Description of Historic Place

The Tom Bones House is a one-storey, wood-frame Arts and Crafts cottage with an inset entry porch and cedar shingle siding. It is situated adjacent to an alley on the north side of Royal Avenue, within the North Shore district of Kamloops. The property includes mature perimeter plantings.

Heritage Value

Built circa 1930, the Tom Bones House is valued for its association with the settlement of the North Shore of Kamloops. Before 1909, the North Shore was primarily a rural farming area of orchards and fields. In 1909, a British-based company named B.C. Fruitlands was incorporated and obtained over 9,000 acres on the North Shore. By 1920, the company owned over 22,000 acres and had installed an extensive irrigation system that supplied water to all of North Kamloops. After the irrigation system was installed, the company promoted programs to attract settlers to the area. Over time, the patchwork of farms developed into a community and in 1946, the Village of North Kamloops was incorporated.

The Tom Bones House also has heritage significance for its association with the first owner, Thomas Bones (1875-1964), a local carpenter, and his wife Louisa Jane (1874-1929), both of whom came from England. Tom Bones worked at the sanitarium in Tranquille and built this Arts and Crafts style cottage himself. His carpentry skills are evident on both the exterior and interior; the round stones for the fireplace are thought to have been collected from Tranquille.

Furthermore, the Tom Bones House is valued as an example of an Arts and Crafts Period Revival cottage, representative of traditional domestic ideals. Between the two World Wars, houses were expected to display some sort of historical reference in order to demonstrate the owner's good taste. An Arts and Crafts influence is demonstrated here in the cedar shingle siding, diagonally-cut window trim and built-in flower boxes.

Source: City of Kamloops Planning Department

Character-Defining Elements

Key characteristics that define the heritage character of the Tom Bones House include its:
- location on Royal Avenue in the North Shore district of Kamloops
- residential form, scale and massing as expressed by its one-storey height with side-gabled roof, front-gabled projection, inset entry porch and later matching addition to the west side
- wood-frame construction and concrete foundation with stucco finish
- Arts and Crafts influence as expressed by cedar shingle siding, diagonally-cut window trim, built-in flower boxes and multi-paned glazed front door
- two internal chimneys with stucco finish and corbelled tops
- windows, such as double-hung, one-over-one wooden sash windows in single and double assembly
- associated landscape features such as mature perimeter plantings