The Knight Street Bridge photo essay is the second in a three-part series by Angus McIntyre. The photos were taken on Angus’s Konica Autoreflex T Camera.
December 31, 1972 was an unseasonably warm Sunday and Angus McIntyre jumped on his bike and headed to the Fraser River. He spent the day documenting the construction of the Knight Street Bridge and the Arthur Laing Bridge – the two Fraser river crossings that would replace the Fraser Street swing span bridge from Vancouver to Mitchell Island and the fixed trestle bridge to Lulu Island.
By Angus McIntyre
The approach to the south span of the Knight Street bridge from Lulu Island (Richmond) looking north. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972
Construction on the Knight Street Bridge started in 1969. It was the second cantilever bridge in North America to use cast-in-place segments.
Looking north on the bridge deck towards Mitchell Island. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972View from the bridge deck shows the trestle bridge from Mitchell (Twigg) Island to Lulu Island, with the Oak Street Bridge in the distance to the right. This trestle bridge was hit by a barge in 1966. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972Approach to Mitchell Island looking north. The south span is four lanes wide. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972View from the end of the south span arriving on Mitchell Island. North span construction visible. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972The six-lane north span of the bridge from Mitchell Island to Vancouver. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972Looking west from the north span of the Knight Street Bridge downstream towards the Fraser Street swing span bridge. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972Knight and E. 63rd Avenue – the calm before the storm. Angus McIntyre photo, December 31, 1972The Knight Street Bridge was closed for 48 hours when a crane on a barge hit the underside of the bridge. Province photo, January 16, 2000.
The Fraser Street Swing Span Bridge was built in 1894 and linked what’s now Fraser Street with No. 5 Road, Richmond. It was demolished in 1974 after completion of the Knight Street Bridge. This is part one of a three-part series about crossing the Fraser River in 1972 by Angus McIntyre
On December 31, 1972, Angus McIntyre, 25 was living at the Fairmont Apartments at 10th Avenue and Spruce Street. The last day of the year was a mild one, and Angus packed up his Konica Autoreflex T camera, jumped on his 10-speed and headed south. Lucky for us, he had decided to spend the day on a bridge tour—taking photos of the Fraser Street Swing Span Bridge, the Knight Street bridge and the Arthur Laing bridge, both which were under construction.
Angus McIntyre at the book launch for Cold Case BC. Scott Alexander photo, November, 2022
Story, photos and captions by Angus McIntyre, who is now 75, still cycling and still taking photos.
Two Bridges:
“If you were a motorist in Vancouver 50 years ago, there were two bridges that you could cross to get to Lulu Island and Richmond – the Oak Street Bridge and the Fraser Street Swing Span,” says Angus. “There were no other bridges until you reached the Queensborough Bridge, although two new ones were under construction.”
Looking south on Fraser Street at N. Kent Street, just south of Marine Drive. The swing span is in the distance. Angus McIntyre photo, 1972
The speed limit sign says 20 miles-per-hour (about 30 km)
Photo shows the final approach to the Fraser Street swing span bridge from Vancouver. Angus McIntyre photo, 1972
There was just room enough on the bridge for two cars to pass. “The bridge was not wide enough for trucks and buses to enter at the same time as automobiles,” says Angus. “Without any signs warning about this, everyone knew that a truck or a bus had the right of way and opposing traffic would wait until the truck exited the span.”
Looking north from south end of the swing span. Angus McIntyre photo, 1972
“The swing span bounced up and down with heavy vehicles,” says Angus. “If it jammed open in the rush hour, the traffic on Oak Street backed up to 41st Avenue.”
The truck driver has taken the right of way using both lanes. Angus McIntyre photo, 1972
Built in 1894:
The Fraser Street swing span bridge was built in 1894 and lengthened in 1905. Terry Slack grew up on a houseboat at Wreck Beach in the 1950s, and worked with tugs, fishing and boatbuilding on the Fraser. He told Angus: “Tug boats called the channel ‘Shooting the Gap’ in the North Arm and many a tow boat skipper just called it a day, after knocking out one or both of the swing bridges and scaring the hell out of the bridge tenders!”
A bridge tender had a very dangerous job. The crow nest shack was on the opening and closing swing span of the bridge, says Terry. “Making the swing for marine traffic and being stranded in the middle of the channel, praying for the tug and barge to change course, was sometimes a daily happening.”
Looking north from Twigg/Mitchell Island. Angus McIntyre photo, 1972
Once on Mitchell Island you had to cross a fixed wood trestle bridge to get to Richmond. There were no street lights. If you’d like a sense of what this was like, take a drive out to the Reifel Bird Sanctuary on Westham Island and you’ll cross a single lane swing span wood trestle bridge.
The trestle bridge to Mitchell Island. Angus McIntyre photo, 1972
Barge Smashes into Bridge:
With shades of the English Bay barge mishap last November, on July 23, 1966 a barge struck the centre span of the Fraser bridge punching out a 150-foot section. Six teenage boys who were cycling across the bridge to pick strawberries in Richmond, were thrown into the water and rescued by a tug crew. George Symonds, 27 of North Burnaby was driving his truck across the bridge when he was thrown into the swift flowing river. He survived by smashing his fist through a side window and swimming to the surface.
Vancouver Sun, June 23, 1966
Note: I was confused when I searched for information on the swing span bridge and came across the Fraser River Bridge. Angus tells me that this bridge was built for road and rail traffic in 1904, connecting New Westminster with Surrey. It was decommissioned as a road bridge when the Patullo Bridge opened in 1937, but still exists for rail. Road trip!
To be continued with Part 2: Knight Street Bridge and Part 3: the Arthur Laing Bridge.
The first thing you notice about Sandon is that the buildings face Carpenter Creek. That’s because in the late 1800s, the town decided to contain the creek in a flume. When the town was rebuilt after a fire in 1900, the creek was boarded over and turned into the main street. Eve Lazarus photo
Thought I’d take a break from my summer break to write up this post about Sandon, a super interesting town in the Kootenays. We dropped by there last week on our way to Nelson because I’d heard it was a ghost town and a graveyard for Vancouver’s Brill Trolley buses. We arrived there via a 10 km dirt road that runs off Highway 31A between New Denver and Kaslo.
Sandon in the 1890s
Ghost Town:
Sandon is much more than a ghost town and its history is staggering. A century and a couple of decades ago, the Slocan silver rush brought people from all over Canada, California, Colorado, Oregon and Idaho. By the late 1890s, Sandon had 29 pubs, banks, three churches, a major redlight district, a soft drink factory, three breweries, a cigar manufacturer, three sawmills, two newspapers, a bowling alley, a bookstore and an opera house. It also had the most advanced electric light system in North America.
CPR steam engine meets Vancouver Brill Trolley Bus at Sandon. Eve Lazarus photo.
Hal Wright:
We crossed the little bridge over the creek and bumped into Hal Wright who was walking up the road schlepping a ladder. Lucky for us because Hal owns most of the town. He is also an authority on the history of the place—his family settled there in the booming 1890s, and he has lived there since 1972 when he co-founded the Sandon Museum with the help of a government grant at age 16.
Eve Lazarus photo, 2022
As well as owning a chunk of Sandon land, the 1900 City hall and a steam train, Hal also owns the power station. In 2001, he rescued 13 Brills from the scrapyard, and used his long-haul trucking company to bring them up to Sandon for restoration. The goal, he says, is to put them back into service, probably in Vancouver since that’s the only city in Canada left that still runs electric buses.
Hal Wright, Eve Lazarus and Brill 2289. Hal rescued the Brills from a scrapyard in 2001 and brought them to Sandon for restoration. The Brills operated in Vancouver until 1984 when they were retired prior to Expo. July 2022During his 40-year career as a Vancouver bus driver, my friend Angus McIntyre drove many of these buses – including 2289 shown here and in the previous photo. Angus McIntyre photo, taken at the end of the Nanaimo route at Slocan and Kingsway in 1983
Japanese Internment:
Over the years, Sandon has been besieged by avalanches, floods and fires. In 1900, a fire destroyed most of the business section of the town. Silver prices tanked and mines folded after WW1. Then when things looked bleakest and population declined to around 100 in 1942, Sandon became an internment camp for close to 1,000 Japanese/Canadians. They fixed up abandoned buildings and revived the town. After they left in 1945 the population dropped to 30. Ten years later a flood finished off the lower part of Sandon. Today the population is five.
The 1916 Silversmith powerhouse provided electricity for the mine. It’s fully functioning and Hal sells power to BC Hydro. Eve Lazarus photoPowered by a 1905 Westinghouse generator. Eve Lazarus photo
Sandon has a museum, a gift shop and a food truck also owned by Hal, which sees more than 60,000 visitors every year. We saw more tourists in Sandon then we did wandering around many other fully functioning small towns. And, a mine is once again operating in the area. Apparently galena (made up of 20% silver, 60% lead and 20% zinc) is making a come back, and so it seems is Sandon.
Our travels that day took us from Vernon, across Arrow Lake by a delightful free ferry, through little towns such as Nakusp and New Denver and included a detour to Sandon and onto Nelson via Kaslo – about 400 kms
Long before the Vancouver Film School occupied the building at East Pender and Columbia Streets, there was a railway station that was later repurposed into the legendary Marco Polo restaurant.
The sign stayed on the building until it was demolished in 1983. Angus McIntyre photo, 1979
Train Station:
If you’re walking around Chinatown, you’ll likely notice the four-storey brick building at the corner of East Pender and Columbia Streets, now home to the Vancouver Film School. But if you were to take a stroll down the 100 block of East Pender in the early years of the 20th Century, you would actually be on busy Dupont Street and you’d find visitors from the U.S. disembarking at the Vancouver, Westminster and Yukon Rail depot.
VWYR depot on Dupont Street (now east Pender Street) in 1915. Vancouver Archives
Several hundred people came to see the first fast train leave for Seattle on March 20, 1905 and cross the new trestle bridge that connected the north and south sides of False Creek. The last train left on May 31, 1917 and the building turned into the Hu Ye Restaurant and later the Forbidden City. The last and most famous tenant was the Marco Polo Restaurant.
The VW&YR depot on Dupont Street (now East Pender) ca.1915. Tom Carter collection
The Ghost Sign:
Before the building could be destroyed in 1983, heritage advocate Arthur Irving made a deal with the demolition crew and pried 88 bricks off the wall that still had the original railway sign VW&Y To Trains printed in black letters. He had the bricks mounted in a box to preserve them, and in doing so, saved one of the few pieces that remain of the Vancouver Westminster and Yukon Railway that operated between 1904 and 1908.
Tom Carter and Arthur Irving with the vintage railway sign in 2012. Andrew Martin photo
After Arthur died in 2018, Tom was helping to clear out his house when he came across the sign and the blueprints for the Great Northern Station built in 1919. “We found them in Arthur’s basement, in a bathtub salvaged from the 1916 Hotel Vancouver,” says Tom.
The Marco Polo occupied 90 East Pender Street for decades before moving to North Van in 1982. Tom Carter collection
The brick sign and the blueprints are with the West Coast Railway Association in Squamish. The bathtub is in Arthur’s next-door neighbour’s garden.
Goad’s Map of 1912 showing the train depot. With thanks to Tom Carter
There is a fake house in Burnaby that has fooled even some of its closest neighbours since 1967. Rumours have spread that it’s everything from a government safe house to an animal crematorium, but the truth is far more interesting.
South portal of the Thornton Tunnel. Angus McIntyre photo, 1975
The Fake House:
The house is actually a huge ventilation shaft that’s hidden in plain sight. It is set in a nicely landscaped garden, and sits about 45 metres above the CN tracks at the midpoint of the Thornton Tunnel. Instead of a kitchen and dining room, ventilation machines and very big fans operating inside. The tip-off is the metal “keep out” wrought-iron fence, the absence of windows and the concrete barriers where a front porch would typically be.
CN’s fake Burnaby house at the corner of Frances Street and Ingleton Avenue. Eve Lazarus photo, 2020
The Tunnel:
The Thornton Tunnel took CN two years to build. It opened in 1968. The tunnel is 3.4 kilometres long and runs from the south end of the Ironworkers Memorial Bridge, under Burnaby and comes out at Dawson Street behind some warehouses.
Larry Lundgren was a switchman for CN from 1967 to 1972 and frequently found himself stuck at the wrong end of the train after a 10 to 15 minute ride through the tunnel. “As sure as heck a ship would come along and the bridge span would be lifted and you’d be sitting in the caboose just gasping,” said Larry.
Entrance to Thornton Tunnel, built in 1968. Eve Lazarus photo, 2020
The Bridge:
Then, as now, marine traffic has the right-of-way and the wait could be up to 40 minutes for a train wanting to cross Burrard Inlet. Larry says when he worked for the railway it wouldn’t be unusual to take an 80-car coal train through the tunnel with a crew of four—two in the front and two in the back. “It was pretty hazardous because the engine is spewing stuff and there is only so much the fan could take out of there,” he says.
Nowadays, there are two crew members per train and they sit in the front. It takes up to 20 minutes to clear the exhaust so that there’s enough air for the occupants of the next train. That limits use of the tunnel to about two trains an hour. People who live above the tunnel tell me that you can hear a “clickety-clack” or a “banging” sound and feel the vibrations when the trains go through.
Southern portal of Thornton Tunnel, below Dawson Street. Eve Lazarus photo, 2020
At 2:00 pm on Sunday March 24, 1974, a group of about a 100 people, many of them students and professors from the UBC School of Architecture, came together in a mock funeral for the Birks Building, an eleven storey Edwardian masterpiece at Georgia and Granville with a terracotta façade and a curved front corner.
Angus McIntyre climbed up on the bed of a dump truck to capture this photo of protestors outside the Birks Building in 1974
Program for the memorial service, courtesy Angus McIntyre
And the band played:
They marched from the old Vancouver Art Gallery at Georgia and Thurlow, led by a police escort and accompanied by a New Orleans funeral band playing a sombre dirge. The mourners assembled under the “meet me at the Birk’s clock,” an ornate iron timepiece that stood more than 20 feet tall and for decades had been a local landmark and familiar meeting place. For generations of Vancouverites, “Meet you at the Birks clock” was a common phrase.
The stunning Interior of the Birks Building. Angus McIntyre photo, 1974
An act of architectural vanalism:
On this day, it was too late to stop the demolition—it had already begun—but not too late to protest what author and artist Michael Kluckner and others have called an egregious act of architectural vandalism.
The crew working on the new building across the road shut off the air compressors and laid down their tools. Reverend Jack Kent, chaplain of the Vancouver Mariners Club officiated. He was accompanied by a choir.
“North Van bus on West Georgia Street is visible through the window. Conductor is standing on two Canada Dry wood boxes. It was the era of checks and flared pants,” Angus McIntyre, 1974
Angus McIntyre then 26, grabbed his Konica Autoreflex T2 35mm camera and rode his bike downtown to record the event.
Ceremony:
“There was a Gathering, a Sharing of Ideas, a Choir performance and a Laying of the Wreaths,” Angus told me. “A small group of people wearing recycled videotape clothing put hexes on new buildings nearby. As soon as it came time to return to the Art Gallery, the band switched to Dixieland jazz, and the mood became slightly more upbeat.”
Some protestors wore Video Armour crocheted out of used videotapes by Evelyn Roth. Angus McIntyre photo, 1974
And just like that, the beautiful old Birks Building—well not that old really—only 61 in 1974—was killed off to make way for the Scotia Tower and Vancouver Centre mall.
For a long time after the funeral, this R.I.P. banner hung in a second storey office window at the Sam Kee building on Pender Street. Angus McIntyre photo, 1974
The only positive thing to come out of the loss of this much-loved building was that it mobilized the heritage preservation community in Vancouver and saved many of our other fine old buildings such as the Orpheum Theatre, Hudson’s Bay, Waterfront Station, the Hotel Vancouver and the Marine Building—from a similar fate.
Inside Birks Building and the model of the Scotia Tower that will replace it. Angus McIntyre photo, 1974
When I think of street photographers, the first names that usually spring to mind are Fred Herzog, Foncie Pullice, Greg Girard, Michael de Courcy, Curt Lang and Bruce Stewart. But there were so many other great photographers shooting Vancouver in the 1950s to 1980s—names like Paul Wong, Tony Westman, Angus McIntyre and Svend-Erik Eriksen (Where were the women?)
These days everybody has a cell phone, and while you might think that makes street photographers irrelevant, there’s a group called Vancouver Street Photography Collective that are doing some really interesting things.
I’d been following some of their work on Instagram and went to their first exhibition last September.
Trevor Wide, Chris McCann and Stuart Weir are the co-founders behind a Facebook and Instagram page that features the Collective’s works. In his day job, Trevor is a visual effects artist for the movies, and photography he says, is a nice way to get outside his room and work outside the lines.
Street photographers hashtag vanspc in their post and the best photos of the week are highlighted on the Instagram account. “We started getting more followers and we noticed that people were connecting with each other on Instagram chat and giving critique and something was happening,” he says. “The Exhibition was our catalyst to get us out there and get known and bring together a whole world of street photographers from Vancouver and beyond.”
The members are a multi-cultural group that range from a 14-year-old to people in their 70s and they are all in different stages of their photography.
“We’ve got junior amateur photographers to professional photographers, everybody is helping each other out,” says Trevor. “We’re just good friends, sharing our art and our love for Vancouver.”
“There are a lot of different interpretations, but in general it’s being able to capture a decisive moment—capturing humanity or what humanity has touched or left behind. It could be anything from architecture to people in public spaces to candid street portraits,” says Trevor. “Camera gear doesn’t matter—you could have an iPhone. You’ve got no lights, no tripod, you are just using the world around you to get your shot and there’s something exhilarating about going out there and not knowing what you are going to take and just trying to capture that moment or that mood.”
To step it up to the next level, Trevor says the Collective plans to publish a magazine this year. “There are a lot of people interested. It’s a good way to get people to physically look and touch our work because it’s a lot different when you see a print rather than a photo through the small screen on your phone.”
Angus McIntyre was reading Murder by Milkshake when he stopped and took a closer look at a photo snapped by the Vancouver Sun’s Dan Scott in December 1966.
Where I saw a rare photo of Lolly Miller leaving court during the murder trial of her lover, Rene Castellani—Angus was looking at the background.
“I just noticed something about Lolly Miller’s photo on page 58,” said Angus, who was a Vancouver bus driver for 40 years. “In the background there is a Brill trolley bus, with the B.C. Hydro logo visible. On the side there is an advertisement–this was for a disc jockey on CFUN, Tom Peacock.”
The ad reads “Tom Peacock. Afternoons 3 to 6.”
Radio plays a prominent part in Murder by Milkshake. In 1965, CKNW personality Rene Castellani murdered his wife Esther with arsenic so he could marry the station’s 20-something receptionist Lolly Miller.
Brill trolley bus in 1969, Angus McIntyre photo
“I just thought it was ironic that behind Lolly there was an ad for a rival radio station,” says Angus who moved to Vancouver in 1965.
“CFUN had a request line phone number, REgent 1-0000, promoted as ‘REgent ten-thousand, CFUN Requestomatic’. It almost always had a busy signal in the days of relay switches in the telephone exchanges, and kids would yell out their phone numbers over the sound of the busy signal to get a call back,” says Angus. “Some of their contests had so many people phone in that parts of the REgent exchange would crash.”
During the ’50s and ’60s, CKNW, the Top Dog, was a familiar sight in the community. Courtesy CVA 180-2127
According to his broadcast bio, Peacock eventually moved to CKWX (1130) and became the station’s general manager. He died in 2006, at age 67.
In 1965, CKNW was still the “Top Dog,” and as George Garrett, a news reporter for the station for over four decades, told me, “We were the most promotions minded station you could imagine.” The station’s deejays included Jack Cullen, Jack Webster and Norm Grohmann. Over at CFUN, a top 40-station at the time, deejays (below) were Red Robinson, Al Jordan, Fred Latremouille, Tom Peacock, Ed Kargl, Mad Mel, and John Tanner.
It depends what source you look at, but I find it hard to argue with thoughtco.com’s top 10 picks of 1965:
I Can’t Get No Satisfaction; The Rolling Stones
Like a Rolling Stone; Bob Dylan
A Change is Gonna Come; Sam Cooke
Tambourine Man; The Byrds
Ticket to Ride; The Beatles
I’ve Been Loving You Too Long; Otis Redding
Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag; James Brown
My Girl; The Temptations
Stop! In the Name of Love; The Supremes
Do you Believe in Magic?; The Lovin’ Spoonful
Top photo: Lolly Miller. Photo by Dan Scott/Vancouver Sun [PNG Merlin Archive]
