Thirty years didn't seem like very long ago. But that was the dawn of the Internet and social media meant getting friends togther every week to watch the new TV series, "Friends." Computer geeks were awaiting the beta release of Windows 95. In Richmond BC, 1994 was when a group of hams from the then Gulf of Georgia Society Amateur Radio Club received a grant from the Federal Government to build a radio station on the Parks Canada GOG Cannery National Historic Site. Over the years the station, designated call sign VE7GOG, experienced as many activities as the surrounding Steveston neighbourhood has undergone changes.

The discovery that inspired further research...

While cleaning up a pile of old maps and other paper material inside the station about ten years ago, we came across a piece of soiled and crumpled light cardboard that turned out to be an original, hand-drawn logo of The Gulf of Georgia Cannery Society Radio Club with the call sign VE7GOG. After some initial cleaning, the sign was framed and is now hanging on the limited wall space of the station (but much restoration is still required).

The correspondence that started things rolling...

In early 1993, a group of "amateurs and other radio people that associate themselves with VE7GOG form a committee of the Gulf of Georgia Cannery Society" to apply for a New Horizons Program grant for new radio equipment to convert a donated trailer into a fully operating amateur station.

By July 1993, a cheque from Health and Welfare Canada, New Horizons Program was received through the office of then local Member of Parliament for Richmond, Hon. Tom Siddon P.C., M.P., to get the project rolling.

According to transcripts from a club report, plans were to open the station VE7GOG in 1994 to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the Cannery.