Vancouver History: City Scenes
byTrying to come up with themes for history posts is sometimes a bit tough. I’ve done everything from feature photos of long-gone hotels and aerial images of the region, to people walking dogs down Hastings Street a hundred years ago. Sometimes it’s the oddities that are the most interesting, such as that time an elephant went parading down Granville.
Browsing the Vancouver Public Library and City of Vancouver Archives I have come up with a collection of City Scenes — everyday moments in time that have been captured and preserved.
1880s – Hastings and Cambie
1890s – Streetcar at entrance to Stanley Park
1939 – Pender at Beatty, looking West
1946 – Granville at Smithe, The Orpheum
1948 – Pedestrians at Hastings & Granville
1951 – Granville at Robson
1967 – Granville at Smithe, looking South on Granville
1972 – Beatty between Georgia and Robson
1978 – Balcony on East Pender
I have left in the archive location numbers on each of the photos as you can order prints of historical photos from both the Vancouver Public Library and the City of Vancouver Archives.
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Thanks, Beck. I have a very clear memory of the last on your list (“Balcony on E. Pender), such is my age and where I spent the most time in my youth. 🙂
Skanky looking old town isn’t it? And those are some of the more picturesque bits.
I love seeing the old photos of Vancouver. Remember the old film footage they had found of Vancouver? I believe the guy filming it was from Seattle and riding a Trolley downtown. Amazing stuff. I took my father to the exhibit they had at the VAG regarding the photos of the 50’s and 60’s. I think it had more of an impact on him then me. It really brought him back. He kept saying “I remember, this is how it was.”