Vancouver Police Museum

The Babes in the Woods have their names back

by Eve Lazarus on February 14, 2022

Since I write about history and cold cases, it’s not often I’ve get to break an actual news story. But thanks to a young woman named Ally who went searching for her Great Uncles—I can now tell you the names of the Babes in the Woods—the little boys whose skeletons were found in Stanley Park in 1953. Meet Derek and David D’Alton.

This episode is based on a chapter in my book Cold Case BC: the stories behind the province’s most sensational murders and missing persons cases

Doreen, Eileen’s fraternal twin is shown with David and possibly Derek, ca.1943

When Ally spit into a tube in 2020, she had no idea that her DNA would help to solve one of Vancouver’s oldest and coldest murder mysteries.

Ally was flicking through the family album one day when she discovered that she had two great uncles who she had never met. The older boy had blonde hair and blue eyes, and the younger had darker features. When Ally asked her grandmother Diane who they were, she found out they were Diane’s younger brothers David and Derek.

Taken by social services:

Twenty-six year old Ally, says the story handed down in the family was that the two little boys were taken away by social services because their mother Eileen who was of Metis heritage, was too poor to look after them. Diane remained with her mother. “I remember my mother sharing stories with me about her mother’s poverty and how they used to jump out of windows at places they were renting in Vancouver to avoid having to pay because they were just so poor,” says Ally.

But when Ally’s Mum Cindy pressed her mother Diane for more information, Diane would tell her: “we don’t talk about that” or “that’s in the past.”

Photos of Derek and David with the family. Diane holding David at right

Genetic Genealogy:

Cindy wanted to find out her mother’s genetic mix, so she took a swab from Diane, who was by then suffering from dementia, and sent it off to MyHeritage. Then Ally spit in a tube and sent it to 23AndMe—a genealogy database where people go to learn about their ancestry and locate lost relatives. She hoped to find her great uncles still alive, or at least trace their children or grandchildren.

Ally didn’t have the boy’s birth certificates or know the year they disappeared, but she knew that Diane was born in July 1937 and was the oldest and then came Derek and David. All three children attended Henry Hudson Elementary in Kitsilano.

Derek pictured top row, second from left at Henry Hudson Elementary in Kitsilano

Ally uploaded her DNA to Ancestry, MyHeritage and several other genealogy platforms. She hoped her DNA would lead her to her great uncles, instead, what she found was devastating.

Identified:

Last May, the Vancouver Police Department partnered with the BC Coroners Service and a Massachusetts-based forensic research firm, to try and identify the Babes in the Woods. Most of their remains had been cremated in the 1990s and only a few fragments were left. These tiny, very old and fragile bone fragments were sent to Lakehead University’s Paleo-DNA lab in Thunder Bay, Ontario. The lab successfully extracted DNA from the bone fragment of the older boy and sent that to a lab in Alabama for DNA genome sequencing. His DNA kit was uploaded to GEDmatch, and a team of forensic genetic genealogists began searching for living relatives.

Then, earlier this month, Cindy was approached by a VPD detective who told her that her uncles were the two skeletons that had been found in Stanley Park in 1953 and who were known for the next seven decades as the Babes in the Woods.

Their mother, Eileen Bousquet was born in Alberta, and as far as Cindy is aware all three of her children—Diane, Derek and David were born in Vancouver. Detectives told Cindy that they hadn’t found any records to indicate that the boys were taken into the custody of child protection services as she had been told, but they would continue searching.

Killed by mother?

Police have always believed that the boys were killed by their mother, who covered them up with her coat. But Cindy doesn’t believe that for a second. She says her grandmother was a lovely, gentle woman. “She was a huge animal lover, she babysat little kids. She was very sad because something had happened and I don’t know what it was because nobody wanted to talk about it.”

Eileen died in 1996 at age 78.

Ally says her grandmother Diane didn’t know who her father was or who the fathers were of her half-brothers. “That’s something I’ve been trying to trace with Ancestry, but so far no luck,” she says. “Even though it came to a devastating resolution, at least we know what happened.”

The VPD have released the boys names as Derek (born Feb 27, 1940) and David D’Alton (born June 24, 1941). The police believe they were murdered in 1947 so Derek would have been 7 and David 6 when they were killed.
All photos courtesy Ally

Show Notes

Sponsors: Forbidden Vancouver Walking Tours and Erin Hakin Jewellery

Music: Andreas Schuld ‘Waiting for You’

Intro : Mark Dunn

Buy me a coffee promo: McBride Communications and Media

Sources:

News report courtesy CTV Vancouver

Huge thanks to Miles Steininger, Darlene Ruckle, and The History Five for all their help with the research

Promo: Vancouver Police Museum and Archives

The Vivien Morzuch Story

by Eve Lazarus on July 31, 2020

Vivien Morzuch was 15 when he was beaten to death and dumped in a ditch near Kamloops, BC in 2000. His case was solved six years later

This podcast is from a chapter in Cold Case Vancouver: The City’s Most Baffling Unsolved Murders

Vancouver Police Museum:

In 2014, I was at a talk at the Vancouver Police Museum given by former homicide detective Steve McCartney.

Steve was a homicide detective assigned to the Provincial Unsolved Homicide Unit which was made up of officers from the RCMP and the Vancouver Police Department and investigated cold cases from jurisdictions all over BC when new evidence emerged.

Steve’s talk became the basis for my last chapter in Cold Case Vancouver: The City’s Most Baffling Unsolved Murders. Because unsolved murders, by their nature, don’t have an ending, I wanted to finish the book with a cold case that was solved. And I wanted to show the lengths that police will go to in closing an unsolved murder, particularly when it involves a child.

Vivien Morzuch, age 12. Courtesy Bruyere Morzuch

Cold Case:

In 2006, Steve was working on the six-year-old cold case of Vivien Morzuch, a 15-year-old boy who had run away from his Montreal home to pick fruit in BC. Instead, the boy was found savagely beaten to death and dumped in a ditch near Kamloops. The only evidence that police had to go on was a partial fingerprint on a piece of duct tape found near his body and some DNA.

Campsite where Vivien Morzuch’s body was dumped in 2000 just outside Kamloops. Courtesy Bruyere Morzuch

The DNA didn’t belong to Vivien and it wasn’t in the system, so for the next six years the case went cold. Then in 2006, police got a break when a man was caught doing a snatch-and-grab on Vancouver’s Davie Street.

My chapter in Cold Case Vancouver and the episode for this week’s podcast is based on media reports, an interview with Vivien’s sister Bruyere, Steve’s talk, and a subsequent interview where he detailed the police investigation and the Mr. Big sting that was launched to catch Vivien’s killer. It’s a fascinating look at the work and resources that go into a cold case when new evidence arises.

Show Notes:

Sponsors: Forbidden Vancouver Walking Tours and Erin Hakin Jewellery

Music: Misconception by thedarkpiano.com

Intro: Mark Dunn

Interview: Steve McCartney, former homicide detective with the Provincial Unsolved Homicide Unit

Promo: Blood, Sweat, and Fear: the story of Inspector Vance, a true crime podcast with Eve Lazarus

With special thanks to Raffelina Sirianni, Dave Barry and Kent Simmonds at CFJC TV in Kamloops for supplying the news clips; and the Vancouver Police Museum.

Tags Provincial Unsolved Homicide Unit, Steve McCartney, Vancouver Police Museum, Vivien Morzuch

Nanaimo Mysteries

by Eve Lazarus on March 1, 2019

With Aimee Greenaway, Nanaimo Mysteries curatorAimee Greenaway was reading Blood, Sweat, and Fear when she came across George Hannay, a safe cracker from Nanaimo. She’d heard a story about the former BC Provincial police officer turned criminal, but this was the first time she’d seen evidence of his crimes.

Aimee thought Hannay’s story would make a great inclusion in the museum’s new exhibit—Nanaimo Mysteries.

The exhibit opened February 16, and my friend (and book editor) Susan Safyan and I went over to check it out. It’s the first time I’ve been to the Nanaimo Museum, and it blew me away.

Inspector Vance, the subject of Blood, Sweat, and Fear and founder of the Vancouver Police Museum’s building on East Cordova Street, gets a starring role. Vance was known as the “Sherlock Holmes of Canada” in the media at the time, and in 1934 there were seven attempts against his life. The last and most brutal was an attempt to blind him with acid and stop him from testifying against Hannay in court. The attack was thought to be instigated by Hannay—at least the note left in Vance’s garage was signed “Hannay’s pals”— (apparently criminals weren’t too smart back then either). The attack on Vance delayed the trial, but went ahead a few weeks later with the Inspector under police guard.

Vance linked Hannay to the robbery through trace evidence. But even though fibres found at the scene were from Hannay’s clothing and a splinter in his coat matched a floor board, the jury was unable to reach a decision because the foreman—a friend of Hannay’s—refused to bring in a guilty verdict.

The material for this chapter and the archival material that Aimee has curated for the display, was found in the garage of one of Vance’s grandsons, in 2016 while I was researching the book. He found several cardboard boxes filled with photos, newspaper clippings, forensic materials and case notes predating 1950. After the book was finished, the Vance family donated everything to the Vancouver Police Museum.

This is the first time any of these documents have been displayed, and there’s some intriguing, material including a letter that Hannay wrote to Vance’s boss in an attempt to discredit him. Aimee has also uncovered Hannay’s connection to Albert Planta, a corrupt senator from Nanaimo.

Nanaimo, it turns out, is quite mysterious. The exhibit has a section on hauntings and ghosts, another on murders and missing children, the red-light district and the infamous Brother X11, who started a cult in 1927 until 1932, when he and Madame Zee skipped town with donations from their wealthy followers.

The exhibit runs through until September 2, and if it’s your first time, there’s plenty of other things there to keep you fascinated, including the mystery of a samurai sword dug up in downtown Nanaimo in the late 1800s.

Tags Aimee Greenaway, Blood Sweat and Fear, George Hannay, Inspector Vance, Nanaimo Museum, Nanaimo Mysteries, Vancouver Police Museum

Saving History: Crime Maps, Surveillance Albums and Mugshot Books

by Eve Lazarus on November 25, 2017

If you enjoy a good murder story, love heritage buildings, or just want to see what a morgue looks like, then you need to make your way down to the Vancouver Police Museum.

For those of us who write about crime, the museum is ground zero when it comes to information, because apart from the static displays there is a vast archive and amazing staff to help you navigate through it.

When the police station at 312 Main Street closed in 2010, the Museum inherited a bunch of really cool stuff. And, when I dropped by last week, Rozz and Elizabeth were kind enough to share a few of their finds.

Most fascinating were the crime maps dated from the 1940s to the mid ’70s.

“They are floor plans that were hand drawn by two officers and signed,” explained Elizabeth.

Some of the maps were for murder scenes, others for robberies.

Elizabeth carefully unrolled one of the maps. It was a very detailed drawing of the interior of a house and dated September 8, 1960. The address was 19 East 26^th Avenue.

I couldn’t wait to get home.

Street directories showed that the house’s owner was a Mrs. Mina May Holmes. My next step was vital statistics. It turned out that 75-year-old Holmes came to an untimely end when she was beaten to death by “persons unknown.”

A date with the Vancouver Public Library’s microfilm confirmed that she was killed by a brain hemorrhage and a blow so severe that it broke her jaw and bashed in her skull. Police found her lying in a bed splattered with orange pop. They concluded that the pop bottle was the murder weapon and the prime suspect was Sammy Semple, 51, a former vaudeville dancer who had moved into her home the day before.

A check on Google maps shows that her house is still there.

Unfortunately, much of the information in the archives can’t be publicized because it contravenes Freedom of Information laws. One of these gems is an album (pictured at the top) packed full of surveillance photos showing women leaving the Penthouse nightclub on Seymour Street in the mid-1970s.

Elizabeth was able to identify the building from the distinctive exterior of the Penthouse door.

The back of the book has pages of mugshots indicating that surveillance paid off and the cops were able to prosecuted Angela, Kitty and dozens of other Penthouse “staffers.”

Tags Vancouver Police Museum

Murder, Investigation, and a Dash of Forensics

by Eve Lazarus on April 8, 2017

Laura Yazedjian, coroner with the Police Museum’s Rozz Shipp

The first time I went to the Vancouver Police Museum was in the late 1980s. It was a breakfast meeting for a tourist organization called Vancouver AM, and we ate in the autopsy room. I fell in love with the place then in all its macabre glory, and nearly three decades later I still love going there.

Last night I was at a reception to launch the new true crime exhibit. I talked to plain clothes detectives, museum curators, librarians, a criminologist, a forensic anthropologist and a GIS specialist from the coroner’s office who have the grim, but rewarding job of matching remains to missing people—sometimes decades later.

Rosslyn Shipp by part of the new true crime exhibit

Museum director, Rosslyn Shipp has spearheaded the changes, mostly on a shoestring budget, and transformed the old morgue in the process. The musty old wooden cases are gone, replaced by stories, case files, trace evidence and photographs from some of the most fascinating murders of last century. Rather than focus on the murder, the exhibits now tell the stories of the victims, putting them front and centre where they belong.

Sandra Boutilier and Carolyn Soltau, whose impending loss from the Sun/Province library will be keenly felt

The Babes in the Woods, the Pauls and the Kosberg murders have been updated and joined by three more. There’s a skull of a farmer found in the 1970s. He’d been shot in the head and buried along the edge of a river. The remains were matched to a missing person’s report by the coroner’s office. There’s the story of Viano Alto, a night watchman who was shot and killed while on the job in 1959. And there’s the 1994 murder of David Curnick, stabbed 146 times with his own kitchen knife.

Proper attention is now given to the work that went on in the building and its place in the evolution of forensics in Canada. John F.C.B. Vance, a city analyst and scientist (and the subject of my next book Blood, Sweat and Fear) has his place in the exhibit and much more emphasis is placed on the building’s history as the VPD crime lab (1932 to 1996).

Rozz is also the force behind the speaker series now in its 5th year. The series kicks off next Wednesday (April 12) with a talk by Heidi Currie on the Kosberg murders. I’ll be looking at the unsolved murder of 24-year-old Jennie Conroy in 1944, former homicide sergeant Kevin McLaren will walk us through the murder investigation of four members of the Etibako family and Ashley Singh in 2006, former VPD sergeant Brian Honeybourn talks about his time in the Provincial Unsolved Homicide Unit, and staff Sergeant Lindsey Houghton will address how the VPD investigates and prosecutes organized crime.

Book your tickets: https://vancouverpolicemuseum.ca/speaker-series/

The skull of a murdered farmer found in the 1970s

Tags Babes in the Woods, David Curnick, Jennie Conroy, Kosberg murders, the Pauls, Vancouver Police Museum, Viano Alto

Heritage Streeters with Bill Allman, Kristin Hardie and Pamela Post

by Eve Lazarus on November 11, 2016

This is an ongoing series that asks people who love history and heritage to tell us their favourite existing building and the one that never should have been torn down.

Bill Allman is a “recovering lawyer” and instructor of Entertainment Law at UBC. Bill has been a theatre manager (the Vogue), president of Theatre Under the Stars, and a concert promoter through his company, Famous Artists Limited. He is no longer willing to move your piano.

Favourite existing building: The Jericho Sailing Club because the main club building, along with the hostel, Jericho Arts Centre and the City works yard, is the only remaining structure from the RCAF Station Jericho Beach. In its latter years, the RCAF Station was home to several army units including 156 Company Royal Canadian Army Service Corps. That was my father, Major Arthur Allman’s unit. Dad’s office was housed in one of four massive hangers that stood on the site until the ’90s. It was in one of those hangars that, as the young child of a Militia officer, I sat on the knee of my very first Santa Claus and I played on the private DND-owned beach. I learned to swim in the ocean water outside what is now the Sailing Club.

Vancouver Opera House on Granville Street in 1909. Photo courtesy Vancouver Archives 64-2 — Vancouver Opera House on Granville Street in 1909. Vancouver Archives 64-2

The building that should never have been torn down: I want my opera house back. The Vancouver Opera House, opened in 1891 and hosted a wide variety of “legitimate” dramas as well as vaudeville and music; but not much opera. The theatre was elegantly appointed and intended by the CPR to add to Vancouver’s status as a world class city. Over the years, the theatre often changed hands and, after a complete renovation in 1913, had a life as the “New Orpheum.”. The old Vancouver Opera House survived until 1969 when they ripped it down in favour of that effing Pacific Centre Mall. Nothing says “culture” like a shoe sale.

Kristin Hardie is the curator for the Vancouver Police Museum.

Favourite existing building: I can’t help but choose 240 East Cordova, now the home of the Vancouver Police Museum and once the Coroner’s Services and the City Analyst Laboratory. Built in 1932, it was the last project architect Arthur J. Bird worked on in Vancouver. Fitting that he ended his career with the Morgue, no? The two-story building is made up of a wonderful mixture of classic Georgian Revival and Art Deco styles . The original design elements inside include the Georgian banister up the front stairs and the unique arched wooden roof in what was once the courtroom—oh and not to mention the actual rooms and autopsy tables used by the pathologist and the Coroner’s Services during 50 years of death investigations.

The building that should never have been torn down: The City Hall on Westminster (now Main) street was a robust turreted building that acted as Vancouver’s municipal and political hub for 30 years. It was built in 1890 to house a market on the lower level and a community gathering space above. It became City Hall eight years later. I love that it was nestled deep within the bustling east side neighbourhood–the busiest part of the city before big businesses started to move downtown. There, it was accessible and stood face-to-face with the regular people of the city. That in-and-of-itself should have guaranteed its longevity. I mean really, who tears down their own City Hall? The wrecking ball came in 1958 and in its place is a squat, single story brick eyesore.

Pamela Post is an award-winning Vancouver journalist, broadcaster and part-time journalism instructor/mentor at Langara College. She was born in the West End and now lives next door to the Sylvia Hotel.

Swathed in its cloak of Virginia Creeper vine (planted by Mrs. Kenvyn, an original tenant of the Sylvia Court Apts.), — “Swathed in its cloak of resplendent Virginia Creeper vine (planted by Mrs. Kenvyn, an original tenant of the Sylvia Court Apts.),” Pamela Post photo, 2016

Favourite existing building: This stately brick and terracotta building stands proudly as a vestige of a long-vanished Vancouver. Designed by architect William P. White and built in 1912 as an apartment building before being converted to a hotel in 1936, it’s named for the owner’s daughter Sylvia Goldstein. GM Ross Dyck tells me that in the autumn, the hotel used to get calls from the Coast Guard station in Kitsilano, saying boaters in English Bay were confusing the bright reds and yellows of the vine with a building on fire. The same family has owned the Sylvia since 1960 and steadfastly celebrated its heritage while regularly refusing lucrative offers to sell. A family recently celebrated its fifth generation of family members married at the Sylvia. The first was a young soldier, heading off to war in 1914. I often say to my friends ‘ahh, the Sylvia Hotel – where it’s always 1947.’

"Janet Hobbs has worked at the Sylvia Hotel for 43 years, and she was working the morning the Englesea burned. "I remember it so well. It was terrible,” she told Pamela. “All the people from Englesea came and gathered in the Sylvia." In fact, many of them were housed at the Sylvia at city expense for the next ten days. CVA 2009-001-006, 1960s — Janet Hobbs has worked at the Sylvia Hotel for 43 years, and she was working the morning the Englesea burned. “I remember it so well,” she told Pamela. “All the people from Englesea came and gathered in the Sylvia.” CVA 2009-001-006, 1960s

The building that should never have been torn down: The Englesea Lodge which once sat on Beach Avenue, was also designed by the same architect as the Sylvia Hotel in 1911. Throughout the ‘70s, the seven-storey building was a pawn in a civic battle royale between the Vancouver Park Board that viewed it as an ‘eyesore and blight’ at the entrance to Stanley Park, and a city council which was facing a severe housing shortage (sound familiar?) and pressure from the heritage-loving ‘Save the Englesea’ movement. The latter which proposed a rent-controlled residence for seniors with a tea/coffee house and educational facility in the lobby. In the end arson took care of the problem and the Englesea was removed from the landscape in 1981.

For more on the series see:

Tags 240 East Cordova Street, Arthur J. Bird, Bill Allman, Englesea Lodge, Jericho Sailing Club, Kristin Hardie, Major Arthur Allman, Market Hall, New Orpheum, Pamela Post, RCAF Station Jericho Beach, Ross Dyck, Sylvia Goldstein, Vacouver Operat House, Vancouver Police Museum, William P. White

The 100-year-old Unsolved Murder of Special Constable Charles Painter

by Eve Lazarus on October 22, 2016

Last year, Constable Graham Walker of the Metro Vancouver Transit Police was asked to research the history for their 10-year anniversary. Graham promptly fell down the rabbit hole and his journey has taken him to UBC Special Collections, City of Vancouver Archives, BC Hydro Archives, and the Vancouver Police Museum. Graham’s first surprise was that the history of transit police goes back far longer than 2005 when a recommendation by the BC Association of Chiefs of Police led to the creation of the Transit Police. In fact, the earliest record showing the appointment of a special constable for the BC Electric Railway dates back to 1904.

But Graham wasn’t calling me with a history of transit, he had uncovered a 100-year-old murder mystery in war-time Vancouver.

Graham Walker standing where the 1915 murder took place near Willow and 6th

On March 19, 1915, Charles Painter, 34, was working the night shift for BCER. The special constable was patrolling the railway tracks at 6^th and Willow when he saw a man carrying a bag of what he thought was wire stolen from the overhead trolley wire. He struggled with the thief, who managed to get his gun and Painter was shot in the stomach with his own weapon.

“Everything comes full circle,” says Graham who is also 34. “I’ve worked overtime shifts myself where we were going up and down Fraser Street looking for trolley wire thieves.”

Nowadays, transit police work foot patrol in pairs for protection, but in 1915 Charles was alone, and wandered for about an hour before he found help. He was able to give a statement to police, but later died from blood poisoning.

Painter was unmarried and lived at 1543 West 3^rd Street. There’s not much known about him—Graham found out that he was born in 1881 in Ireland, and had served in the British Army before coming to Canada in 1908.

“They didn’t have any suspects at first, but a few years later there was an article in the Province saying this man Frank Van der Heiden was being tried in Seattle for murdering two people and was of interest in the murder of Charles Painter,” says Graham. According to the article, Van der Heiden, who had been in Vancouver at the time of Painter’s murder, told a soldier he was locked up with that he was responsible for the constable’s death. Van der Heiden was caught with a large sum of cash, and according to the article, the money was believed to have been provided by the German government for the purpose of persuading soldiers to desert.

graham-memorial Painter’s murder is still officially unsolved, and his death went unrecognized until Graham and his research. Now his name has been added to the Honour Roll of the British Columbia Law Enforcement Memorial in Victoria, and Graham is presently trying to secure the funds to have a headstone placed on his unmarked grave at Mountain View Cemetery.

“Something we struggle with at our work place is lack of history and culture and you look at Victoria and New Westminster and they have this proud heritage,” says Graham. “So to have this now is important.”

BCER terminal at Hastings and Carrall in 1912. CVA M-14-71

Tags BC Electric Railway, BC Hydro Archives, Charles Painter, City of Vancouver Archives, Frank Van der Heiden, Graham Walker, Law Enforcement Memorial, Metro Vancouver Transit Police, Mountain View Cemetery, UBC Special Collections, Vancouver Police Museum

Red Light Rendezvous at the Vancouver Police Museum

by Eve Lazarus on May 30, 2015

Frankie Russell, 1912 inmate of disorderly house

The Vancouver Police Museum has put together Red Light Rendezvous—a new tour for those of us who can’t get enough of the gritty history of downtown Vancouver.

Cat Rose, who is a crime analyst by day, is also the person behind the Police Museum’s other popular Sins of the City tour: Vice, Dice and Opium Pipes.

Cat has access to the Museum’s records which include arrests by the morality squad in the 1920s. She put these records to good use on the tour, finding (with some help from John Atkin), a still-standing brothel on Dupont (now Pender) once owned by Dora Reno. Dora was one of Vancouver’s earliest madams. She appears in Sensational Vancouver’s “The Social Evil” chapter, and when Dora was charged with vagrancy for illegally profiting from her ownership of a brothel, she hired future Attorney General William Bowser to get her off.

Cat’s tour meanders down Main Street, stops at where the red light district moved to Harris Street (East Georgia) in 1906, and which generated a Province headline of that year: “Conditions in Restricted District are worst in city’s history: innocent youths invited into lowest dives. Officials are shocked.”

Prostitution played an important role in the life in Vancouver, as it did in every port city. When city coffers were low, madams were hauled in front of a judge, paid a fine, and then allowed to go back to work. It was just a cost of doing business, and as Cat notes, the madams used it as a marketing opportunity, parading through town in their best clothes, and then returning to work to find an eager line-up of fresh customers.

As the madams were kicked out of Harris Street they gravitated north up to Alexander Street and my favourite part of the tour. A few of the buildings still exist so you can get a sense of what it was like over a century ago.

Dolly Darlington's brothel — 500 Alexander, as a sailor’s home in 1924 VPL 3127

Dolly Darlington, for instance, bought a sturdy brick building at the corner of Alexander and Jackson. Other madams such as Marie Gomez and Alice Bernard built luxurious brothels. A few still exist. The one at #504 was designed as a brothel by William T. Whiteway, the same architect who designed the Sun Tower and the Holden Building.

Marie Gomez brothel — Curt Lang photo, 1972 VPL85872X

You’ll also hear about these businesswomen’s marketing practices. French-born Alice Bernard only hired French girls, while Marie Gomez’s brothel was known as the House of all Sorts because it hired girls of all races. Marie was so proud of her brothel that she had her name set out in tiles. Unfortunately the tiles went into the landfill along with the building.

Tags Alice Bernard, Dolly Darlington, Dora Reno, Frankie Russell, Marie Gomez, Red Light Rendezvous, Sensational Vancouver, Vancouver Police Museum, William Bowser, William T. Whiteway

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