Every Place Has a Story

Vancouver’s O Canada House

FacebookTwitterShare
O Canada House
O Canada House, 1114 Barclay Street. Vancouver Archives photo. 1986

I first came across the O Canada house when I was writing At Home with History around 2005. In those days, there were only hard copies of the city directories at Vancouver Archives and Google Maps was still in the future. Research meant walking neighbourhoods, standing in the hedgerows and staring up at gorgeous old heritage houses. I was still taking photos on film.

O Canada house
Mark Dunn photo, June 2023
The Florida

I was interested in 1170 Barclay Street, which before its recent development, was a simple two-storey, grey stucco affair with palm trees carved into the cement above the door. The palms evidently gave it the improbable name of “The Florida.” The building’s claim to fame was that it housed the famous Italian sculptor Charles Marega and his wife Berta in the early 1930s.

O Canada house
Mark Dunn photo, June 2023
1114 Barclay Street

There were only two houses left on Barclay. The Queen Anne house at #1114 caught my attention, wedged in as it is between a low-level apartment building and a tower, and wearing a large sign: “Built 1897 here in this house ‘O Canada’ Buchan version was written in 1909.”

What !?! Our national anthem was written in the West End. Well,  sort of.

1114 first appears in the street directories in 1903 and the owner is listed as William Walsh of Palace Clothing. Ewing Buchan, moved into the house in 1905 after relocating to Vancouver to manage the Bank of Hamilton. He must have spent many a night, jotting down the English lyrics to Canada’s National anthem. He sent it to his brother, Brigadier-General Lawrence Buchan in Quebec, who with his friend Brenton MacNab of the Montreal Star, made a few changes, and rearranged it.

Ewing Buchan O Canada house
Ewing Buchan. Vancouver Archives photo, ca.1905

Who would have thought it would stick – at least for a decade or two? The song was a favourite in the West End house, and daughter Olive would belt out the tune on the piano. Buchan’s lyrics were first performed at the Vancouver Club in February 1910, where he was president.

With thanks to Chuck Davis who ran the lyrics in a 1981 Province article:

O Canada:

O Canada, our heritage, our love

Thy worth we praise all other lands above

From sea to sea, throughout thy length,

From pole to borderland

At Britain’s side, whate’er betide,

Unflinchingly we’ll stand

With heart we sing, “God Save the King”

“Guide thou the Empire wide,” do we implore

“And prosper Canada from shore to shore.”

O Canada House
Barclay Street June 2023. Mark Dunn photo

Unfortunately, not everyone shared Buchan’s enthusiasm for the song. It lost out around 1929 to the version by R.S. Weir that every school kid sings today.

In 1915, the Buchans moved to Shaughnessy and sold the house to Dr. Robert F. Greer. The house underwent a major renovation and received heritage designation in 1998. It’s now a Bed and Breakfast.

Related:

© All rights reserved. Unless otherwise indicated, all blog content copyright Eve Lazarus.

FacebookTwitterShare

1 comment on “Vancouver’s O Canada House”

We used this house as a ‘B and B’, and it was beautiful inside and out. Love to see some of the old homes from a very long time ago. Homes and event centers with little to no parking. Well, because there was little to no cars on the road at one time.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.