In 1922, ornithologist and naturalist Hamilton Mack Laing moved to Comox, having fallen in love with Vancouver Island during a scientific expedition the previous year. Laing, who counted ornithologists Percy Taverner and Allan Brooks among his friends, would become an influential voice in the nascent conservation movement over the next 50 years, with hundreds of articles published in almost every birding and nature magazine in North America. He purchased land along the shoreline of Comox Bay, built a house he called Baybrook, and established a 900-tree nut farm. When his wife died in 1950, he sold Baybrook and had a second house built, which he called Shakesides.