Captain Henry Pybus Archives

Lynn Headwaters:

The BC Mills House Museum at Lynn Headwaters plays a cameo role in Rachel Greenaway’s brilliant new mystery Creep where the action all takes place in upper Lynn Valley. While the little house has sat at the entrance to the park for a couple of decades now, I only recently discovered its back story.

From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History

Michael Kluckner’s painting of the BC Mills House at 147 East 1st Street in 1989.

According to Michael Kluckner’s Vanishing Vancouver, the two-bedroom house was built in 1908 at East 1^st near Lonsdale in North Vancouver as an investment property. It was a pre-fab Model J constructed by the BC Mills, Timber and Trading Company which operated out of what’s now the Mission to Seafarers house at the foot of Dunlevy.

Captain Pybus:

The owner, Captain Henry Pybus went broke along with a lot of other land speculators in the 1913/1914 land crash. A hunt through the city directories suggests the longest owner/resident was Mark Falonvitch, a Russian-born welder/foreman at Burrard Dry Docks who lived there with his wife Ada from the early ‘20s until his retirement in 1949.

The house’s most famous resident was Richard “The Troll” Schaller, former leader of the Rhinoceros Party of Canada which fielded candidates between 1963 and 1993 on the promise “to keep none of our promises”. Other platform promises included “repeal the law of gravity,” “provide higher education by building taller schools, and “ban guns and butter—both kill.”

In 1995, the house was saved thanks to the determination of long-time North Vancouver City Councillor Stella Jo Dean and moved to Lynn Headwaters. The Coronado, a four-storey condo building, is now in its former location.

See story on Fred Varley’s former house which is on the way to Lynn Headwaters

With thanks to Michael Kluckner for letting me pillage his painting and background from Vanishing Vancouver, to CBC Archives for their footage on Richard the Troll which you can watch here, Vancouver as it Was , and Macleans Magazine for the 14 campaign promises of the parti rhinoceros.

A little while ago I was having lunch with Tom Carter and Maurice Guibord at the newly renovated Railway Club. Afterwards, we were walking along Richards Street and Tom gave us a tour of the St. Clair Hotel-Hostel.

The Blushing Boutique is on the ground floor and a set of very steep stairs takes you up to the Hostel. The whole interior is designed in a nautical theme, which I guess isn’t surprising since it was designed by architect Samuel Birds for Captain Henry Pybus.

The four-storey brick building at 577 Richards Street was finished in 1911 and initially known as the Dunsmuir Rooms until 1930 when it became the St Clair Rooms. It sits next door to BC Stamp Works, which was built in 1895 as a boarding house.

When Pybus was building his commercial block, it looks like the owner at BC Stamp Works (583 Richards) took the opportunity to have the first floor lifted so a retail store or offices could be added—one of Vancouver’s few remaining buried houses.

Captain Henry Pybus in 1909. Courtesy CVA Port P1645

Pybus captained the Empress of China, and later and the Empress of Japan—a white clipper-ship, which with Pybus at the helm, held the record for crossing the Pacific for over 20 years. Pybus retired in 1911 at age 60. The Empress of Japan was decommissioned in 1922 and left to rot in Vancouver Harbour. Fortunately, the editor of the Province heard she was to be scrapped and had his staff rescue her dragon figurehead, donated it to the city, and it sat in Stanley Park until 1960 when it was replaced with a fiberglass replica. (The original was restored and remains with the Vancouver Maritime Museum).

The dragon figurehead from the Empress of Japan in 1936. Courtesy CVA Bo N83.1

According to Michael Kluckner’s Vanishing Vancouver, the South African born Pybus, fancied himself as a speculator and owned a bunch of property around the city—including a pre-fab Model J BC Mills house that sat at East 1^st and Lonsdale from 1908 until 1995 when it was moved—and remains at—Lynn Headwaters Regional Park.

Pybus’s BC Mills House now at Lynn Headwaters

Pybus lost most of his properties in the land crash of 1913/14. He spent the rest of his long life in the West End and died in 1938. Fifty years later, his grandson, Henry Pybus Bell-Irving became the 23^rd Lieutenant Governor of BC

What’s surprising, is how little change there has been on the Richards Street block. The retail space below the St. Clair started as a storefront for the United Typewriter Company, became the Vancouver Auction Rooms in the ‘20s, and by 1930 was the headquarters for Pluto Office Furniture. BC Stamp Works, the St. Clair and the office furniture business were still co-existing 25 years later, and not much has changed in the years since.

Top photo: The St. Clair Hotel and BC Stamp Works on the 500-block Richards Street in 1985. Courtesy CVA 790-1797

The BC Mills House Museum, a Mystery, a Captain and a Troll

Lynn Headwaters:

Captain Pybus:

Captain Pybus and Vancouver’s St. Clair Hotel

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Lynn Headwaters:

Captain Pybus:

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