Vancouver History

In 1957, the PNE prize home, at 1,444 square feet, was one and a half times the size of a normal house.  Story from: Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the city’s hidden history 1957: In 1957, things were a lot less complicated. People went out to movies and drank Nescafe in the kitchen. The prize home,… Continue reading The PNE Prize Home: Party Like it’s 1957!

The first PNE was in 1910, and, not surprising, a lot of things have changed since then. Some things will be missed and others not so much. Here are 10 things you won’t be seeing this year. From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History 1. A brill trolley bus Unless it’s taken out… Continue reading Ten Things You Won’t See at the PNE This Year

It’s been over seven decades, but I’m confident that the mystery of who blew up one of the courthouse lions in 1942 has now been solved. No one will be charged for this crime, but it’s thanks to a reader—we’ll call him Dave. It was his grandfather who made a bang loud enough that Vancouverites… Continue reading The Man who Blew up the Courthouse Lion

On August 2, 1970 three people died when Russian freighter Sergey Yesenin collided with BC ferry the Queen of Victoria in Active Pass. The freighter’s steel bow sliced through the ferry almost cutting it in half. From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History Active Pass: One of the highlights of taking a BC… Continue reading Russian Freighter Collides with BC Ferry

Looking at the outside of the plain two-storey building at Victoria Drive and Truimph Street, you’d never guess that Fraser Wilson’s  mural runs the full length of a 25-metre wall. The building is the home of the Maritime Labour Centre, and Fraser Wilson painted the mural in 1947. Story from Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the… Continue reading Fraser Wilson and the (mostly) Working Man’s Mural

The name of the 11-acre green space at the entrance to Stanley Park known as Devonian Harbour Park has nothing to do with its indigenous history, the land’s connection to the Kanakas, the buildings that once dotted its landscape or Vancouver. The park was named after the Calgary-based Devonian Group of Charitable Foundations which forked… Continue reading The Evolution of Devonian Harbour Park

The Ironworkers Memorial Bridge collapsed June 17, 1958 killing 18 men, and one diver the following day. It is the worst industrial accident in Vancouver’s history. Thanks to Bruce Stewart for sending photos that his father Angus shot of the tragedy. June 17, 2025: There is a memorial service today at 1:00 pm at New… Continue reading The Day the Bridge Fell Down

Harry Jerome and Percy Williams were two of the most remarkable sprinters in Vancouver’s history. This story is from Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History Former Province sports reporter Brian Pound tells me that the first time the two officially met was at a photo shoot that he had set up at a… Continue reading When Harry met Percy

The friendship between Bruce Stewart and Fred Herzog began because of a mutual love of photography and went onto span half-a-century. Bruce Stewart has been documenting Vancouver ever since his father gave him a reflex camera for his eleventh birthday. A few years later, he started an after-school job at the Department of Biomedical Communications… Continue reading Walks with Fred Herzog

Update: In February 2022 it was announced that the Wing Sang Building at 51 East Pender Street and reportedly the oldest in Chinatown, is going to be the new home of the Chinese Canadian Museum. Story from Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History  In 2006, I wrote a story for Marketing Magazine featuring… Continue reading Wing Sang Building

Boot Hill, BC Penitentiary’s cemetery in New Westminster, holds dozens of unnamed graves of burials between 1913 and 1968. In last week’s blog, I wrote about my visit to New Westminster to see the buildings that once formed part of BC Penitentiary, a federal prison that operated from 1878 to 1980. The most interesting part… Continue reading Boot Hill: New Westminster’s Strangest Cemetery

Jail for Sale: In a real estate crazed city like Vancouver where a heritage house can sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars over its list price, turns out it’s just not that easy to sell an old jail. Realtor Leonardo di Francesco has had parts of the former BC Penitentiary on the market since… Continue reading Jail for Sale

From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History The Stuart Building was a landmark that sat at the southeast corner of Georgia and Chilco Streets, marking the border between the city and Stanley Park from 1909 until its demise in 1982. Painted Sky Blue: It didn’t have the elegance of the Birks Building, the… Continue reading Our Missing Heritage: The Stuart Building

The first CPR station sat at the foot of Howe Street and operated between 1887 and 1914. The First Transcontinental Train: The first transcontinental train arrived in Vancouver on May 23, 1887. Businesses closed for the afternoon, city council adjourned, the city band and fire brigade led a parade of hundreds to the station. The… Continue reading How the First CPR Station became William Alberts House

The Imperial Bank of Canada opened its new building on April 21, 1958 at Granville and Dunsmuir Streets. It featured this stunning mural by BC Binning. The building is now occupied by a Shoppers Drug Mart, but the mural is still there. From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History The Mural: Next time… Continue reading BC Binning’s Secret Mural

The Devonshire Hotel on West Georgia was demolished July 5, 1981 to make way for the head office tower of the Bank of BC. Story from Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History Devonshire Apartment Hotel: The Devonshire originally opened as an apartment building, but within a few years was operating as the Devonshire… Continue reading The Devonshire (1924-1981)

I had the pleasure of visiting Griffin Art Projects with Tom Carter last Saturday. It’s a gallery of sorts hidden in an industrial building on Welch Street in North Vancouver. The exhibit features stories, photos, videos and paintings about Chinatowns in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, many from private collections. Some of Tom’s personal collection is… Continue reading Whose Chinatown?

You wouldn’t buy a house without having a building inspector check the foundation, so why wouldn’t you research your potential home’s history? A heritage house at Fraser and East 10th went up for sale last week for $1.4 million. It wasn’t the price-tag though (low by Vancouver standards) that captured people’s attention, it was the… Continue reading Would you buy a murder house?

The Imperial Roller Skating Rink opened in 1907 at English Bay and boasted the largest skating floor in North America. Morton Park: In 1907, more than 100 years before the famous laughing statues appeared at English Bay, the Imperial Roller Skating Rink opened in Morton Park at Denman and Davie Streets. Roller skating was surging… Continue reading The Imperial Roller Skating Rink and Other Missing Structures of Beach Avenue

Mountain View Cemetery may have been Vancouver’s first official cemetery when it opened in 1886, but Stanley Park was first. Bodies had been buried on Deadman’s Island in Coal Harbour for thousands of years, and those who didn’t want their relatives interred  alongside the socially undesirable, the diseased or unchristened, moved their burials further into… Continue reading The Lost Cemetery of Stanley Park