Not only is the Antelope Brush property one with ecological significance but it along with adjacent land has been owned by the same family for 127 years who have cared deeply about protecting the land. One of the family members, George Kennedy provided a descriptive history.

Peter McIntyre came across Canada with the second group of Overlanders in 1862. After some time searching for gold, he went to the US where he rode “shotgun” for the Pony Express. In 1886, he returned to the South Okanagan and settled on land beneath a massive cliff. His land spread from the Okanagan River on the west side of the valley to a fast flowing creek on the east side. He chose to settle here because of this creek, where he installed a large water wheel which he used to generate power for a small saw mill.

As a bachelor, Peter McIntyre lived alone on his property. His brother-in-law was suffering from a lung disease from working in the mines, so Peter invited him and his sister to take advantage of the dry air of the Okanagan and live with him. They relocated with their young daughter Hazel. The family used water from the creek to irrigate a hay meadow and raised cattle, calling their property Cliff Ranch. The cliff later became known as McIntyre Bluff and the creek as McIntyre Creek. Hazel called her uncle “Uncle Pete,” and later everyone else did too.

The first big intrusion of the ranch was the Kettle Valley Railroad. The story has it that Uncle Pete greeted the railway clearing crew with a shotgun. He was strongly attached to his land and wanted to protect it – a commitment that has been prevalent through his descendants to the current day.

The nearest town was Fairview (Oliver didn’t exist yet). At a dance at Fairview’s “Big Teepee” hotel, Hazel met Ed Kennedy, an engineer who was in the area. They later married and had two children, “Jack” and “Mickey”, whom they raised at the ranch. When the kids reached high school age, the family moved to Vancouver so they could go to high school. Uncle Pete passed the ranch on to his niece, Hazel, who later joined her family in Vancouver.

Jack married and had three boys: John, George and Blake. Hazel joined Jack and family in Vancouver. Mickey lived in Spokane so during this period none of the family was living at the ranch. The property was leased out to the neighbouring rancher for hay and pasture.

The next big intrusion of the property was the construction of the dam and irrigation ditch on the Okanagan River. The river was straightened and gravel covered dykes replaced the cottonwood trees along the banks.

When the neighbour no longer needed to lease the property, it remained idle for several years. Offers to sell the property were entertained by the family, but their attachment to the land always won out.

In 1967, Mickey and her nephew George returned to the property and re-established the former hay meadow. The family built a log house where Mickey spent the rest of her days in the same location under the bluff where Uncle Pete had lived. Blake has carried on Mickey’s role of living in the log house and watching out for the property.

The family has tried to keep the land as natural as it was when Uncle Pete arrived. It is an ongoing and formidable challenge to protect a pocket of naturalness in the midst of so much development.

source Natures Trust