Eve Lazarus
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 grandeur of the second Hotel Vancouver or the presence of the Georgia Medical-Dental 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 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 you’re downtown and have a mascara emergency or need some aspirin, drop into the Shoppers Drug Mart at Granville and Dunsmuir.
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 Hotel.
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 featured and includes everything from scrapbooks from the Marco Polo, to postcards from Ming’s and Bamboo Terrace in the late ‘50s to souvenir photos from Mandarin Gardens and Forbidden City.
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 house’s murder history.
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.
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 Stanley Park.
