Loalinda anchored in Langlois Bay, Bowen Island
In
2005, Jan Stevens established her Bowen Island home as a popular waterfront
vacation rental, the Lazy
Bowen Hideaway. What began as a single property would
eventually grow into Bowen Island Accommodations—a thriving business built not
only on hospitality, but on unexpected connections and stories that seemed to
find their way to her door.
One of those stories arrived the following year, in the form of a conversation—and later, a painting—that would quietly link together families, properties, and a piece of Bowen Island history that had long been forgotten.
In 2006, while Jan was still working as an interior designer in Nevada—her other home turf—a sales rep named Lori Conway came to visit. Before long, their conversation turned to Bowen Island and the Lazy Bowen Hideaway.
Something about Bowen Island struck a chord with Lori. The name sounded familiar. Then she remembered why: her great-grandfather, Thomas Talton Langlois, had been a property developer on Bowen Island in the early 1900s, and he had owned a cottage there as well. She did not know exactly where on the island he had settled, but on her next visit she brought old Langlois family photos. Jan immediately recognized the names of these early settlers, many of which still live on in Bowen road names. Lori also shared a family story about her great-grandfather naming their bay, Langlois Bay where the family anchored their yacht, the Loalinda.
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| Thomas Talton Langlois 1867- 1937 |
During that same visit, history turned into mystery when Lori mentioned a painting hanging in her mother’s garage in New Mexico. Thomas had loved Bowen Island so much that he commissioned a local artist to paint a landscape of his waterfront property, which he called Langlois Bay. In the distance, the artist included Thomas’s yacht, the Loalinda. Lori did not know the artist’s name, and neither did her mother. But perhaps the landscape itself might reveal where Thomas had once settled on Bowen.
Upon
learning that Jan had a connection with Bowen Island, Lori’s mom gifted the
painting to her. Sight unseen, this piece of historic Bowen art was shipped
from New Mexico back home to Bowen. After opening the package, Jan found it to
be perfectly suited, and mounted it above her fireplace in the Lazy Bowen Hideaway. It was a
picture-perfect focal point to share with her guests.
Loalinda anchored in Langlois Bay hanging in the Lazy Bowen Hideaway
The painting soon raised two questions that only deepened Jan’s fascination.
First, who was the artist? The signature was too unclear to read. Second, why
was there no place on Bowen officially known as Langlois Bay?
Determined to solve at least part of the mystery, Jan and her son Akira spent a summer visiting waterfront viewpoints around the island, comparing each one to the painted scene. None matched. At last they began to wonder whether the artist had merged Bowen’s most beautiful features into a single imagined landscape.
Then, the following summer of 2008, the mystery took an unexpected turn. After returning to Bowen, Jan was invited to a party by her neighbors the Athertons. Still thinking about the painting viewpoint and its unknown artist, she mentioned her search to another guest at the party. The two of them walked next door to the Lazy Bowen Hideaway to study the painting more closely—and to Jan’s astonishment, he recognized the viewpoint immediately.
photo of Flower Island (center), Hutt Island (left) and Mount Brunswick in the background
The very next day, he rowed Jan to the spot, just north of the
Mount Gardner Road government dock. To her delight, the view matched the
painting: little Flower Island in the centre, Hutt Island to the left, and
Mount Brunswick rising in the distance. And when Jan turned back toward the
shoreline, she realized she had finally found it—the long-lost Langlois Bay of
Bowen Island.
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| Langlois Bay with Mt. Gardner in the distance. |
But one answer continued to elude her: who was the Bowen Island artist
that Thomas commissioned over one hundred years ago? She’d never been able to
decipher that signature.
At that time, unbeknownst to Jan, others were sleuthing the
name "Langlois" and stirred up yet another fortuitous connection. A
woman by the name of Linda Froese (sounds like rose) was researching her family
history and did an internet search for the Langlois surname. She came across a
blog post written by Jan about “A beautiful summer
vacation on Bowen.” In this post, Jan had written about her newly acquired painting
and that it had been commissioned by Thomas Langlois. As luck would have it, Thomas
was a cousin of Linda's grandmother, Alma!
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| Alma Morrison (Linda's Grandmother) |
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| Alma picking fruit on Bowen Island |
Linda
contacted Jan to ask whether the painting bore a signature. Even if it did not, she said, she had a strong hunch
about who the artist might
be—and even more information to share about the mystery of the
Langlois Bay painting.
As it turned out, Linda was related to Thomas and, of course, to Lori, who had first given Jan the remarkable painting. Jan introduced Linda, from northern British Columbia, to Lori, from Southern California, by email. It was one more reminder that the world can feel very small when a story is waiting to be completed.
Much storytelling followed. More Bowen Island history surfaced, and at last some light was cast on the secretive identity of the artist Thomas had commissioned to paint his view of Langlois Bay.
Linda’s grandmother, Alma, had grown up on Bowen after moving there from Detroit. Thomas, Alma’s cousin, was raised in her household. Both of them had been friends with Mack Eastman from their childhood in Detroit, and he later visited Alma’s family on the island. Mack married Antonia Larribe Eastman, a painter trained in Paris. Could Antonia Eastman be the artist who painted the Loalinda in Langlois Bay?
Linda also mentioned that Mack’s grandson, Charles McNeill, owned property on Bowen—and wondered whether it might be the same waterfront once associated with Langlois Bay. Jan called Charles in New York to introduce herself and to share the remarkable synchronicities surrounding the painting, her connection with Linda Froese, and the possibility that Charles’s grandmother might be the artist. Was Charles the final link in solving the mystery? In the spring of 2013 Jan, Linda, and Charles met on Bowen and were delighted to discover just how closely their stories were intertwined, all because of one painting of the Loalinda in Langlois Bay.
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| Charles Ian McNeill, grandson of Mack Eastman. |
That
first meeting over the
Loalinda painting became the catalyst for a lasting connection. Jan and
Charles quickly developed a wonderful manager-homeowner
relationship that flourished for more than 13 years, with Jan
managing the beautiful vacation rentals on his family’s historic property. The
Eastman properties were likely part of the land holdings sold by Thomas T.
Langlois, though the location itself lies a few lots south of
Langlois Bay, on the other side of the Mount Gardner dock. The painting had already reunited
people, places, and family history—but one mystery still remained.
In the winter of 2022, history revealed its last secret. The theory about Antonia was eventually set aside, thanks to one final and unexpected connection. Jan’s path crossed with Gail Daldy, granddaughter of another prolific Bowen Island artist. When they compared the painting’s distinctive style—especially in the way the trees were rendered—to his other known works, the answer finally came into focus.
More than a century after Thomas commissioned the scene, the mystery was solved: the Langlois Bay painting had been created by Hans Lehr.
What began as a single painting had done far more than reveal its artist. It had brought together families across generations, uncovered a long-forgotten place on Bowen Island, and helped forge relationships that became part of the foundation of Jan’s growing business. Just as the story had quietly arrived at her door, it had also reshaped what lay behind it—reminding her that the most meaningful connections are often the ones you never see coming.
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