Eve Lazarus - Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the Citys Hidden History

VANCOUVER EXPOSED

VANCOUVER
EXPOSED

SEARCHING
FOR THE CITYS
HIDDEN
HISTORY

EVE
LAZARUS

ARSENAL PULP PRESS
VANCOUVER

VANCOUVER EXPOSED

Copyright 2020 by Eve Lazarus

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any part by any meansgraphic, electronic or mechanicalwithout the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may use brief excerpts in a review, or in the case of photocopying in Canada, a licence from Access Copyright.

ARSENAL PULP PRESS

Suite 202 211 East Georgia St.

Vancouver, BC V6A 1Z6

Canada

arsenalpulp.com

The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the British Columbia Arts Council for its publishing program, and the Government of Canada, and the Government of British Columbia (through the Book Publishing Tax Credit Program), for its publishing activities.

The author gratefully acknowledges the financial support of the Yosef Wosk Publication Fund at Vancouver Heritage Foundation.

Arsenal Pulp Press acknowledges the xmkym (Musqueam), Swxw7mesh (Squamish) and slilwta (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, custodians of the traditional, ancestral and unceded territories where our office is located. We pay respect to their histories, traditions and continuous living cultures and commit to accountability, respectful relations and friendship.

COVER IMAGE BY Canadian Photo Co., City of Vancouver Archives, Bu P726

COVER AND INTERIOR DESIGN BY Jazmin Welch

BACK COVER PHOTOGRAPHS TOP TO BOTTOM BY Tom Carter collection, John Denniston photo, NVMA 15806, courtesy Lisa Pantages

PHOTOGRAPHS FOR CHAPTER OPENERS BY Catherine Rose

EDITED BY Shirarose Wilensky

COPY EDITED BY Derek Fairbridge

PROOFREAD BY Alison Strobel

INDEXED BY Stephen Ullstrom

Printed and bound in Canada

LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION:

Title: Vancouver exposed : searching for the citys hidden history / Eve Lazarus.

Names: Lazarus, Eve, author.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200211501 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200211552 |
ISBN 9781551528298 (softcover) | ISBN 9781551528304 (HTML)

Subjects: LCSH: Vancouver (B.C.)History. | LCSH: Vancouver (B.C.)Buildings, structures, etc.History. | LCSH: NeighborhoodsBritish ColumbiaVancouverHistory. | LCSH: Vancouver (B.C.)HistoryPictorial works. | LCSH: Vancouver (B.C.)Buildings, structures, etc.HistoryPictorial works. | LCSH: NeighborhoodsBritish Columbia VancouverHistoryPictorial works.

Classification: LCC FC3847.4 .L39 2020 | DDC 971.1/33dc23

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

I started my blog Every Place Has a Story in 2010 as a way to add to stories from my first book, At Home with History: The Untold Secrets of Greater Vancouvers Heritage Homes. The blog quickly became my obsession, and I looked forward to digging into a new story every week. When people asked me what my blog was about, I told them it was about history and heritage houses and murder. But that really meant anything I thought was interestingfrom street photographers to ghosts, research tips to legendary women, and others who are typically not found on the front page of newspapers.

Later I started the Every Place Has a Story Facebook page and soon I was connecting with bloggers, tour guides, artists, academics and amateur historians who shared a love for Vancouvers quirks and the citys often seedy history. Gradually people started to post comments and personal anecdotes from their own family histories, and little by little the stories took on new life. These observations and memories, as well as photos scanned from family albums, then helped shape the direction of this book.

Early in 2019, I mentioned to Arsenal Pulp publisher Brian Lam that my blog was approaching its tenth anniversary, and I was thinking of self-publishing a book of my stories. Brian said Arsenal might be interested and asked me to send him a proposal. I did, and I am thrilled that this is the result.

Vancouver Exposed is not meant to be read from start to finish. It jumps from walled-up sculptures to missing murals to repurposed buildings. There are crashes, explosions, scary institutions and crimes. There are amazing athletes, squatters, architects and a sea captain. There are stories of big plans that never happened, missing theatres, a fake house and not-so-secret tunnels.

The book is divided into six areas, starting with whats always been one of the citys most important intersections, Granville and West Georgia.

There are still regal old buildings dotting the area around that intersection, and over the years, Ive been in and out of several of themthe Hudsons Bay department store, the Vancouver Art Gallery, the Hotel Vancouver and the Hotel Georgia. I may have even noticed the three nurses looking down from their eleventh-storey parapets on the Georgia Medical-Dental Building, but it wasnt until the early part of this century that I gave any thought to these buildings, or what was there before them. Much later, when I fell in love with Vancouvers sleazy underbelly and dwindling heritage, I found that our civic enthusiasm for pulling things down has always been with us. In fact, its astounding when you think in terms of not what weve lost but what weve struggled to retain.

The section about the Downtown Eastside includes stories that explore how Hastings Street evolved from the Great White Way to our current mess. It looks at Woodwards department stores forgotten elevator operators, Christmas window displays and $1.49 Day, and travels through tunnels, stations and terminals.

In the West End section we have the much-loved English Bay lifeguard and swimming teacher Joe Fortes, successful salon and beauty school owner Maxine MacGilvray, the English Bay Pier, the Hippocampus fish and chip shop and the distinctive Stuart Building. The neighbourhood is still home to the century-old Polar Bear Swim, a long-forgotten cemetery and several of Vancouvers buried houses.

In the section of the book that encompasses the city west of Main Street, there are ghost signs on buildings to remind us of businesses past, and there are the houses of Downtown South, that mostly exist only in memory. There is an exotic museum that is now a record store, a former bootlegging joint turned restaurant and a sheet-metal rocket ship.

In the section about what lies east of Main Street theres Chuck Curries red-and-white polka-dotted house, an infant memorial garden, an axe murder, the annual summer spectacle of the Pacific National Exhibition and the Japanese internment camps at Hastings Park.

The North Vancouver section features a murder in a convent and a monument to remember the atrocities of the residential school system. Just across Burrard Inlet from downtown Vancouver, Canadas oldest nudist camp, an annual belly flop competition and an inn that has served as a resort, a brothel and an illegal gambling establishment are all fair game.

Got your own story about Vancouvers hidden history, or something to add? Post a comment on my blog, or get in touch at . Id love to hear from you!