Every Place Has a Story

The Lost Scrapbooks from the Marco Polo

FacebookTwitterShare

In 2017, Tom Carter bought scrapbooks from the Marco Polo that were found in a Chinatown dumpster. The club closed in 1983. From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History

By Tom Carter

Tom Carter is an artist, a musician, a historian, and a private collector. He has kindly agreed to write a guest blog about one of his most exciting finds.

There are some “holy grails” out there in Vancouver entertainment history—stuff we fantasize about that still exists somewhere. I still can’t believe I landed one of the biggest of them—the owner’s scrapbooks from the Marco Polo!

The Marco Polo, a club deep within Chinatown, was one of Vancouver’s legendary nightclubs. In the ‘60s it was considered one of the “big three” along with The Cave on Hornby and Isy’s Supper Club on Georgia. While posters, cards and ephemera are pretty common from The Cave and Isy’s, the Marco Polo has long been shrouded in mystery.

Over the years there have been rumours of scrapbooks kept by Victor Louie, manager and one of the Louie brothers who owned the club. They had become a legend among collectors like Jason Vanderhill and Jim Wong-Chu who have been hunting them for years.

What we knew was that Victor Louie had loaned the scrapbooks to Jason Karman when he was researching a film about Harvey Lowe in the early 1990s. Lowe was a yo-yo champion, owner of the Smilin’ Buddha and  a staple of the Chinatown entertainment scene with connections to the Marco Polo.

After Karman returned the scrapbooks they  vanished!

Then, last year, they miraculously resurfaced when a dealer I know bought the scrapbooks from a picker who had pulled them out of the garbage behind a warehouse in Chinatown. (A “picker” is someone who combs through junk in alleys, dumpsters, etc. looking for things of value to sell to antique dealers).

The dealer told me he planned to dismantle the books and sell off the bits—effectively destroying their historical value.

Instead, I bought everything.

When I got the scrapbooks home, I discovered photos of musicians on stage and chorus girls. There were menus and handbills and all sorts of letters from clients. Harvey Lowe had produced and emceed the opening show, and I found his script. There was even a handwritten listing of every act that played the club from 1964 to 1968!

These scrapbooks form a more-or-less complete history of the Marco Polo from 1960 when the Louie’s took over the Forbidden City and renamed it, through to 1982 when the original Chinatown club closed and moved to North Vancouver.

Everything is now photographed, and with the assistance of BC PAMA  and the UBC School of Library Archival and Information Studies, the entire contents of the scrapbooks will eventually be online.

Tom Carter has been painting historical views of Vancouver for many years with artwork in prominent private and corporate collections. Tom serves on the boards of the BC Entertainment Hall of Fame, Friends of the Vancouver Archives and the Vancouver Historical Society. You can read more about his work in Vancouver Confidential “Nightclub Czars of Vancouver and the Death of Vaudeville.”

Courtesy Dan Brewster
FacebookTwitterShare

40 comments on “The Lost Scrapbooks from the Marco Polo”

I worked at CP Transport located at 44 W Pender. It was a short walk to the Marco Polo and the buffet was a favorite. Every time we ate the owner would give us a shot of scotch. My wife and I took our two year old there for diner. Were lucky the owner was patient as our screaming two year old drowned out the band. We didnt take him out to diner for many years after that evening. We still remember the Marco Polo as a high lite of working that close to China Town. The crab in black bean sauce was the best ever.

Amazing! Some of the names on the list of entertainers are of people who would later appear in or produce some epic 70’s TV sitcoms – Redd Foxx, Pat Morita, Gary Marshall.

I remember being taken to a Temptations concert at the Kerrisdale arena and then topping off the evening with Sam & Dave at the Marco Polo! Best date ever!

hey janet, we also saw sam & dave at the marco polo! i even managed to get their autograph 🙂
i also remember scrumptious lunches there when i worked for mitsubishi … thanks for the memories <3

My best friend is writing her memoir titled, Motown in My Life, and she wanted to know what year we were at the Marco Polo to see Sam and Dave. I can’t remember, maybe 1968? 1969? Can anybody help me?

Hi, Anna,
I saw your comment on Eve’s site. I want to say 1968. I graduated in ‘69 but don’t think it was that year. I know someone else who was there and can find out from her. My memory is not what it used to be. Lol.
Janet

What an incredibly cool find ! Thanks for sharing it ! I remember going to the Marco Polo for dinner with my Aunt when I was a kid in the late 50’s. It was a beautiful restaurant- but I wasn’t aware that it was also a nightclub !

WHAT A FIND!!! My parents, Harry & Mary Tuey were close friends with some of those names.
I just remember stories that they used to tell me when I was a child.

Wow! Never head of this piece of entertainment history, but I sure am envious as a fellow collector of Vancouver items. To think these scrapbooks were in the garbage.

And you would play for 2 weeks. 6 nights a weak.
Love it. I played there a couple of times.
I’d like to see the entertainment list for 69 and 70.

What a wonderful result, Tom! Congratulations to the picker first and to all those involved in preserving this piece of local history. I think the chorus girls get some credit too, for reminding us that heritage preservation is so much more than buildings and art objects.

The story of the almost loss reminds me of the African proverb that says when a old person dies, a library burns down.

This extends to relatives throwing out the memorabilia after a person dies.

I trust the internet will make it easier for thoughtful people to connect vulnerable ephemera with collectors and institutions.

I lived next door to Alex Louie who ran the Marco Polo with his brother Victor and have many fond stories about the club. I was a young guy just starting out in life and one of my visits to the Marco Polo was to see the wonderful singer Gigi Galon. Alex introduced me to her and we ended up going on a date. Then she was gone back to the US to chase her career.

I would love to run into her now and share a memory or two.

i saw sam and dave at the marco polo. was a fantastic show and i even got their autographs….as a matter of fact, still have them. ah, the memories of a fantastic era in chinatown 🙂

My mom’s first cousin was married to Victor Louie. When I was a child our family occasionally went to the Marco Polo for special family dinners or when out-of-town guests came to visit. Every time we went there my siblings and I asked to have the ‘smorgasbord’ food and were always told, ‘No, that’s for the loh fan’ (or white people). We always ate a wonderful variety of traditional Chinese dishes. The atmosphere was dark and had an exotic feel. I loved to go there and have very fond memories of those days gone by.

What a treasure! I played in the band there briefly when Jim Blackley led it, with Ralph Dyck. It was a great place to play but I couldn’t stay long. Finding and putting these records online is priceless! Thank you!

Thank you for sharing Eve and Tom. I visited Marco Polo many times as a child, because my father Bill Wong, was the sign writer who painted many of the show cards, as well as the big orange dragon on the Columbia St side of the restaurant. I remember seeing The Platters, The Mills Brothers, The Fifth Dimension. Dad would bring home stickers that said “Pat Paulsen for President”. One evening when my dad was painting, I remember him asking if the name “Ronstadt” was spelled correctly.

Jim Wong-Chu gave me a Marco Polo DVD he salvaged from the dumpster he wanted me to tell my in-depth knowledge of Marco Polo and that within this DVD of Marco Polo Jim Wong-Chu wanted to know. He would be delighted the pleasure of today’s as you all kindly posted herein of Marco Polo. See little insights I’ve wrote above of good fun time of all the various set-up for Banquets, Night Club, Cantonese Dinners, Buffett for the Caucasians and our ‘perfecto’ renowned Tangos, Quick Waltz, Samba, Rumba, Fox Trot, jive, twist, rock+ roll swirled the lovely dance floor throughout the decades!! Thanks zillions Jim Wong-Chu I’ll treasure your DVD of Marco Polo in happy memories of you & Marco Polo. Thanks zillions to All for the Memories, God Bless All Good Fortune Faye Leung 7, 28, 17
AND: posted reply in Facebook above & below in appreciations thanks zillions All.
The memories from the start of Marco Polo & of the Louies till Victor Louie seized control to the end from Chinese Banquets, Night Club joyful great time, to the Buffett for the Caucasians and the dinners too with great photos our many friends together happily greatest great time. Prior to Marco Polo took over the Chinese poem written on the mirror in white paint meaningfully I always remember and repeated enjoyment that were done by previous owner that Victor Louie left within as its “Right Time Walk About/In” the Samba I had with Victor Louie as dear husband Dean & I renowned ‘perfecto’ Tangos, Quick Waltz Rumba ballroom dancers jive to rock+ roll fox trots swirl lovingly dance over 43 years friends remembers admired respectfully good times Marco Polo, Golden Dragon, Roof at Hotel Vancouver etc. Vancouver Great Fun Times! God Bless Good Fortune Faye Leung 7, 28, 17 thanks zillions for the memories!!

Jim Wong-Chu gave me a Marco Polo DVD he salvaged from the dumpster he wanted me to tell my in-depth knowledge of Marco Polo and that within this DVD of Marco Polo Jim Wong-Chu wanted to know. He would be delighted the pleasure of today’s as you all kindly posted herein of Marco Polo. See little insights I’ve wrote above of good fun time of all the various set-up for Banquets, Night Club, Cantonese Dinners, Buffett for the Caucasians and our ‘perfecto’ renowned Tangos, Quick Waltz, Samba, Rumba, Fox Trot, jive, twist, rock+ roll swirled the lovely dance floor throughout the decades!! Thanks zillions Jim Wong-Chu I’ll treasure your DVD of Marco Polo in happy memories of you & Marco Polo. Thanks zillions to All for the Memories, God Bless All Good Fortune Faye Leung
AND: posted reply in Facebook above & below in appreciations
The memories from the start of Marco Polo & of the Louies till Victor Louie seized control to the end from Chinese Banquets, Night Club joyful great time, to the Buffett for the Caucasians and the dinners too with great photos our many friends together happily greatest great time. Prior to Marco Polo took over the Chinese poem written on the mirror in white paint meaningfully I always remember and repeated enjoyment that were done by previous owner that Victor Louie left within as its “Right Time Walk About/In” the Samba I had with Victor Louie as dear husband Dean & I renowned ‘perfecto’ Tangos, Quick Waltz Rumba ballroom dancers jive to rock+ roll fox trots swirl lovingly dance over 43 years friends remembers admired respectfully good times Marco Polo, Golden Dragon, Roof at Hotel Vancouver etc. Vancouver Great Fun Times! God Bless Good Fortune Faye Leung 7, 28, 17

Someone should do a “club” history of Vancouver. Lots of intrique in those Mad Men times. Hornby or horny street alone has many tales to tell before some die off and their memories lost. And a video montage to Petula Clarks Downtown, I Know a Place ect.

I first eat there as
A young teen
and later played
there in the mid to late 60s.
Billy Preston was a regular there for about 3
years.

My friends mothers band was called “Kay Marlow and the right approach” who played in the Big Suppers Club, Isys Club and Marco Polos Club and she opened for Chuck Berry and the Everly Brothers in the 1960s I believe 1964-68. We are trying to find a photo or article with her in it. Can anyone please help?

Through my treasure hunting I found a record album relating to the story the lost scrapbooks from the Marco Polo club. It is a album called Poco Loco with Joe Loco and would like to share the picture of the album if possible. It is autographed with Joe Loco. Here is exactly what it says

“To Joy and Lee two of the finest dancers at the Marco Polo Jan. 1965
Joe Loco”

Feel free to contact me

Thanks …Dan

My memories run deep. Bobby Hebb singing “Sunny” offstage and then appearing with a mic sauntering through the crowd to open his set was a show-biz thrill. Interviewing my musical hero Billy Preston for the radio show I hosted and produced – Canada’s first Black Music radio show “Groovin’ Blue” on CKLG-Fm. Being asked on-stage to sing “Stormy Monday Blues” by another hero – Joe Tex – and knowing he was standing at the side watching me sing with his great Texas R&B – Joe Tex band . Afterward he said to the Marco Polo audience, “That young man sounds just like Joe Cocker!” I was crushed. Ah, the performer’s ego . . . I didn’t want to sound like J. Cocker. I wanted to sound like Joe Tex! Being best man at the reception for Terry and Cindy Wong. And my own wedding reception. That’s where I was taught the trick by my father-in-law Henry Sung of pouring Tong Yen Cha (Chinese tea) into a glass and pretending it was Scotch to toast the many attending guests.
Thank you Louie Family. Thank you everyone who worked for them at the legendary Marco Polo.

Wow ! I saw the Platters at the Marco Polo in 1967 and what a show, all their hits. Plus later that year I saw the Fabulous Echoes who were a group from Japan and I eventually even obtained their one hit “Cry I Do” on a 45 RPM. They were incredible ! Started me off collecting records and I ended up with a huge collection. They also played at the Cave a little while after.

I do remember going on stage to dance with a friend at the Marco Polo in Summer 1974. We had free tickets to the show as we worked at Customs & Immigration at YVR. We processed the singing group (name?) I have forgotten.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.