Lequime's Store

The Lequime Store has heritage value for its association with pioneer Eli Lequime and his family, for being a rare representative of the period of rapid growth in the original townsite area immediately before and after municipal incorporation in 1905, as Kelowna's first dressed-stone commercial building, for being the oldest surviving commercial building in Kelowna, and for the way in which its different uses over time reflected the growing and changing Kelowna community.

The building's value resides in part from its having been built by Bernard and Leon Lequime, the developers of the Kelowna townsite (hence the names Bernard and Leon Avenues) and the sons of renowned pioneer Eli Lequime. The elder Lequime had arrived at Okanagan Mission in 1861. He started a store on his ranch there, and operated the first blacksmith shop, post office, and hotel-saloon. Sons Bernard and Leon laid out the townsite of Kelowna on the lakefront in 1892, after the CPR established steamer service on Okanagan Lake connecting with the railway at Okanagan Landing, near Vernon. As developers of the townsite, the Lequimes built their general store in the prime location, directly opposite the steamer landing.

The Lequime Store initiated the second phase of Kelowna's growth, in 1904. The Lequime brothers, probably impelled by a series of fires that had struck the small downtown, moved their original wood-frame store one lot east and in its place erected this, the first stone building in Kelowna. It was built by William Haug, with squared stone quarried on Knox Mountain. This second stage of downtown building, which continued until the outbreak of World War I, saw stone and brick structures, filling the entire street frontage, replace the detached, wooden 1890s-era buildings.

The subsequent values associated with the building are also substantial, as its history of differing uses reflects the growing and changing community over many decades. In 1913 Bernard Lequime sold the store to L. Richmond of Vancouver and moved to San Francisco. Richmond's Ready-to-Wear and Dry Goods Co. failed about 1916, and the building was converted to a movie theatre by Mrs. Raymer, after the Opera House in the Raymer Block was destroyed by fire in that year. The cinema operated until the purpose-built Empress Theatre opened in 1919.

Pasquale 'Cap' Capozzi, later of such importance in the wine industry, had his first grocery store in this building. In the 1930s and 1940s the building was divided and occupied by a cafe and government offices (including the Unemployment Insurance Office until 1955). For many years after 1955 Thomas 'Scotty' Angus (well-known locally for his weekly program of old-country music on CKOV radio) had his second-hand and antique business in the building. In the 1970s several restaurants occupied the building, followed by nightclub use after 1982. The building is at present divided into three small food-sellers, largely serving the tourist and amusement trade.