300 acres into the first commercial hop yard in British Columbia. Because of this, Agassiz is often recognized as the birthplace of hops in British Columbia.

The industry took off in the 1930’s when thousands of pickers would arrive annually to work in the fields owned by the BC Hop Company. The pickers were primarily First Nations and Chinese pickers that arrived in Agassiz to pick for the season, however there were some local pickers as well.

One of his pickers, James Galozo, later wrote about his experiences working for Hamersley’s hop yards each summer. Keep reading to discover his story.

Working in the Fields of the Hop Farms

Workers picked hops from large strung up vines in the summer heat. They were cut down, and loaded onto wagons and prepared for drying. The dried hops were used to make beer.

Sunday’s on the Hop Farms

For those who picked at the hop farms, they worked a grueling day for minimal pay and slept in tiny cabins provided by the company. On Sunday afternoons, the pickers would gather for games and music.

The Decline of the Hop Yards in Agassiz

The hop yards began to decline in 1935 when mildew affected most of the crops and it was too costly to spray. When the Fraser River flooded the hop yards in 1948, the industry in Agassiz, British Columbia came to a halt. The land was converted into dairy farms and the BC Hop Company moved up to Clinton, British Columbia.

Editorial Note: Use of Archival Documents

This post includes photographs and handwritten documents transcribed verbatim from original manuscripts held at the Agassiz-Harrison Museum & Archives. All spelling, grammar, punctuation, and word choice have been preserved as they remain in the original documents. All wording of the manuscript is that of the original author and not of BC History Diary. Editorial introductions and historical context have been added to assist modern readers and to situate the documents within the broader social and historical landscape of British Columbia.

“Picking Hops at Agassiz in the Thirties” by James Galozo

Every year for several years, away we would go around mid-August in the 30’s to The Hamersley Hop Yard at Agassiz, B.C.

Peter Gonzales was a Chilean by birth who arrived here on a sailing vessel in 1875. He admired the country so much that he “jumped ship,” and settled with the Squamish Indians, and soon was married to Emma John, one of the beautiful native princesses in North Vancouver.

Pete Gonzales was hiring agent for A. St. George Hamersley for over 45 years, and when the hop crop was ready for harvest, we would load into a wood truck, and away we would go for a two-hour trip from North Vancouver to Agassiz. (A. St. George’s home was here in North Vancouver). We would start picking hops the day after our arrival.

Peter acted as Field Boss during the picking season, and a Frank Baker who lived in Agassiz was responsible for buying the picked hops from the pickers.  Mr. Baker issued a ticket to the pickers for value of the hops that were redeemed for cash by a Mr. Inkman who operated a store on the premises at the Hamersley Hop Yard. Mr. Inkman was always fair, and would “carry” anyone with no cash till they were in possession of their first ticket. 

In September of 1924, one of these cabins at Hamersley became an emergency maternity ward when Peter Gonzales’ daughter gave birth to one of his many grandsons. The child was named Arnold Bro. (This information passed along to me by Arnold’s brother, Marcel Bro).

Picking hops was a tedious job, but during the “depression” we were quite content to earn about $2.50 for a 10-hour day.The population of the Harrison-Agassiz area would literally double for one month every year during the hop picking season prior to 19”? when hop growing was terminated here. Unlike today, hops were picked by hand; hence the need for so many pickers. Whole families (mostly native people) would take up residence in the long rows of “cabins” supplied by the hop company. Today’s society would never tolerate the living conditions we accepted in the ‘30s at the hop camp. During hop picking season, we were clustered together in cabins, the size of each individual cabin being about 10’ x 10’. 

In 1936 at the peak of the depression, Andy Grant and I left home for the first time to go to Agassiz and pick hops. We were away about five weeks, and we returned home with about $20.00. We were quite satisfied at the time. After all, a chocolate bar cost only 5c.

Many local people picked hops too, and I’m in mind of the Luke Martin family who pioneered a dairy farm in the Hamersley area, just south of the C.P. R. tracks on — Road One of the first Agassiz Residents was Mary Martin, who also picked hops. Mary was a happy girl who always would leave early to go home and mount her horse and round-up her father’s cattle for the evening milking session. The Martins lived south of the C.P.R. Railway Tracks, close to the hops fields. Mary’s Mother was also a welcome daily visitor to the hop yard, as she went from row to row selling the pickers delicious hot buttered fresh corn.

Andy and I always “felt at home” when we would visit with Mary’s parents or her three brothers, Tom, Lawrence, and Ted. Just what one needed when one was away from home for the first time!

 I mentioned earlier that many families came to the hop fields with all their children. I noticed that three month old babies predominate the number of small children there, and this did not surprise me, as the Harrison-Agassiz area is a very beautiful and romantic area indeed. 

There were no showers on bathing facilities at the camp so we would go to the foot of Luyat Road and wash up in a back wash of the Fraser River. And yes, there was gold on the banks of the Fraser River, and a couple squatters had their cabins and sluice boxes there and would manually separate the gold from the gravel. 

The entire geography at the foot of Luyat Road is now changed (probably since the 1948) flood, and cabins and sluice boxes have disappeared.

Recreation at the camp some evenings would be a La Hal game where two picked teams squatted and faced each other (with a bon fire in between them) and the leader of each team would try to guess which hand a branded bone was held in. It was a betting game in which one could double his money, and some nights the game would carry on for hours. 

Some of our neighbors here in North Vancouver were quite curious to know where we went every summer around mid-August. To make an impression as though we were “big shots” our reply was “we have a summer cabin near the resort of Harrison Hot Springs!”

And that was the truth.

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