Ryan Cameron has worked with Vancouver Fire and Rescue for the past 27 years. During that time, he’s had his fair share of burning buildings, calls to accidents, and of course, firehall hauntings.
Firehall No. 19
You can find Firehall No. 19 at 12th Avenue and Trimble Street in Vancouver’s West Point Grey. The original firehall opened in 1922 and was demolished in January 1979, when an almost identical building was put up on the same site. Both buildings have been haunted for as long as anyone can remember.
Listen to Ryan tell his firehall ghost story on episode 44, Cold Case Canada Halloween 2023 podcast
Captain Ryan Cameron started with Vancouver Fire Rescue Services in 1996, and did a two year tour at the hall starting in 2000. He remembers one occasion when their shift of four was having lunch and could clearly hear the sound of someone sliding down the fire station pole. “We all got up and looked because the kitchen is just off the apparatus bay. There was nobody else in the hall, but somebody slid down that pole,” he says.
Who’s Haunting the Firehall?
“You always have that feeling that somebody is there, but they’re not there,” says Ryan. “It feels like somebody is watching you.” At other times, there are cold spots in the stairwell, and sometimes in the early hours of the morning, the doors in the upstairs storage area slam shut. A bed shakes.
“There’s a mezzanine behind the sitting room, and late at night when you’re back from a call, you’re watching TV and there’s a feeling that something is there. But when you turn and look, it’s like a shadow. It’s been going on for years. People have seen faces, there’s the bouncing ping pong ball.”
Over the years, Ryan who is a member of the Vancouver Fire Fighters Historical Society, has talked to firefighters who worked in the original building, and to those who have had more recent encounters with the firehall ghost. He has done his research and believes that the ghost is Bill Wootton, a firefighter who worked out of the original hall in 1943 and was killed in the line of duty.
A Friendly Ghost:
“They were going to an alarm call in November 1943 at 7th and Alma and they collided with a Vancouver police car that was going to the same box alarm,” says Ryan. “Unfortunately, Bill was thrown from the truck, because they rode the tailboards back then, and he hit his head on a rock garden and died.”
Bill, he says is harmless. “If something is going on the crew will say ‘Bill that’s enough’ and just talk to him and I think he appreciates that.”
Beneath Dark Waters: The Legacy of the Empress of Ireland Shipwreck by Eve Lazarus, coming April 2025. Preorder through Arsenal Pulp Press, or your favourite indie bookstore
© All rights reserved. Unless otherwise indicated, all blog content copyright Eve Lazarus.
