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Hazel Harding was born in 1921. She came to Langley with her parents, Joseph (Joe) and Lily Harding, and her brother Bernie in 1937, from La Fleche, Saskatchewan when the Depression drove them to move. They settled on what was then called Winchester Road in Murrayville and began a small dairy farm. She finished high school by doing part of junior high by correspondence and finishing senior matriculation courses at Abbotsford. She went to normal school in Vancouver at age eighteen, and some of her classmates included Les MacDonald (the judge) and Norman Sherritt (the principal). She went to school to become a teacher, receiving a teacher's specialist certificate, even attending summer school in Victoria to get 15 credits. She taught at County Line School, where she remembered having four Japanese students that were taken in 1941 to the Hastings Park internment camp and moved east. She late taught at Murrayville School. She married Robert (Bob) Harrower in July 1946 at Sharon United Church, after he returned from overseas where he had served in the Royal Canadian Air Force (R.C.A.F.) as a navigator during World War II. Hazel and Bob had met the very first Sunday Hazel was in Langley in 1937; they were introduced by Ron Cockett, who was the choir leader at church, and Hazel was in the choir. Before marriage, Hazel worked as a teacher for six years: three at County Line School, and three at Murrayville Elementary. She left teaching after her marriage. She and Bob continued to farm until 1957, when Bob began to work for the customs service. The couple had three children: Jim, Lillian, and Rob (d. 1981).
Term Source: Oral history interview with Hazel Harrower; Langley Advance article "Pioneer Mourned" May 15 1996; handwritten document, "Mrs. Robert Harrower," in Harrower family reference folder.