Every Place Has a Story

The Trend House – North Vancouver

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See the story about Victoria’s Trend House 

The Trend House at 4342 Skyline Drive in North Vancouver has just sold for $1,375,000.

The house was one of 11 built in 1954 for Ted and Cora Backer, designed by Porter & Davidson Architects, and sponsored by BC forest industries to boost retail lumber, plywood and shingle sales in the province.

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SS Greenhill Park: A Vancouver Tragedy

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Just before noon on March 6, 1945, the SS Greenhill Park blew up, killing six longshoremen and two seamen. Twenty-six others, including seven firefighters were injured in the explosion.

On March 6, 1945, nearly 100 men were either loading or getting the SS Greenhill Park ready for its voyage to Australia from CPR’s Pier B-C (now Canada Place).

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The First Vancouver Art Gallery

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Before the Vancouver Art Gallery moved into the old courthouse on West Georgia, its home was a gorgeous art deco building a few blocks away. 

If you live in Vancouver, you know that the Vancouver Art Gallery is housed in the old law courts, an imposing neo-classical building designed by celebrity architect Francis Rattenbury in 1906.

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Here & Gone: Vancouver’s Corner Stores

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Michael Kluckner’s latest BC bestseller Here & Gone: Artwork of Vancouver & Beyond is gorgeous. One half is filled with his paintings of disappearing Vancouver (Here) and the other of his travels in countries such as Australia, Cuba, Mexico and Japan (Gone).

Missing Heritage:

In the introduction to Here, he writes: “I see myself as a witness, certainly not an activist anymore or a serious historian.” I served on the board of the Vancouver Historical Society with Michael for several years and I see him as all these things.

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When Fact Meets Fiction: Sam Wiebe’s Vancouver

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Sam Wiebe is the award-winning author of the Wakeland novels, a detective series set in Vancouver that includes Invisible Dead and Hell and Gone.

“When poet-turned-screenwriter Paul Ling goes missing, his teenage daughter hires Vancouver P.I. Dave Wakeland to track him down. To the shock of his family and colleagues, Ling’s body is found within days in the home of a stranger, killed by a drug overdose—and Wakeland suspects foul play.

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Frank Gowen’s Vancouver

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Frank Gowen was born in England in 1877. He moved to Vancouver in 1913 and worked as a photographer until his death in 1946.

Chris Stiles kindly sent me this fabulous panoramic photo that she and husband Alan found when they were going through some personal effects of Alan’s father recently.

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Top 10 Vancouver History Blogs of 2019

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It’s been a couple of years since I’ve done a roundup of my favourite history blogs. To make the list, the blog had to be written by an individual, come out fairly regularly and have a strong Vancouver flavour.

In alphabetical order:

1. Changing Vancouver 

John Atkin and Andy Coupland started the blog just after their book of the same name was published in 2010.

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The Vancouver Heritage House Tour, Alvo von Alvensleben and the Old Residence

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The Vancouver Heritage House tour is coming up Sunday June 2, and I haven’t been this excited since Casa Mia was featured in 2014. Don’t get me wrong, the VHF works hard all year to curate a great mix of architectural styles, neighbourhoods and house sizes, but unless you work at, or have a daughter at Crofton House School, you likely won’t get inside the Old Residence.

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