Every Place Has a Story

The Cambie Street Rocket Ship

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The rocket ship at the southwest end of the Cambie Street Bridge is a replica of one built in 1938 for the annual PNE parade.

Story from Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History

The original rocket ship at Vancouver Airport, 1947. CVA 1376-360
Cambie Street Bridge:

Have you ever wondered why there is a snazzy-looking rocket ship at the southwest end of the Cambie Street Bridge? It was built for Expo 86, then shifted by helicopter to its current site after the fair ended. It’s actually a replica of a rocket ship that was designed by Lew Parry and built for the Sheet Metal Workers Local 280 as a float in the 1938 PNE parade.

The original rocket ship in the 1938 PNE parade being pulled by two men on a tractor. Photo by J.E. Hughes of Victoria.

After Vancouver Exposed came out last Fall, Paul Hancock sent me a photo that his uncle had taken of the PNE parade (above). Thanks to Tom Carter for pinpointing the location at the northeast corner of Georgia Street looking down Howe Street.

Built by Sheet Metal Workers:

According to a story in the Province dated August 25, 1938j, the original rocket ship was built through the efforts of 50 members of the Sheet Metal Workers’ International Association in several city shops. It weighed “half a ton, is 18 feet long, 13 feet high and nine feet wide and made of tin, iron and copper.”

Sheet Metal Workers’ rocket designed by Lew Parry in the 1938 PNE parade. CVA 775-195

The float was awarded the grand prize. Lew Parry, who became a highly regarded film producer, also designed a float for the Sheet Metal Workers’ in 1936 called “The Modern Aim,” which also won the grand prize at the PNE that year.

The rocket ship has lived at the south end of the Cambie Street bridge since 1986. Eve Lazarus photo, 2020
VIA:

The original streamlined rocket ship sat at the Vancouver Air Terminal until 1972, when its rusting frame was thrown into the landfill. The replica was made using old photos of the original and advice from Parry, who turned 80 as Vancouver celebrated its centennial.

This replica is made of hardier stuff than its predecessor—stainless steel and brass which will hopefully see it through another 100 years.

You might also want to make a note on your calendar that a Centennial Time Capsule buried at the base of the rocket, is scheduled to be dug up and opened in 2036. According to the CoV website “it includes items such as an Expo 86 passport with stamps of all the pavilions and recorded messages from local celebrities and many other things.”

The Flying Seven with the original Cambie Street rocket ship at Vancouver International Airport ca.1940. CVA 371-987

With thanks to Donna Sacuta of the BC Labour Heritage Centre

Related:

The Flying Seven and the Cambie Street Rocket Ship

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The Flying Seven formed in 1935 and were Vancouver’s all-female aviators’ club 

The Flying Seven at YVR ca.1940. Photo CVA 371-987
Vancouver’s aviatrices:

This is one of my favourite photos. It ran with a story in Sensational Vancouver and shows six members of the Flying Seven posed in front of the rocket ship at Vancouver International Airport. The Flying Seven were Vancouver’s all-female aviators’ club. Tosca Trasolini—second from the right—was the youngest member at just 29 in this 1940 photo. The others were Margaret (Fane) Rutledge, Rolie Moore, Jean Pike, Betsy Flaherty, Alma Gilbert and Elianne Roberge.

Flying Seven ca.1936. Photo CVA 341-478

The club formed in 1935 after Margaret Rutledge flew to California to meet with Amelia Earhart, president of the Ninety-Nines—an American organization for women pilots. There weren’t enough experienced Canadian pilots to form a chapter, so the Canadian women started their own.

Flying Flappers:

Newspaper editors called them the “Sweethearts of the Air,” “flying flappers” and “angels,” defying what a Chatelaine article had asked a few years earlier: “Are women strong enough to fly with safety? Are they fitted temperamentally to operate aircraft.” The women flew Fairchilds, Golden Eagles, Fleets and Gypsy Moths—they said that a woman’s place was in the air. Fane and Roberge held their commercial pilots’ licence.

Tosca Trasolini, 1939

The members of the Flying Seven attended an airshow sponsored by the Vancouver Junior Board of Trade in 1936. “They stopped us at the gate and told us we couldn’t go in,” Trasolini later told the Vancouver Sun’s Stuart Keate. “We were just as interested in the different machines as a lot of men around the place. But don’t worry, we made it.”

The enterprising Trasolini got hold of an admittance ticket, had a look around and one by one the other six women went in to see the aircraft.

The original rocket ship at Vancouver Airport, 1947. CVA 1376-360

Strathcona-born Trasolini, told Keate that she’d always “been crazy to fly” she just didn’t have enough money to do it until she got a job as Angelo Branca’s legal secretary.

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