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David Moss Coulter was born in 1862 in Perth County, Ontario. He married Elizabeth "Lizzie" Burton in 1885. She was born in 1865. The Coulters had six children. In 1897, David Coulter went west to Fort Langley and bought a store. Lizzie Coulter came out later that year with her four young children, by rail. The family lived behind the store, on the south-east corner of Glover Road and Mavis Street, before building this house to the south of the store on Glover Road in about 1898.

David Moss Coulter was born in 1862 in Perth County, Ontario. He went to school where he trained to become a teacher. He taught school in Ontario for 15 years. He married Elizabeth "Lizzie" Burton in Ontario in 1885. The Coulters had six children: William (b.1889), Agatha (b. 1891), Ruby (b. 1893), Enid (b. 1896), Alice (b. 1899), and Bertha (b. 1903). In June of 1897 David went west, intending to go to the Yukon after stopping in Fort Langley to visit friends. His friends sold him their store, and he stayed in Fort Langley. Lizzie Coulter came out in August of that year with her four young children, by rail. David convinced his friend John Walter Berry to move to Fort Langley and help him run the store. The pair operated two stores, one in Fort Langley (managed by Coulter) and one in Murrayville (managed by Berry). Their original Fort Langley store was in the old Hudson's Bay Company Store, north of what is now Mavis Street on the east side of Glover Road. A new location was later built on the south-east corner of Mavis and Glover in about 1900. He sold the store in 1923, and it was destroyed by fire years later. David was a government liquor vendor in 1929, and a member of the Eureka Lodge. The Coulter family was also very involved in St. Andrews Church. David Coulter died in a car accident in 1935 at the age of 73.
See Also: Coulter & Berry Store

James Hossack emigrated from Cromarty, Scotland. He worked as a CPR bridge foreman in the days when the transcontinental rail was being laid across western Canada. Mr. Hossack came to Fort Langley B.C. in the early 1880’s where he purchased land from the Kenneth Morrison family and began constructing Hossack Mill. The 1887 B.C. directories list Hossack as a miller, and he continues to be listed as a grist mill proprietor and flour and feed merchant in 1912. After getting the grist mill in operation, James Hossack bought a farm on Telegraph Trail. But in 1887, he sold the farm to Alexander Mavis. This farm was later known as the Rawlison Farm.

James Hossack returned to Scotland before 1914, leaving the Hossack Mill business to his nephews.

John Maxwell was born on January 6, 1836 (38?) in Ireland. When he was 10, his family left Ireland and came to Canada, where they settled along the Gatineau River in Quebec. He worked on logs jams there until the family moved to B.C. when John was 20 years old. It was shortly after this (in about 1862) that John Maxwell and his cousin James Reid caught the gold rush fever and headed to the Cariboo. Maxwell became sick, and Reid went with him on a journey to a hospital in New Westminster. Along the way, the pair almost starved to death, and even had to resort to eating their dogs. Following this adventure, John headed back east for a number of years, returning to B.C. in about 1870-71 to pre-empt 400 acres southeast of Fort Langley, B.C. He was one of the original petitioners to have Langley incorporated as a municipality in 1872, and was one of its first councillors. Heading back to Ontario again, Maxwell married Elizabeth Carmen in July 1874; they lived in Ontario for a time. The family returned to Langley, and John quickly re-involved himself in community affairs. He was the reeve in Langley from 1878-1879, 1884-1889, and 1890-1891. By 1894, John and Elizabeth had 10 children. A story recorded in "The Langley Story Illustrated" by Donald E. Waite states that James Murray Johnston and Maxwell got into a fight about taxed on their land at a council meeting. Getting angry, Maxwell offered to switch properties with the man, and Johnston, out of anger, agreed. The two switched properties, but the deal ended poorly for them both. John Maxwell died March 11, 1915 in Milner at the age of 79, and is buried in the Fort Langley Cemetery.

James Gordon McAdam was the son of William McAdam. A native of Scotland, he had farmed in Ontario before commencing farming in west Langley, B.C., in 1875. He bought a portion of the Muench farm along the Fraser River, which initially became known as McAdam's Landing and later as Grant's Landing. He became Reeve of Langley in 1884 before moving to Surrey.
Term Source: HPC Records (MCADJ-1/421), Fort Langley Cemetery pg. 34 (Hannay)