This week’s theme is a not-so-subtle reminder that there is a civic election happening this Saturday, November 19, 2011. The City of Vancouver has had 39 individual mayors in its 125 years, here are just a few of them in action over the last century. 1886 – VPL Accession Number: 508. The first council meeting […]

HistoryPin has been developed by We Are What We Do (a non-profit company) and Google to mashup maps with historic photos from communities around the world. The map works by adding user-contributed photos to Google Maps and Street Views. You can zoom into communities and pin points for a true “the and now” view of […]

One walk around Yaletown’s Roundhouse Community Centre and you can see traces of its past. An engine, tracks that lead nowhere, and the giant turntable in the plaza. Once the terminus of the CPR’s transcontinental line, the Roundhouse is almost as old as Yaletown itself. Photo credit: vancouver4life.com on Flickr Yaletown is named after Yale, […]

It’s always a challenge to come up with a theme for my weekly series. However, being that this month is all about facial hair growth for Movember, I decided to make “moustaches” my focus this week. All of the photos below were taken in Vancouver over the last century and found via the Vancouver Archives. […]

Over the years a few Presidents of the United States of America have visited Vancouver. Whether it was during the depression or war years or for speaking engagements after their terms. In 130 years the Commander in Chief has been no stranger to our city, although some visits have been few and far-between. American Presidents […]

It’s a happy Halloween in Vancouver as I watch robots, Lego men, Sailor Moon, and plenty of pirates walk by this morning. I thought it would be fun to check out what Vancouverites did for this haunting occasion in the past but I was unable to find many results for “Halloween” during my research but […]

Checking in on my favourite website this morning I saw a small announcement at the top of the page: “The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver goes to press! Chuck Davis’s final gift to the people of Greater Vancouver, his History of Metropolitan Vancouver, has been completed and will appear in bookstores November 15, 2011.” […]

With another year comes another battle downtown over a historic property that is slated for demolition to make room for a high-rise. This time around it’s the Legg Residence on Harwood that’s on the chopping block. Listed as one of Heritage Vancouver’s Top 10 Endangered Sites for 2011, it’s one of only three West End […]

It was on this day in 1893 that the Hudson’s Bay Company opened a store at the corner of Georgia and Granville streets. 118 years later, the company is still in the same location (albeit in a different building). It’s been a shopping destination, a meeting place, and a beacon of Canadian pride during the […]

On this day in history, September 21, 1980, the Stanley Park seawall loop was officially completed. To avoid erosion around Stanley Park, work began on the first part of the seawall in 1917 thanks to the vision of W.S. Rawlings and James Cunningham’s initiatives with the Vancouver Park Board. Over the next several decades it […]