The area was settled in 1888 when Arthur Wilson bought 16 hectares of land and began the Cedar Cottage Nursery on corner Knight and Westminster Highway (Kingsway). A few years later, some settlers began to buy large tracts of land in the area for farming. These farmlands were mostly located around Trout Lake. But the boom started sometime in 1891 when an interurban link was built to link Vancouver with New Westminster that opened up the Kensington - Cedar Cottage area. The new link drew merchants to the area opening shops around tram stop.
In 1894, a bank and a schoolhouse were opened on 20 th Avenue between Clark Drive and Inverness Street. By then, Kensington move forward as a small independent village with post office, stores and a two-storey school house mushroomed on blocks of Commercial Drive. The school house Lord Selkirk still stands today in the same area where it was constructed.
At the start of WW I, Cedar Cottage another image began to shape up in the area. Wooden houses started to line along the streets and factories began full steam. Workers spent as much as 10 hours a day in factories as the number of factories grew in Cedar Cottage. Among these were Marston s Sash and Door, Fletcher s Meats, Bader s Biscuits to name a few.
