J.W. Hughes House

The Hughes House is valued both for its association with a significant member of the early horticultural industry, and for its architecture and its context amongst the heritage structures along Bernard Avenue, east of the downtown core. The Hughes House is also representative of changing urban patterns in Kelowna in the later twentieth century.

The historic place has value for its association with Jesse W. Hughes (1887-1975). He had moved from Iowa to Olds, Alberta, in 1908 and married his wife Ruth there. They came to the Kelowna area in 1917. Hughes was an energetic innovator, always ready to try new crops and techniques. After starting on an apple orchard, he progressed to apple buying, shipping, and selling. He started growing grapes in 1926, expanding from 45 acres near Mission to 75 acres by 1933, and eventually had over 300 acres of grapes in production. He was one of the earlier growers in the Kelowna to produce grapes, which has become a leading agricultural industry. Hughes also grew cucumbers, asparagus, raspberries, and flowers; sold vegetable seeds; and experimented with game and poultry farming in the 1940s. Hughes sold most of his vineyards to men who had worked for him, and shifted to growing and sending gifts of flowers to hospitals and shut-ins in BC and Alberta through the Rotary Club. Over the years, until his death in 1975, he sent about two million peonies, tulips, and gladioli.

Hughes built this substantial house himself in 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, when building a house was a bold gesture. The design of the house has value for being characteristic of architecture between the world wars, 1.5 storeys high, with a large forward-facing dormer and projecting porch. Jesse and Ruth Hughes lived here until the mid-1950s, when they retired to their remaining property in Okanagan Mission.

In 1956 this house was rented by Ivan A.K. and Norah Beadle. Ivan Beadle was a music teacher in the community.

A Heritage Designation Bylaw protected this house in 1995, giving it value as an early participant in the City's heritage conservation program. Like many of the buildings on this stretch of Bernard Avenue, it passed from residential to commercial use, representing the increasing land values and consequent new uses of the inner-city area, just east of the downtown core. In 2001 it was used as a retail store called Cubby House Gifts, although in 2006 the building appears to be back in residential use.