The History in Langley City’s Street Names: Glover, Grade, and Michaud

Paul Weme of the Langley Foundation recently gifted me the book Roads & Other Place Names in Langley, B.C., by Maureen L. Pepin. The name of the book is pretty self-explanatory.

The roads’ names in Langley link to some of our community’s setter history, but without context, you would never know the connection or the importance of those names.

The following are a few excerpts about road names from that book.

Glover Road

The Langley Trunk Road from Langley Prairie (Langley City) to Fort Langley was renamed Glover Road following WWI after Lieut. F.W. Glover, who had been Langley’s Municipal Engineer before he enlisted. He is listed on the Fort Langley cenotaph as having died after the WWI Armistice, presumably from injuries received during the war.

Historial photo of Glover Road. Select the image to enlarge.

Grade Crescent

Grade Crescent is part of the original route of the Vancouver Victoria & Eastern Railway… The cut through High Knoll Park is the old railway grade.

Michaud Crescent

Joseph (1841 – 1909) and Georgiana (Moran) Michaud first came to Langley in 1878 from St. Philippe de Kamouraska, Quebec, the first French settlers in the municipality. They settled in an abandoned stopping house on Smugglers’ Trail. Ten years later they built Michaud House which is the oldest house in Langley City and has been restored by the Michaud family, the Heritage Society, and the Langley Arts Council. A replica of their drawing room, including furniture and pictures belonging to the Michauds, is in the Langley Centennial Museum. Maximilian Michaud, Joseph’s older brother, owned 600 acres in the area which he had bought after many years spent in Hope, New Westminster, and Vancouver. The first Roman Catholic mass in Langley was held in the Michaud home by an Oblate father. The small former school house in Innes Corners was moved across Yale Road into the Michaud hayfield to become the first Langley Catholic church, called St. Joseph’s, after the uncle of Joesph Michaud, also called Joeseph. Joseph Michaud’s hogs and cattle thrived on pea vine and crab apples which grew on the Hudson’s Bay Co. farmland [along Glover Road.]