Douglas Ian Cox attended the University of British Columbia, where he trained as a teacher. Joyce Cox was also trained as a teacher. Doug and Joyce Cox were married in England in the summer of 1973 and they now reside in Penticton, BC. Doug Cox's interest in British Columbia history was sparked while hunting in the mountains above the Tulameen Valley where he discovered the former townsite of Blakeburn, a coal mining town that was abandoned in the 1930s. After later moving to the Penticton area, Cox made connections with residents who had been raised in the area and who provided him with historical narratives. Doug Cox acquired custody of collected materials (or copies thereof) beginning in the 1970s while he was living on the road leading to Apex Mountain, near Penticton B.C. These collections consist of the documentation of Cox's career as an historian and author and are comprised predominantly of photographic material. These collections represent Doug Cox’s photographic collecting activity carried out in support of his writing. Points of origin are predominantly the southern interior of British Columbia. Contents depict a variety of scenes and settings, primarily concerning industry and infrastructure, family life, city scenes, and landscapes during the first half of the twentieth century. The photographs in BCRDH represent just a small part of Cox’s full research collection, which has been described in a comprehensive finding aid and is available for consultation in the Special Collections Reading Room.
