Frank Holland Archives

Five amazing women who put their stamp on BC in unique ways. There is more information about them in At Home with History, Sensational Victoria and Sensational Vancouver, and in the books listed below.

Capi Blanchet (1891–1961)

Capi Blanchet was found dead in 1961, slumped over her typewriter while writing a sequel to The Curve of Time. For a writer, that’s not a bad way to go. The tragedy in Capi’s case is that she died without ever having an inkling of the success her book would enjoy. There was no way for her to know that a half century into the future, her book would be republished in a 50th-anniversary edition and be a regional best-seller.

Capi Blanchett — Capi with Pam on the beach near her house. Courtesy Tara Blanchet

Born in Montreal, Muriel Liffiton married Geoffrey Blanchet, a banker when she was 18. In 1922 the family drove out west and bought Clovelly, a house designed by Samuel Maclure near Sidney. Soon after moving in, the Blanchets bought a boat called the Caprice. In 1927 Geoffrey took the boat out and never returned. That left 33-year-old Capi to raise five kids aged between two and 14, and to wonder if it was accident or suicide.

The resourceful Capi rented out her house, packed up her kids and Irish setter, and set off for what would be the family’s annual journey around British Columbia’s rugged coastline. The rent supplemented her income, and the trips provided the basis for her book.

Muriel “Capi” Wylie Blanchet (1891-1961)

Blanchet, M. Wylie. The Curve of Time (50th anniversary edition). Whitecap, 2011.

Gwen Cash (1891–1983)

When Gwen Cash went to work for Walter Nichol at the Vancouver Daily Province in 1917, she was one of the first women general reporters in the country. Gwen and her husband Bruce settled in Victoria in January 1935. She was the public relations officer for the Empress Hotel and wrote three books including her memoir, Off the Record. In 1954 she had John di Castri design a house to prove that small didn’t have to mean a box. Called the Trend House, it was one of 11 built in Canada and sponsored by BC forest industries to boost retail lumber, plywood, and shingle sales. At 835 sq.ft. Gwen’s house was the smallest, but also the most talked about. “Conventional Victorian viewers, addicted to pseudo-Tudor or modern box construction, were puzzled and vaguely angered by its unique design. Like modern painting it was something that they couldn’t understand,” she wrote. The house was opened to the public for three months and more than 34,000 people trekked through.

Cash, Gwen. Off the Record. Stagecoach, 1977.

Sylvia Holland (1900-1974)

Sylvia Holland 1940s — Sylvia Holland at Disney in the 1940s. Courtesy Theo Halladay

Sylvia Holland met her Canadian husband at architectural school in London, England. They moved to Victoria in 1925 and designed their house. Two years later Frank was dead and Sylvia was left to raise two babies on the eve of the Depression. To make ends meet, Sylvia rented out her house and moved to Metchosin, where Frank’s parents had a farm. Even during those lean times, she managed two architectural commissions. When Boris was diagnosed with the same infection that had killed his father, Sylvia moved to Los Angeles and was hired by Universal Studios and then by MGM as a background artist. Walt Disney hired her as one of his first women animators, and she worked on productions such as Fantasia and Bambi. She worked for Disney for several years, bought an acre of land in the San Fernando Valley and designed a large two-storey house where she set about developing the Balinese breed of cat. She never married again. “All the single guys at Disney were courting her, but she chose to retain her independence,” says her daughter Theo. “She said, ‘If I had a man, what would I do with him?’”

Nellie McClung (1873-1951)

When Nellie retired to Gordon Head in 1935 and made sauerkraut and dill pickles from her garden, few neighbours realized how famous she was until her image came out on a 1974 postage stamp. Nellie fought for women’s rights and her accomplishments are long and awe inspiring. In 1900 a woman’s salary was legally the property of her husband. He had control of their children, and of her. The law defined an eligible voter as “a male person, including an Indian and excluding a person of Mongolian or Chinese race.” And, if that wasn’t clear enough; the Election Act went on to say: “No woman, idiot, lunatic or criminal shall vote.”

Nellie raised five kids in rural Manitoba. By 1908, she had written the first of 16 books. That novel, Sowing Seeds in Danny sold over 100,000 copies—outselling Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables, which came out the same year—in a country where 5,000 is still considered a best-seller.

In 1928, she was one of five women who went to the Supreme Court of Canada to insist women are “persons,” and eligible to be named to the Senate. She campaigned for the Liberals in 1935, was the first woman to sit on the CBC board of directors the following year, and in 1938, represented Canada in 1938 at the League of Nations in Geneva.

McClung, Nellie. The Complete Autobiography. Broadview Press, 2003.

Helen Gregory MacGill (1864-1947)

Helen was the first woman to graduate from Toronto’s University of Trinity College, and she was the first woman judge in B.C. From 1917 she presided over Vancouver’s Juvenile Court, fighting for the rights of women and children. Her husband was a sketchy lawyer and their finances went up and down with the times. The MacGill’s bought a house in Vancouver’s West End in 1908, and lost it five years later when they couldn’t afford the taxes.

By 1926 Helen’s judge’s salary had increased to $100 a month, she received $3,000 in damages from an accident settlement and they bought back the Harwood Street house. The house withstood the apartment blitz of the 1950s and is a strata conversion painted a regal red.

The MacGill’s younger daughter Elsie (1905-1980) became a trend setter like her Mum. She was the first woman to receive an electrical degree in Canada and the first woman aircraft designer in the world. She earned the name “Queen of the Hurricanes” for her work on the Hawker Hurricane fighters during the Second World War.

MacGill, Elsie Gregory. My Mother the Judge. Toronto: Ryerson Press, 1955.

For more stories like this one:

Women’s History

Sylvia Holland was the first registered female architect in British Columbia. After her husband died, she took her two children and moved to Los Angeles where she worked for Universal Studios and later MGM as a background artist. Walt Disney hired her as one of his first women animators.

See the full story in Sensational Victoria: Bright lights, red lights, murders, ghosts and gardens

I had a really interesting chat with Theo Halladay recently. Theo is 83 and living in the house her mother designed in the San Fernando Valley near Los Angeles. Theo was born in Victoria, and I’m quite fascinated with her mother Sylvia Moberly Holland, the first registered woman architect in British Columbia.

Sylvia Holland 1929

The London years:

Sylvia met Frank Holland at the Architectural Association School in London. Soon after graduation, they married and moved to Frank’s home town in Victoria. They designed an arts and crafts house at 1170 Tattersall Drive in Saanich.

Arts and Crafts House designed by Sylvia and Frank Holland — 1170 Tattersall Drive, Victoria

In 1928, two years after moving into their house, Frank died leaving Sylvia, 28, to raise Theo, not yet two, and her brother Boris, born a month after his father’s death.

B.C.’s First female architect:

Being taken seriously as a female architect would be challenging at any time, but with two young children to support and on the eve of the Great Depression, it was devastating.

Theo says her mother rented out the Saanich house to William Weir McGill, a pharmacist and his wife Gertrude. They opened a preschool , and the Hollands moved to Rocky Point, Metchosin in 1932 where Frank’s parents had a farm. Sylvia worked on two architectural commissions. The Collinson residence at 640 St. Patrick Street in Oak Bay in 1935 and the Tysoe residence on Arbutus Road in Saanich the following year. Mostly though, she farmed.

The final blow came when Boris was diagnosed with the same mastoid infection that killed his young father.

Move to California:

“The doctor told her that Boris would not survive in the damp climate of Victoria and she would have to take him to a desert climate,” says Theo. “So in 1938 we all climbed aboard the train to LA and my mother picked up a car that she had ordered and headed for the desert.”

Sylvia put the two children into a boarding school and started to look for work to support them.

She never sought work as an architect, but fell back on her art training and was hired first by Universal Studios and then by MGM as a background artist. After gaining a solid reputation Walt Disney hired her as one of his first women animators. She worked on productions such as Fantasia and Bambi. Sylvia worked for Disney for several years, had a stint as a Christmas card designer, then bought an acre of land in the San Fernando Valley. She designed a large two-storey house and bred Balinese cats.

She never remarried. “All the single guys at Disney were courting her, but she chose to retain her independence,” says Theo. “She said ‘if I had a man what would I do with him’?”

Sylvia died in 1974.

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