Wigwam Inn

A postcard from the Wigwam Inn

by Eve Lazarus on September 21, 2024

One of my favourite parts about writing this blog is getting comments from people that add to the story, and often take it in a whole new and unexpected direction. I get really excited when someone sends me a 100-year-old postcard or a photo of Vancouver that’s never been seen outside the family album.

Maria Brunskog saw my story on the Wigwam Inn at Indian Arm and sent me this postcard.

“The Wigwam Inn also relates to one of my ancestors who visited and worked as a forest manager in Canada between 1903 and the 1920s. He and his wife and daughter sent a postcard from the Inn to one of his sisters in Sweden dated December 1, 1911,” she writes. “I just wanted to share this information with you since you contributed to my family history.”

Hugo Claughton-Wallin was born in Sweden in 1879 and worked in Montreal, Ottawa and Vancouver. He wrote several letters to the family telling them of the physically challenging work, hard-earned money and the cold, says Maria.

Marika, who signed the postcard, was Hugo’s wife Marika Topffer, also from Sweden and also born in 1879. The couple had two children who were born in Vancouver in 1910 and 1911—Rigmor Marta and Gilbert Hugo.

Alvo von Alvensleben:

Hugo and Marika and their two little children would have been at the Wigwam Inn at the same time as Alvo von Alvensleben who owned the Inn until 1914. The son of a German count, he came to Vancouver in 1904 with $4 in his pocket and dreams of finding gold in the Wild West. He was about 10 years too late and ended up fishing for salmon until he made enough money to speculate in property.

Alvo’s story is in At Home with History: The Secrets of Greater Vancouver’s Heritage Homes

He was wildly successful. Before WW1 he brought millions of dollars of German investment into BC. His family home is now part of the Crofton Girl’s School in Kerrisdale. As well as developing the Wigwam Inn into a luxury resort, he financed the Dominion Building on Hastings Street, and he owned huge tracts of land all over BC, including Pitt Meadows.

Alvo von Alvensleben, 1913. Courtesy CVA Port P1082

Tags Alvo von Alvensleben, Hugo Claughton-Wallin, Marika topffer, Wigwam Inn

Henry Switzer and his Shocking Pink House

by Eve Lazarus on January 29, 2022

Henry Switzer’s shocking pink house sat at Mathers and Taylor Way in West Vancouver. It was designed one Sunday and received attention from all over the world.

840 Mathers Avenue, West Vancouver. ca. 1970 courtesy Daryl Parsons

Local Landmark:

A few years ago, I wrote a story about a West Vancouver house that became a local landmark. Readers told me that they fondly remembered the pink house on the hill as the “airplane house,” the “Jetsons House,” the “windmill house,” and the “helicopter house,” because it appeared to have wings. Legend has it that Henry Switzer designed the house in an afternoon.

Thanks to Angus McIntyre for finding and siting this still of the Switzer house in a 1966 Department of Highways film of a Burnaby to Horseshoe Bay road trip. “This view is looking east on the old Upper Levels Highway, and at the bottom of the hill is the intersection of Taylor Way, with traffic signals. The actual address of the Switzer home was on the north side of Mathers.”

With thanks to John Milinkovic for this current view

Unfortunately, Henry’s home only lasted for 11 years. In 1971, it was expropriated along with 50 or so other houses between Taylor Way and Horseshoe Bay to make way for the widening of the Upper Levels Highway.

Henry Switzer (left) Winnie, wife Eleanor and brother Christopher, 1944 courtesy Daryl Parsons

Switzer House:

Henry’s great nephew Daryl Parsons recently sent me a photo of the 1,600 sq.ft house. He put me in touch with his uncle Garth Switzer, who helped Henry build his house in 1960.

Garth says the house was designed for the California hills. “One arm was the kitchen eating area, one arm was the living area and the other two were bedrooms and bathrooms,” he says. “I’m told it took about two months to knock it down because there was so much rebar and all sorts of high-density concrete.”

Curly Switzer:

But Henry was much more than his house. He was born in Bells Corner, Ottawa in 1904, and was the youngest of 15 children. During the 1940s and ‘50s he was the Superintendent at Marwell Construction, one of the largest construction companies in Western Canada. Henry worked on the city hall and the high school in Rossland, on the Fernie General Hospital, and the courthouse in Chilliwack. Later, he formed his own company. “I have very fond memories of his house, his gold teeth, his pink Cadillacs and his band—Curly Switzer and the Red Mountain Boys,” says Daryl. “He was a very charismatic, charming and entertaining guy.”

Henry or Curly as he was known, was a musician and a composer. His songs include “High on Grouse Mountain,” “Wigwam Inn,” and “The Malibu.” Henry’s wife Eleanor was a noted pianist, and Garth tells me that Peter Cowan, co-owner of Harbour Navigation and the Wigwam Inn, played the bass fiddle in the band in the early 1950s. “We had our Christmas dinner at the Wigwam Inn. Curly organized it and the band played. He was dressed up in his black cowboy shirt and pants, stetson hat and a couple of 45s on a holster,” says Garth. “He played a steel slide guitar, and he had a pretty decent voice.”

Shortly after this, the Wigman Inn became known for more nefarious activities. But if anyone has one of Curly Switzer’s albums I would very much like to hear it!

Henry, Eleanor and Lloyd Switzer, Rossland 1951

Henry died in 1976.

The Vancouver Heritage House Tour, Alvo von Alvensleben and the Old Residence

by Eve Lazarus on May 18, 2019

The Old Residence ca.1947. Courtesy Crofton House School

The Vancouver Heritage House tour is coming up Sunday June 2, and I haven’t been this excited since Casa Mia was featured in 2014. Don’t get me wrong, the VHF works hard all year to curate a great mix of architectural styles, neighbourhoods and house sizes, but unless you work at, or have a daughter at Crofton House School, you likely won’t get inside the Old Residence.

I was lucky to get a tour when I wrote At Home with History in 2007. What makes the house special for me is that it was owned by Alvo von Alvensleben, one of my favourite historical characters.

Alvensleben arrived in Vancouver in 1904 with $4 in his pocket, but he was hardly a rags-to-riches immigrant. He was the third son of a German count and had the connections, the education, and the charm to convince people like Emma Mumm, the champagne heiress, Bertha Krupp, heir to the Krupp fortune, General von Mackensen, and even the Kaiser himself to open up their bank accounts.

Alvensleben lived in Vancouver less than a decade, yet he was one of the biggest movers and shakers in the city. He brought millions of dollars of German investment into Vancouver and bought up large tracts of land and huge houses. Before going fabulously broke in 1913, he had a personal fortune of around $25 million. His business interests included mining, forestry, and fishing. He financed the Dominion Trust Building, and it was Alvensleben’s capital that built and developed the Wigwam Inn into a luxury resort.

He also owned houses in North Vancouver, Pitt Meadows, Port Kells and Issaquah, Washington.

Old Residence, 2019. Courtesy Crofton House School

In 1909, he paid $30,000 for the Kerrisdale house and 20 acres, made a number of additions, and he and his Canadian wife Edith moved in the following year. He bought a string of thoroughbred horses, and by 1912, it took 13 servants to run the household and cater the parties.

The parties stopped at the outbreak of war in 1914. Alvensleben, in Germany at the time, read the signs and stayed in the States. Edith packed up the three kids and everything she could fit into the car and fled to Seattle before the Custodian of Enemy Alien Property stripped all their assets.

You could stare at this ceiling for hours and not see everything. Alvensleben hired Charles Marega the sculptor, and there are gargoyles, bats, rabbits and assorted weird faces in the white plaster of his dining room ceiling. There are mice carved into the sides, owls, frogs and a horse shoe. I think Marega may have even carved his own face into one of the columns. Courtesy Crofton House School

The Kerrisdale house stood empty until 1919 when it sold to Robert J. Cromie, publisher of the Vancouver Sun. The original 20 acres had been reduced to about 13 after the rest had been sold to pay off Alvensleben’s creditors. In 1942, Bernadette Cromie, now a widow, sold the house and property to the Crofton House School for $15,000.

Dining in 1967. Courtesy Crofton House School

Alvensleben died in Seattle. And over half-a-century later, no one really knows if he was a savvy businessman, a shady salesman, or a German James Bond.

For more information on the house tour and where to buy tickets: Vancouver Heritage Foundation 2019 House Tour

Tags Alvo von Alvensleben, Bernadette Cromie, Casa Mia, Crofton House School, Dominion Building, Robert J. Cromie, Vancouver Heritage Foundation, Wigwam Inn

The Buntzen Power Stations on Indian Arm

by Eve Lazarus on August 26, 2017

The original Buntzen powerhouse came into service in 1904, and was replaced in 1951. A second gothic looking powerhouse was completed in 1914. #2 has been the host to a number of creepy films, including Stephen King’s It, Placid, Freddy Vs. Jason and Roxanne.

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

Buntzen powerhouse #2 — Top photo of Power Station #2 courtesy Vancouver Archives LGN 1169 ca.1914

Indian Arm:

A couple of weeks ago, I took a boat ride up Indian Arm with Belcarra Mayor Ralph Drew and the Deep Cove Heritage Society. It’s hard to imagine that over a century ago Indian Arm was thriving and serviced by sternwheelers, a floating post office and grocery store.

The highlight for me was finally seeing the Wigwam Inn, but almost as exciting were the two massive power stations that dominate the eastern shore at Buntzen Bay.

Power Station #2. Eve Lazarus photo, July 2017

Heather Virtue-Lapierre was born up there in 1943. Her grandfather Matt Virtue was one of the first power house operators shortly after #1 opened in 1903. Her father Jim carried on the family tradition from 1941 until the plant was automated in 1953.

1910: Far left Matt Virtue. H.R. Heinrich, master mechanic is in the cap. #5 Tom Lundy, #6 George Henshaw, and #8 Jim Findlay. Courtesy Heather Virtue-Lapierre

One-room school:

Heather’s school was a one-room building above the power house. She was taught by a teacher who had worked as a welder during the war. “You didn’t mess with her!” she says. The teacher and her husband, who worked on the new penstock, lived in a small apartment attached to the school.

Buntzen |Power Station — Heather at Power House #1 in 1953. Courtesy Heather Virtue-Lapierre

Heather says that power house operators were exempt from service during the war years, and instead joined the Pacific Coast Militia Rangers. “Nobody was allowed to land at Buntzen without permission during the war,” she says. “I still remember the blackout curtains in our house.”

Buntzen Lake Power Station — 1940s, the second generation. Left to right: Jim Virtue (son of Matt), Vic Shorting, George Mantle, Gill McLaughlin, Bill Henshaw (son of George) Courtesy Heather Virtue-Lapierre

Community:

Dawson Truax’s father was a floor man, and Dawson was just 18 months old when he moved to Buntzen with his war-bride mother in 1946. They lived in a cabin on the hill above the power plant owned by the BC Electric Railway (the forerunner to BC Hydro). Supplies came weekly on the MV Scenic.

“It was quite a small community and only took three men to run the power plant at any time over three shifts a day,” he says. “There was a hoist on tracks that went up the hill from the plant area to the cabin. One of my first childhood memories is of my father putting me on the hoist with a pile of parcels while he walked alongside.”

“My mother talked about it quite a bit. It was quite horrifying for her to move from London, England to the Canadian wilderness,” he says.

Buntzen gets its name from Johannes Buntzen, BCER’s first general manager. According to Ferries & Fjord, the power stations weren’t the first industry on the Arm. The area was populated as early as 1880 by a Japanese Logging Camp. Between 1902 and 1914 around 500 men camped up there while they worked on a tunnel from Coquitlam Lake to Buntzen Lake.

Vancouver’s rapid growth soon demanded more power, and Power Station #2 opened in 1914.

Robert Lyon architect

Rumour has it, #2 was designed by Francis Rattenbury, the architect who designed the Parliament buildings and the Empress Hotel in Victoria, and the Courthouse on West Georgia. It certainly looks like his work—large, gothic and creepy (Rattenbury, who was a bit of a jerk, was eventually murdered by his trophy wife’s 18-year-old lover). But according to Building the West, #2 was designed by Robert Lyon, an architect employed by BCER.

Buntzen Power Station #1 — Power Station #1. Eve Lazarus photo, July 2017

The Wigwam Inn at Indian Arm

by Eve Lazarus on December 10, 2016

I finally got to motor up Indian Arm and see the Wigwam Inn–well from the outside. You can’t get inside unless you’re a member of the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club.

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

It seems crazy to me that it’s still fairly inaccessible (unless you own a boat), yet in 1910 there were four different sternwheelers taking guests up and down the Arm from Vancouver—the year the Wigwam Inn opened.

Alvo von Alvensleben:

I first “discovered” the Inn about 10 years ago. I was doing some research on Alvo von Alvensleben, an early Vancouver businessman and son of a German count who came to Vancouver in 1904, and not only has a name you couldn’t make up, he’s one of the most fascinating characters in BC’s history. For some reason, he has never rated a biography, so I’ve dedicated a chapter to him in my book At Home with History: the secrets of Greater Vancouver’s heritage homes.

Benny Dickens, an advertising manager for the Daily Province saw potential in creating a resort and bought up a few hundred acres at Indian Arm in the early 1900s. He quickly ran out of money and turned to Alvensleben.

Alvensleben financed the construction of the Dominion Building. His private residence is now part of the Crofton House girl’s school in Kerrisdale, he owned a hunting lodge on Somerset in North Vancouver and houses in Pitt Meadows, Surrey and Washington State that are still known as “Alien Acres” and “Spy House.” It was Alvensleben who made the Inn a reality, turning it into a German Luftkurot (fresh-air resort). At the same time, Alvensleben was also selling lots for $200 to $300, and promising a private boat service to Vancouver that “guaranteed to get business people to the office by 9:00 a.m.”

Inn changes hands:

When the war hit, Alvensleben headed to Seattle. The inn which had attracted guests like American millionaires John D. Rockefeller and John Jacob Astor, fell upon tough times after the government seized it in 1914. Over the years, the Inn changed hands many times, and all but disappeared from public view until the early 1960s when William “Fats” Robertson, 34 and his partner Rocky Myers, 30 took control.

In July 1962, Marine Constable Gale Gardener was one of a a couple of boatloads of RCMP officers from the liquor, gambling and prostitution squads, sent up to bust the old resort. They arrested 15 people and uncovered an illegal gambling operation, plates for printing counterfeit money, stolen art and 300 cases of beer. Robertson, and his partner were found guilty of trying to bribe an RCMP officer and received six years in prison. More owners followed until the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club bought the Inn in 1985. Now it’s strictly members only, and there’s no more room at the inn.

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

Tags Alvo von Alvensleben, At Home with History, Benny Dickens, Crofton House, Dominion Building, Indian Arm, Royal Vancouver Yacht Club, Wigwam Inn

Water’s Edge at Presentation House

by Eve Lazarus on April 16, 2016

Next time you’re in the Lower Lonsdale area, drop by Presentation House and check out Water’s Edge. It’s a new interactive exhibit developed by the North Vancouver Museum that shows how the waterfront has changed over the last couple of hundred years. I did the research and wrote the stories, archivist Janet Turner sourced hundreds of photos and maps, and Juan Tanus and his team at Kei Space added the magic. The result is a really interesting look at how industry, infrastructure and development have changed the coastline all the way from Indian Arm to Ambleside.

Water's Edge at Presentation House — Flotsam and Jetsam wall for making your own art assemblage on set-up day.

The sound effects add to the whole experience, as does a floor to ceiling slide show of the blue cabin and accompanying video, as well as a wall of flotsam and jetsam. One of my favourite touches is the two benches from the old ferry building at the bottom of Lonsdale.

North Van has so many stories that it wasn’t hard to come up with close to 100.

One of my favourite stories is the streetcar that hurtled down Lonsdale in 1909 dumping all of its passengers, including the mayor’s wife, into the water.

Several stories came out of Maplewood, which has seen its coastline change from mudflats to a sand and gravel quarry to squatter shacks. Public protest saved the area from becoming another shopping centre, and it’s now a wild bird reserve that’s home to 246 different bird species.

Indian Arm has a plethora of stories. There’s the Wigwam Inn built by Alvo von Alvensleben in 1909. Canada’s only floating post office operated from 1908 to 1970 up and down Burrard Inlet, as did a floating grocery store which visited 25 different wharves five days a week in summer and three in winter. In 1891 Sarah Bernhardt took some time off from her performances at the long defunct Vancouver Opera House and went duck shooting at Indian Arm.

Water's Edge — Wigwam Inn, 1910. Built by Alvo Alvensleben the Inn attracted people like John Rockefeller and John Jacob Astor. CVA OUT P991.2

There’s stories from what was once Moodyville, named after Sewell P. Moody who went down on a ship in 1875, but not before leaving a message on some driftwood that said “S.P. Moody all lost.” And there’s the fire at the grain elevators 100 years later that claimed five lives.

Many stories come from the Mission Reserve. Their lacrosse team won the 1932 BC Championship. Emily Carr visited several times, painted and wrote about the area, and there are the very unpleasant stories that came out of the Residential School that sat near St. Paul’s Church until its demolition in 1959.

Some of the really amazing stories were the ones that didn’t happen—the aborted plans such as the Capilano Airfield, and if that had gone ahead, would have turned North Van into a very different place than it is today.

Tags Al Neil, Alvo von Alvensleben, Capilano Airfield, Carole Itter, Dollarton Pleasure Faire, emily carr, Joe Capilano, Juan Tanus, Kei Space, North Vancouver Museum and Archives, Presentation House, Sarah Bernhardt, Sewell P. Moody, Vancouver Opera House, Water's Edge, Wigwam Inn

The Former Houses of Beach Avenue

by Eve Lazarus on March 17, 2013

For the first half of last century, houses lined the water side of Beach Avenue, from the Burrard Street Bridge to Stanley Park

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

When I first started researching Alvo von Alvensleben some years ago I made several road trips to see how many of the buildings associated with him had withstood the bulldozer. Happily many did. His private home (1910-1913) at the time a 20-acre estate in Kerrisdale, is now the “old residence” at the Crofton Girl’s School, the Wigwam Inn is owned by the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club, the Dominion Building still dominates the corner at West Hastings and Cambie, his hunting lodge in North Vancouver is a private residence, and houses that he built for employees in Pitt Meadows, Port Mann and Issaquah, Washington still exist.

Taken from the Sylvia Hotel, 2013. CVA 2013-002.1

1409 Nicola Street:

But I was intrigued by one that didn’t.

In 1909 the city directory lists Alvensleben’s home as 1409 Nicola Street, but when I went to track down the address, I landed on the grassy promenade of Beach Avenue with nary a house in sight.

It turns out that the water side of Beach Avenue was lined with houses right up to the 1950s. A newspaper article from 1950, reports that the City expropriated 14 sea-side houses in 1929 with the intention of creating our current scenic drive from English Bay to the Burrard Street Bridge.

“Depression, war and housing shortages have since thwarted the Park Board’s scheme to tear down the houses and landscape the property into a seashore drive which would give motorists a panoramic view of English Bay and West End residents several blocks of new ornamental parkland.”

It looks like 1409 Nicola may have been one of these houses situated between Bidwell and Nicola, at least there was still a listing for it in 1950—the only house over Beach Drive.

Then I read a memoir by Martin Nordegg called “The Possibilities of Canada are Truly Great,” written about the period from 1906 to 1924. Nordegg writes that he was sent to British Columbia in 1909 to check up on Alvensleben on behalf of a German Bank. “This German” he calls him, “had induced German aristocrats to entrust him with large amounts of capital for investment. His name was Alvo von Alvensleben. His residence looked like a castle on the Rhine with turrets and bastions.”

Joe Fortes house on Beach Avenue — Joe Fortes and his sweet little cabin at the foot of Bidwell Street. Demolished in 1922. CVA BuP111, colourized by Canadian Colour

Beach Avenue Houses:

I went to the Vancouver Archives to look for pictures of these houses. Couldn’t find one. And then a few weeks back I saw a picture of Carol Haber in the Vancouver Sun holding a 1913 photograph recently donated to the Archives. Heather Gordon, Archives Manager, was kind enough to send me this photo—and for a while I thought I had Alvo’s house–the one at the foot of Nicola as described by Nordegg. Unfortunately the photo was taken at the top of what’s now the Sylvia Hotel, so it couldn’t be Nicola, but it’s a great photo and maybe some more will start to emerge.

Heather says that the Archives are posting a blog about the area in the next little while. Can’t wait to learn more about that area. Does anyone remember these houses or have any photos of them?

For more on the Englesea Lodge which is the apartment block on the top left of the photo see: The Life and Death of the Englesea Lodge

Tags 1409 Nicola Street, Alvo von Alvensleben, Carol Haber, City of Vancouver Archives, Crofton Girl's School, Dominion Building, Heather Gordon, Martin Nordegg, Royal Vancouver Yacht Club, Wigwam Inn

The Hunting Lodge on Somerset Street in North Vancouver

by Eve Lazarus on February 24, 2013

The house on Somerset Street in North Vancouver was built in 1912 as a hunting lodge for Alvo von Alvensleben.

The story of Alvo von Alvensleben and the hunting lodge on Somerset appears in At Home with History: the secrets of Vancouver’s heritage houses:

A couple of weeks ago I was taking photos of this house on Somerset when Bob Findlay politely asked me what I was doing skulking around in his bushes. Fortunately, Bob, the current owner, has researched his house’s social history and kindly invited me inside to take a look around.

The house was built in 1912 as a hunting lodge for Alvo von Alvensleben. One of the first houses built in the area, it sits on a high piece of property overlooking Burrard Inlet. A century ago, it would have looked like it was carved out of the forest, with a grand wrap-around veranda and a circular carriage drive.

Son of a Count:

In 1912, Alvensleben was at the top of his career. The son of a German count, he came to Vancouver in 1904 with $4 in his pocket and dreams of finding gold in the Wild West. He was about 10 years too late, and ended up fishing for salmon until he made enough money to speculate in property.

He was wildly successful. Before WW1 he brought millions of dollars of German investment into BC. His family home is now part of the Crofton Girl’s School in Kerrisdale. He developed the Wigwam Inn into a luxury resort, financed the Dominion Building on Hastings Street, and he owned huge tracts of land all over BC, including Pitt Meadows.

Branded a Spy:

Like many land speculators Alvo went broke in 1913. While he was out of the country the following year, war broke, rumours abounded that he was a spy and he couldn’t return to Canada. The federal government confiscated everything he owned, and what’s really fascinating is that you can still see a bit of the red wax on the windows of his Somerset House when the government impounded the house.

I’ve written about Alvensleben and this house in At Home with History, and the history of the house gets interesting again in 1931 when the parents of actor John Drainie rented it for a few years. Orson Welles called him the greatest radio actor in the world. Young John was self-taught, and in a biography written by his daughter Bronwyn, she says one Christmas when her father was about 15 he directed a production of Twelfth Night in the living room.

The Gundry’s bought the house in 1945 and the family lived there until 1972. Mr. Gundry was a psychiatrist, and their daughter Fran was an archivist in Victoria. She told me that she spent years searching for secret tunnels but never found any.

Senator Ray Perrault and his wife Barbara, a former City of North Vancouver councillor lived here from 1974 until 1995.

Spy Story:

My favourite story of the house comes from Don Luxton, who has connected it to another of Alvensleben’s properties on Harris Road in Pitt Meadows, and to Baron Carl von Mackensen’s house in Port Kells. Don says that after war broke out there were rumours that the Pitt Meadows house, the Somerset Street House and von Mackensen’s Port Kell’s house were used by the Germans to pass secret signals by mirror. A century later it’s hard to imagine–and it’s a long distance between the three houses–but it’s possible. They did find a secret radio room in the turret of the Port Kells house, now the Baron’s Manor Pub.

One of the most significant houses in Pitt Meadows in 1912 — 14776 Harris Road, Pitt Meadows

Tags 14776 Harris Road, 437 Somerset Street, Alvo von Alvensleben, Baron von Mackensen, Crofton Girl's School, Dominion Building, Don Luxton, Pitt Meadows, Spy House, Wigwam Inn

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