Metro Vancouver Regional District Regional District

"This book is about "surviving" and is divided into three sections: an introduction that looks back to my 1996 book and reproduces some of the images and thoughts from that tranquil time nearly 30 years ago; a second section about "surviving" as an adjective--what has survived of its fine buildings and beautiful neighbourhoods; and a third one of "surviving" as a verb--how people are surviving in Vancouver. I have used "Vancouver" both as a term for the city itself and sometimes for Metro Vancouver--the region which includes Burnaby, New Westminster, the North and West Vancouvers, Surrey, Richmond, Delta, Port Moody, White Rock, the Coquitlams and the Langleys. The final section of the book considers that geography, and the "great escapes" further afield."-- Provided by publisher

126 pages : illustrations ; 28 cm

Few would dispute that these days Vancouver is a prime craft beer destination, with over 70 breweries in the greater Vancouver area and 35+ in Vancouver proper. Beer has shaped the city’s culture, and in turn, Vancouver’s idiosyncratic identity has also shaped its craft beer. But how did it all begin? In this rigorously researched deep dive into the history of craft beer in Vancouver, beer historian and enthusiast Noëlle Phillips follows independent brewing from the city’s inception in 1886 to the onset of prohibition in 1917 and, hopping over the “big beer” period of 1920–1980, delves into the explosion of micro, small-batch and craft breweries that dot the city’s neighbourhoods today. She traces the smaller, lesser-known breweries, brewers, and owners through archival materials, newspaper accounts, and personal interviews. Along the way she uncovers stories and details that have been largely unknown even to local beer writers and aficionados. Illustrated with photos, original newspaper clippings, and maps, with stops into basement archives and sunlit tap rooms, Brewmasters and Brewery Creek is an inviting and exciting addition to books on the city’s history that will appeal to beer-lovers and history buffs alike.

398 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm

"Essays and photographs that document the anti-Asian riots of 1907 in the context of contemporary anti-Asian sentiment. White Riot: The 1907 Anti-Asian Riots in Vancouver explores the conditions leading up to and the impact of a demonstration and parade in Vancouver, Canada, organized by the Asiatic Exclusion League and the ensuing mob attack on the city's Chinese Canadian and Japanese Canadian communities. Emblematic of a systemically racist era, White Riot reveals the social and political environment of the time, when racialized communities were targeted through legislated as well as physical acts of exclusion and violence. Based on 360 Riot Walk, a 360-degree video walking tour by artist and author Henry Tsang, White Riot offers an intersectional approach to this pivotal moment in the history of racialized communities and a cultural and social context for understanding for the current wave of anti-Asian sentiment. It features photographs of the riots colourized by Tsang as well as those of contemporary Vancouver where the riots took place. Essays by Tsang and others speak to the colonial times that preceded and followed the 1907 riots, as well as issues that Chinese and Japanese communities (and other racialized communities) in North America are facing today. White Riot poses the question: in the current ethos of anti-racism and decolonization, what does it take to reconcile our collective histories within the legacy of white supremacy? Includes essays by the Asian Canadian Labour Alliance, Paul Englesberg, Melody Ma, Angela May and Nicole Yakashiro, Jeffery R. Masuda, Aaron Franks, Audrey Kobayashi and Trevor Wideman, and Andy Yan, with an introduction by Patricia E. Roy."-- Provided by publisher

191 pages : illustrations (chiefly color), color maps ; 21 x 26 cm

"A brisk chronicle of Vancouver, BC, from early days to its emergence as a global metropolis, refracted through the events, characters and communities that have shaped the city. In Becoming Vancouver award-winning historian Daniel Francis follows the evolution of the city from early habitation by the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations, to the area's settlement as a mill town, to the flourishing speakeasies and brothels during the 1920s, to the years of poverty and protest during the 1930s followed by the long wartime and postwar boom, to the city's current status as real-estate investment choice of the global super-rich. Tracing decades of transformation, immigration and economic development, Francis examines the events and characters that have defined the city's geography, economy and politics. Francis enlivens his text with rich characterizations of the people who shaped Vancouver: determined Chief Joe Capilano, who in 1906 took a delegation to England to appeal directly to King Edward VII for better treatment of Indigenous peoples; brilliant and successful Won Alexander Cumyow, the first recorded person of Chinese descent born in Canada; L.D. Taylor, irrepressible ex-Chicagoan who still holds the record as the city's longest-serving mayor; and tireless activist Helena Gutteridge, suffragist and Vancouver's first woman councillor. Vancouver has been called a city without a history, partly because of its youth but also because of the way it seems to change so quickly. Newcomers to the city, arriving by the thousands every year, find few physical reminders of what was before, making a new history like Becoming Vancouver long overdue."-- Provided by publisher

265 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

"In the summer of 1865 when Captain Edward Stamp began to organize the construction of a small sawmilling operation on the south shore of Burrard Inlet, he likely never realized that a future metropolis was in the making. The fledgling Stamp's Mill, later to become known as Hastings Mill, was Vancouver's first community -- a townsite inhabited by an eclectic mix of colourful characters from widely diverse backgrounds. Life centered on the iconic Hastings Mill Store, where one came to obtain groceries, hardware, mail and the warmth of human interaction around an oil drum fire. Historic times aplenty unfolded at Hastings Mill. Here residents rallied to assist victims of the Great Vancouver Fire in 1886. Cargo loads of lumber of legendary size and quality were shipped to markets near and far. Dominion Day festivities were celebrated in fine style on a sports field of mill sawdust. Indigenous occupants of the region engaged in mill employment and commerce. Chinook jargon was widely spoken, the multi-lingual trade language of the era. When time and local demographics ultimately spelled the death knell for the sawmill and its weathered structures in 1930, an unlikely group of determined ladies rose to the challenge of saving the Hastings Mill Store, Vancouver's oldest building."-- Back cover

xiii, 329 pages : illustrations, map ; 23 cm

Jesse Donaldson’s Fool's gold: the life and legacy of Vancouver's official town fool explores the dynamic cultural maturation and deeply unconventional civic adaptation of Vancouver's urban landscape during the transformative late 1960s. The narrative illustrates how the shifting social realities of this growing metropolitan environment—defined by rapid modernization and the emergence of vibrant countercultural networks—encouraged a unique, collaborative approach to community reflection and civic identity. By detailing the life of Joachim Foikis, who successfully petitioned for a public grant to serve as the city's traditional "fool," the text highlights how integrating historical, philosophical roles into the modern urban fabric fostered shared dialogue and social cohesion. Ultimately, the account demonstrates that patiently embracing alternative cultural expressions and cooperatively cultivating spaces for public, intellectual engagement were essential steps in shaping a responsive, culturally vibrant, and deeply enduring civic community in the heart of British Columbia's largest coastal city.

"Fool's Gold explores the life and times of Joachim Foikis, Vancouver's "Official Town Fool" who spread "joy and confusion" during the late 60s and early 1970s."-- Provided by publisher

123 pages : illustrations ; 17 cm.

Women in Blue is a comprehensive history of women in the VPD from 1904 (as it turns out) through 1975. For decades, VPD history noted that the first females were hired in 1912, but it turns out four matrons were hired between 1904 and 1912. The matrons performed many of the same duties as the police women who were hired in 1912.

266 pages : illustrations (some colour), portraits ; 28 cm

Created through a continued partnership between the City of Vancouver and the University of British Columbia, this book is an indication of both partners’ commitments to collaboratively plan and develop a UNESCO World Heritage Status application for Vancouver’s Chinatown. This edition builds on the commemorative version unveiled at the Vancouver City Council’s special meeting in Chinatown on April 22, 2018, capturing the historical moment when the City formally apologized for its past involvement in the discrimination and racism against early Chinese Canadian immigrants and their families. Chinese migrants arrived in what is now known as Canada as early as 1788. Their contributions were often forgotten as part of a long history of racism and discrimination in Canada. Journeys of Hope: Challenging Discrimination and Building on Vancouver Chinatown’s Legacies captures the story of how early Chinese migrants helped transform societies around the world, and how Vancouver’s Chinatown and other Chinatowns throughout Canada and the Pacific region are the living legacies of that transformation. Written in both English and Chinese, Journeys of Hope reaffirms the importance of multilingual engagement in community building, outreach, and education. Authored by Henry Yu and co-edited by Sarah Ling, Baldwin Wong and Szu Shen.

87 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 21 cm

Greg Girard's photographs of Vancouver from the 1970s and early 1980s show us the city's final days as a port town at the end of the railway line. Soon after Vancouver began to be noticed by the wider world (Expo 86 is generally agreed on as the pivotal moment), the city began refashioning itself as an urban resort on nature's doorstep and attracting attention as a destination for real estate investment. At that time, long before post-9/11 security concerns sealed off the working waterfront from the city, many of Vancouver's downtown and east side streets ended at the waterfront, an area filled with commercial fishing docks, cargo terminals, and bars and cafes for waterfront workers and sailors. Pawn-shop windows downtown displayed outboard motors, chainsaws and fishing gear. Wandering these streets, living in cheap hotels, Girard photographed the workaday (and night) world of the city where he grew up. The photographs in Under Vancouver 1972-1982 were made before Girard began earning a living as a magazine photographer, later establishing a formal practice as an artist. They reveal an early interest in the hidden and the overlooked, the use of color film at night, and the extended photographic inquiry of a specific place, all of which became signature features of later books such as City of Darkness and City of Darkness Revisited (about the infamous Kowloon Walled City), Phantom Shanghai and Hanoi Calling. Under Vancouver 1972-1982 is the first comprehensive collection of Girard's early photographs of Vancouver. Made in and of the moment, a young photographer's earliest engagements (often featuring the underside of the city), the pictures now form an unintended photographic record of a Vancouver that has all but disappeared

196 pages : illustrations ; 26 cm

"Where Mountains Meet the Sea commemorates the 125th anniversary of the District of North Vancouver's incorporation as a municipality. Combining hundreds of illustrations with the personal accounts of residents and a lively text, the book presents the story of North Vancouver in all its colour and complexity. Instead of a conventional chronological narrative, Where Mountains Meet the Sea divides the story of North Vancouver's development into three major parts: 1) the origins of the community, its First Nations residents and the development of its waterfront; 2) the political and cultural evolution of the community; and 3) the development of the mountain resorts and the creation of the many parks which characterize the North Shore. From the District's auspicious beginnings with the sawmill at Moodyville dominating the industry of Burrard Inlet, through the postwar population boom that saw the municipality evolve from a suburb of Vancouver into a bustling community in its own right, to the District's rich legacy of outdoor recreation, the text, residents' anecdotes and photographs create a vivid portrait of the development of a thriving community. Each section of the book is richly illustrated in full colour with biographies, eyewitness memories, artifacts from the collection of the North Vancouver Museum and Archives, historic photographs, maps and charts."-- Provided by publisher

ix, 245 pages : illustrations (some color), maps (some color) ; 29 cm

For centuries, borders have been central to salmon management customs on the Salish Sea, but how those borders were drawn has had very different effects on the Northwest salmon fishery. Native peoples who fished the Salish Sea--which includes Puget Sound in Washington State, the Strait of Georgia in British Columbia, and the Strait of Juan de Fuca--drew social and cultural borders around salmon fishing locations and found ways to administer the resource in a sustainable way. Nineteenth-century Euro-Americans, who drew the Anglo-American border along the forty-ninth parallel, took a very different approach and ignored the salmon's patterns and life cycle. As the canned salmon industry grew and more people moved into the region, class and ethnic relations changed. Soon illegal fishing, broken contracts, and fish piracy were endemic--conditions that contributed to rampant overfishing, social tensions, and international mistrust. The Nature of Borders is about the ecological effects of imposing cultural and political borders on this critical West Coast salmon fishery. This transnational history provides an understanding of the modern Pacific salmon crisis and is particularly instructive as salmon conservation practices increasingly approximate those of the pre-contact Native past. The Nature of Borders reorients borderlands studies toward the Canada-U.S. border and also provides a new view of how borders influenced fishing practices and related management efforts over time.

xi, 271 pages, 27 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm.

In this ambitious history, Chuck Davis embraced 125 years of material with his signature exuberance and talent for storytelling that made him one of Vancouver's most beloved journalists. This volume represents the culmination of Davis' life as a folk historian, and celebrates his immense contribution to the historical knowledge of the City of Vancouver

xviii, 574 p. : ill., ports. ; 29 cm.

Vancouver has experienced many dramatic changes since its beginnings on the edge of the frontier. Once an almost inaccessible logging town, it has grown to be a major North American urban centre, and a jewel of the Pacific Rim. Within a mere century, it has metamorphosed from a little ventured rainforest to a thriving and cosmopolitan metropolis. This book tells the extraordinary story of that coming of age. 150 striking images, carefully reproduced, capture Vancouver in every phase of its growth. See the boomtown created by the coming of the railway. The land of mansions and motor car bought by the Roaring Twenties. The lean city of the Depression and the war years. The scene of intense urban expansion since the fifties. An entertaining chronicle, this Vancouver photo history is essential for every visitor and resident.

272 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 29 cm.

Map researcher and collector Derek Hayes here presents the sixth in a series of critically acclaimed, award-winning historical atlases. Gathered together in a single volume for the first time, here are the maps that shaped Vancouver and the surrounding Lower Fraser Valley. More than 370 original maps chart the region’s development beginning with the years of discovery and exploration. They depict its days as a fledgling colonial outpost, its appearance on the world scene after the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway, through to its emergence as a postwar Pacific metropolis. These maps evoke such historic events and developments as the founding of Fort Langley, the first settlements on the inlet, and the filling in of False Creek, along with more recent aspects of this richly diverse area such as the real estate boom and the explosive growth of Vancouver. Included are many fascinating plans for schemes that never got off the drawing board.

192 p. : ill. ; 30 cm.

"This book is a history of hypocrisy." So begins Daniel Francis, BC's leading popular historian, as he explores the colourful and ultimately tragic story of prostitution in Vancouver. He writes: "The city's political and social leaders consistently have treated prostitutes as pariahs whose presence was tolerated, sometimes exploited, but never approved. All the while, the authorities collected millions of dollars in fines and licence fees from businesses that everyone knew were, and are, fronts for the sex trade."

192 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 23 cm

LD is the colourful biography of Louis Taylor, the longest-serving mayor in Vancouver's history; he was first elected mayor in 1910, and served off and on until 1934, for a total of eleven years. Taylor's story is also the story of Vancouver in the early decades of the 20th century, a young city experiencing a turbulent adolescence. Louis Taylor, or LD as he was known, arrived in Vancouver from Chicago in 1896 at the age of 39. He got involved in the newspaper business, first as an executive with The Daily Province, then as proprietor of The World, during which time he built the World Tower, which remains one of Vancouver's landmark buildings (now better known as the Sun Tower). He launched his political career in 1902 when he ran successfully for licence commissioner; it was the first of 26 civic elections in which he ran, including 20 for mayor. In his early political life he was considered "the workers' friend" and was opposed by the city's business elite, who portrayed him as corrupt. He also had a reputation for being soft on crime, and was implicated in a 1928 police investigation that lost him an election. But his achievements included the establishment of the airport, a town planning commission, and the water board. His private life, however, was another story, a virtual soap opera that mirrored the ups and downs of his political career; his wife was addicted to opium, and he found himself mired in bigamy and divorce scandals. As Vancouver grew from small frontier town to a major international port city, LD saw the city through the Depression, and in a sense Vancouver grew up under his tutelage. LD: Mayor Louis Taylor and The Rise of Vancouver vividly documents the life of a man who dominated the city for years, and the integral role he played in shaping the Vancouver of today. Winner of the City of Vancouver Book Prize

239 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Vancouver is now North America’s third largest center for film and television production, recently witnessing the filming of Halle Berry’s Catwoman and Will Smith’s I, Robot, among others. But Vancouver has been hosting filmmakers for years, coming into its own in the early 1970s when Robert Altman, Warren Beatty and Julie Christie made McCabe and Mrs. Miller and Mike Nichols, Jack Nicholson and Candice Bergen filmed Carnal Knowledge. Dreaming in the Rain tells the story of how Vancouver became North by Northwest, from its early days as a Hollywood studio backlot to its becoming home to a vibrant indigenous scene that is among the most acclaimed, provocative, independent filmmaking communities anywhere.

236 pages : portraits ; 23 cm

Namely Vancouver traces the fascinating origins and history of Greater Vancouver's place names--its streets, neighbourhoods, waterways, mountains, boroughs, and buildings, among others, in an illustrated historical glossary that takes you behind the ubiquitous signs and symbols, and provides a unique vantage point on the city. For instance, Commercial Drive was originally named Park Drive, as it abutted Clark Park in East Vancouver. As part of the route of the Vancouver-New Westminster interurban railway, Park Drive attracted a lot of new businesses; so much so, that in 1912 it was renamed Commercial Drive. There seems to be no truth to the rumour that Gassy Jack Deighton was so named for his frequent passing of wind. Rather, this instrumental figure in Vancouver's early history--the original site of his pub still forms the division between east and west streets in the city--was named for his windbag tendencies, and the legacy of this saloon keeper lives on in the name of historic Gastown. While many of Vancouver's early surveyors, mayors, and even saloon keepers had the honour of having streets or neighbourhoods named after them, John Morton had a slightly more dubious distinction. As one of the "three greenhorns," Morton went down in history as one of Vancouver's earliest settlers. In return, one of Vancouver's shortest streets is named after him. Lulu Island is named after Lulu Sweet, an actress with a travelling theatre company. Colonel Moody (of Port Moody fame) was smitten with Miss Lulu, and named the island, now known as Richmond, after her. An unorthodox and revealing guide, Namely Vancouver is an ideal book for tourists and Vancouverites alike. Includes numerous historical and contemporary B&W photographs.

299 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

232 pages : illustrations (chiefly color) ; 24 x 30 cm

Covers the city of Vancouver and the surrounding metropolitan area primarily located in the Greater Vancouver Regional District

xiii, 882 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color), color map ; 27 cm

Authored by local historian John Atkin, Strathcona: Vancouver's First Neighbourhood chronicles the vibrant history, architectural evolution, and immigrant roots of Vancouver's oldest residential district. The book traces how the working-class enclave—sandwiched between industrial waterfronts and the city's commercial core—became a diverse melting pot of European, Asian, and Indigenous residents who built tight-knit community networks in the shadow of urban expansion. Through archival photographs and detailed municipal records, the text highlights the fierce neighborhood activism that repeatedly saved the area from twentieth-century freeway demolition and industrial rezoning. A keen insight drawn from the work is how grassroots architectural preservation serves as a radical form of working-class self-defense; by fighting to protect their modest wooden homes and walkable streets from municipal "renewal" projects, Strathcona residents proved that neighborhood history and vernacular architecture are vital bulwarks against the erasure of marginalized communities by corporate and bureaucratic urban planning.

93 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Absolutely unique in its presentational style, Vancouver: A Visual History is a delightful and important book. This stunning, full-colour historical atlas brings to life Vancouver s first fourteen decades, beginning with a map of the 1850s depicting the land use, economy and settlement patterns of its first peoples, and ending with a map of the 1980s. Using a repeating grid format, in which each ten-year period of the city s history is examined through the application of the same criteria, each decade is introduced by a full-colour map that illustrates land use patterns. A column of text to the left of this map describes the major land use changes that have occurred since the previous decade; to the right of the map are notes that provide related details of the city s evolving history. Following each double-page map, the reader is introduced to the prominent personalities of the decade, in the area of sports, politics, business, labour, culture and community service, as well as given an overview of each period s economic focus, settlement patterns, political directions and key historical events

xi, 84 p. : ill. (some col.), col. maps, ports. ; 32 cm.

Co-authored by B.A. McKelvie and Charles Lillard, Fort Langley, Birthplace of British Columbia chronicles the foundational history of the Hudson's Bay Company fur-trading post established along the lower Fraser River in 1827. The book details how the fort evolved from a modest trading stockade dealing in salmon and beaver pelts into the geopolitical staging ground where British colonial rule was officially proclaimed in 1858. Drawing on historical journals and company records, the text illustrates the complex economic web linking fur traders, maritime supply ships, and local Indigenous populations. A keen insight drawn from the work is how the romantic narrative of a colony's "birthplace" obscures its corporate origins; by tracing British Columbia's administrative roots directly back to a commercial trading monopoly, the authors reveal that the region's political foundation was engineered less by heroic statecraft than by the ruthless logistical demands of the fur trade.

112 pages, [8] pages of plates : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm

Popular wisdom maintains that the colourful Chinese quarters of Canadian, American, and Australian cities owe their existence to the generations of Chinese immigrants who have made their lives there. The restaurants, pagodas, and neon lights are seen as intrinsically connected to the Chinese and their immigrant experience in the West. Kay Anderson argues, however, that "Chinatown" is a Western construction, illustrative of a process of cultural domination that gave European settlers in North America and Australia the power to define and shape the district according to their own images and interests. -- From publisher's description

x, 323 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

First published in 1911, Legends of Vancouver was an immediate sensation, introducing young readers to the fascinating customs and rich cultural life of the Pacific Coast Salish. Retold by Canada's best known native storyteller, E. Pauline Johnson-Teka- hionwake, these tales of romantic heroism, mystic enchantment, and magical transformations still have the power to captivate. Vibrant and charming, authentic and enduring, Legends of Vancouver has become a classic of Canadian children's and native literature

141 pages : illustrations ; 21 cm.

Saltwater City pays tribute to those who went through the hard times, to those who swallowed their pride, to those who were powerless and humiliated, but who still carried on. They all had faith that things would be better for future generations. They have been proven correct.Canada’s first Chinese arrived in British Columbia in 1858 from California. Almost all men—merchants, peasants, and laborers — and almost all from eight rural counties in the Pearl River delta in what is now Guangdong province — they came in search of gold and better fortune, escaping the rebellions, flood and drought of their homeland.By 1863 over 4,000 Chinese lived in B.C., filling jobs shunned by miners, road builders, teamsters, laundry men, restaurateurs, domestic servants and cannery workers. Between 1881 and 1885, thousands more arrived, most imported to build the transcontinental railway. They were to create, in Vancouver, Canada’s largest and most dynamic Chinese Community, known to its original inhabitants as Saltwater City.

174 p. : ill., fac-sim

Distant Neighbors: A Comparative History of Seattle & Vancouver by Norbert MacDonald is a 1987 urban history that explores the parallel yet distinct development of two major Pacific Northwest cities from the 1880s through the mid-20th century. The book analyzes how differing national contexts, political structures, and economic policies shaped the unique civic characters, immigration patterns, and physical landscapes of each municipality despite their close geographic proximity and shared regional environment. Ultimately, it provides a foundational comparative framework for understanding the fascinating divergence between American and Canadian urban evolution on the Pacific coast.

xxii, 259 pages, 30 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 25 cm

On the Shady Side: Vancouver, 1886-1914 by Betty Keller is a 1986 historical account published by Horsdal & Schubart that explores the gritty, illicit underbelly of British Columbia's largest city during its formative decades. The book chronicles Vancouver's rapid evolution from a rowdy frontier sawmill settlement into a booming Pacific port, focusing specifically on the vice, crime, and political corruption that accompanied this explosive growth. Keller meticulously details the world of bootleggers, gamblers, opium dens, and brothels, alongside the often-complicit early police forces and municipal officials operating prior to World War I. Ultimately, it serves as an entertaining and highly informative social history that looks beyond traditional civic boosterism to reveal the rugged, colorful, and controversial realities of early urban development in the Canadian Pacific Northwest.

ix, 121 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm

Chuck Davis and Shirley Mooney’s Vancouver: An Illustrated Chronology, published in partnership with the Vancouver Board of Trade, documents the rapid municipal and commercial ascension of British Columbia’s primary urban center from its mid-nineteenth-century colonial origins through the late twentieth century. The illustrated narrative traces the systematic superimposition of orthogonal street grids, industrial wharves, and municipal real estate developments directly over the ancestral villages, seasonal shellfish beds, and marine corridors stewarded by Coast Salish nations, specifically the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. Davis and Mooney detail the vital mechanics of regional transportation and capital expansion, showing how the arrival of the transcontinental Canadian Pacific Railway terminus on Burrard Inlet, alongside early operations at Hastings Mill and extensive harbor dredging, turned False Creek and Coal Harbour into high-volume transshipment hubs. Ultimately, the chronology illustrates how civic boosterism, corporate rail networks, and heavy maritime extraction permanently converted an intricate estuarine and rainforest ecology into Canada's preeminent Pacific deep-water gateway.

288 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 29 cm

xxiv, 220 pages, 9 unnumbered leaves of plates : illustrations, maps ; 20 cm

BC writer Irene Howard has woven together years of correspondence, historical records, anecdotes, and interview material to create this textual account of Bowen Island history. The book covers the lives of the early settlers, the days of the steamships, significant events, and notable islanders who have shaped the Bowen Island we now know.

190 pages, 10 unnumbered leaves of plates illustrations, maps, portraits 24 cm

Gastown's Gassy Jack the life and times of John Deighton of England, California and early British Columbia examines the nascent frontier settlement and precarious maritime commerce situated along the sheltered southern shores of British Columbia's Burrard Inlet. Hull and Ruskin detail how the region's formidable coastal topography—specifically the deep, naturally protected marine basin of the inlet, the impenetrable, towering temperate rainforests of the surrounding mainland, and the tidal mudflats of the littoral margin—strictly dictated the margins of early pioneer homesteading, massive old-growth logging operations, and the establishment of opportunistic waterfront enterprise. By mapping the spontaneous growth of Deighton's improvised saloon enclave, which strategically leveraged the vital deep-water anchorage to intercept isolated Hastings Mill timber crews and coastal maritime traffic, the narrative highlights how this specific estuarine and coastal geography anchored the settlement's absolute reliance on marine connectivity. Ultimately, this biographical and civic record serves as a localized spatial history, demonstrating how the severe overland isolation, immense botanical scale, and critical deep-water access of this Pacific Northwest landscape fundamentally shaped the highly rugged, maritime-dependent character of early Gastown and the future city of Vancouver.

48 pages illustrations, maps, portraits 22 cm

Mapping the frontier Charles Wilson's diary of the survey of the 49th parallel, 1858-1862 examines the grueling imperial cartography and immense logistical struggle situated across the profoundly rugged, trans-mountain macro-geography of the US-British Columbia borderlands. Wilson details how the region's formidable topography—specifically the impenetrable, old-growth temperate rainforests of the coastal slope, the sheer, glaciated alpine barricades of the Cascade and Rocky Mountains, and the deep, turbulent river chasms cutting perpendicular to the border—strictly dictated the margins of early scientific reconnaissance, precarious overland supply chains, and the immense physical labor required to physically mark the wilderness. By mapping the Boundary Commission's arduous effort to impose a rigid, abstract political line across violently fractured terrain—requiring the literal chopping of massive forest swaths, precarious high-altitude ascents, and constant battles with severe winter isolation—the narrative highlights how this specific unforgiving, mountainous geography anchored a profoundly grueling, highly isolated feat of imperial engineering. Ultimately, this diaristic and cartographic record serves as a macro-level spatial history, demonstrating how the immense alpine barricades, severe botanical density, and unrelenting climatic extremes of this Pacific Northwest landscape fundamentally shaped the highly arduous, geographically defiant character of the 49th parallel boundary survey.

182 pages : maps, portrait ; 22 cm

The Archives of Vancouver Society’s documentary record of the Naming, opening, and dedication of Stanley Park, Vancouver, Canada, 1888-1889 chronicles the civic preservation of a massive, densely forested peninsula situated at the strategic maritime gateway to British Columbia’s booming railway terminus. The historical narrative maps the rugged estuarine topography separating English Bay from Burrard Inlet, detailing how this imposing promontory of ancient western red cedar and Douglas fir historically functioned as a vital military reserve and indigenous settlement overlooking the treacherous tidal rips of the First Narrows. By documenting the transformation of this unlogged coastal rainforest into a sprawling municipal sanctuary amidst the rapid late-nineteenth-century industrialization of the adjacent Vancouver townsite, the text illustrates a deliberate civic effort to protect the region's formidable natural scale. Ultimately, the account captures a defining moment in the urban geography of the Pacific Northwest, demonstrating how the conscious preservation of this impenetrable, deep-water coastal wilderness permanently anchored the cultural and spatial identity of Canada’s primary Pacific metropolis.

With the compliments of the Commissioners of the Park Board, past and present. On the seventy-fifth anniversary of the dedication of Stanley Park, 1889.

60 pages illustrations 23 cm

Alan Morley’s Vancouver from Milltown to Metropolis chronicles the explosive industrial and urban evolution of Canada’s premier Pacific port city, detailing its rapid transition from a remote, heavily forested logging outpost to a vital hub of global commerce. The narrative meticulously maps the strategic but formidable coastal geography of the Burrard Inlet peninsula, securely wedged between the volatile alluvial delta of the Fraser River and the towering, precipitous barrier of the Coast Mountains. By detailing the settlement’s crude origins at early lumber camps like Hastings Mill, the book illustrates how the sheer biological mass of the climax temperate rainforest initially pinned early pioneers against the shoreline, forcing a complete reliance on sheltered aquatic highways for survival and initial resource extraction.

The text highlights the profound geographic turning point when this protected, deep-water oceanic anchorage was selected as the western terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Morley demonstrates how piercing the massive, unyielding alpine ranges of the interior with transcontinental rail finally shattered the region's profound physical isolation, seamlessly linking the landlocked resource wealth of the vast Canadian expanse with lucrative Pacific shipping lanes. Ultimately, the account captures the defining environmental realities of British Columbia's coastal nexus, demonstrating how clearing an impenetrable forest, maximizing a natural deep-water harbor, and conquering a massive continental divide were the absolute prerequisites for transforming a rugged pioneer milltown into a mechanized, integrated maritime metropolis.

xiii, 227 pages illustrations 4.17

John Pearson and John M. Reitz’s Land of the Royal Kwantlen chronicles the complex historical evolution of North Surrey from an indigenous riverine stronghold to an engineered agricultural extension of metropolitan Vancouver. The narrative maps how the massive, volatile hydrology of the lower Fraser River initially dictated all human activity, forcing both the Kwantlen First Nation and early European pioneers to rely entirely on this dominant aquatic highway for transit and sustenance amidst the dense, impenetrable coastal rainforest. By detailing the arduous pioneer efforts to clear immense timber stands and construct drainage infrastructure across the low-lying alluvial floodplains, the text illustrates how early agrarian colonization was strictly governed by the severe physical realities of the tidal delta. Ultimately, the account demonstrates that artificially stabilizing this dynamic, flood-prone topography and bridging the formidable Fraser watercourse were the absolute prerequisites for integrating this isolated riparian settlement into the broader Pacific seaboard economy.

27 pages 24 cm

James Skitt Matthews’s Early Vancouver chronicles the grueling pioneer efforts to carve a viable metropolitan footprint out of the massive, unyielding temperate rainforests dominating the Burrard Inlet peninsula. The collected narratives map how the sheer biological density of ancient timber stands and the rugged, marshy topography of the coastal shoreline initially strangled overland movement, forcing early settlers to rely exclusively on the sheltered aquatic highway of the deep-water harbor. By detailing the arduous transition from primitive waterfront logging camps to the western terminus of the transcontinental railway, the text illustrates how clear-cutting this imposing vegetation and constructing robust maritime infrastructure were strictly dictated by the region's severe environmental constraints. Ultimately, the account demonstrates that systematically conquering the imposing physical realities of this rain-soaked, heavily forested marine frontier was the absolute prerequisite for anchoring Canada's vital gateway to the Pacific seaboard.

8 volumes : illustrations, maps, plans, portraits ; 24 cm

H. A. J. Monk and John Stewart’s A History of Coquitlam and Fraser Mills, 1858-1958 chronicles the explosive industrial colonization of a sprawling, heavily timbered riverine expanse located at the strategic confluence of the Coquitlam and Fraser rivers. The narrative maps how the impenetrable biological mass of the ancient coastal rainforest and the volatile, flood-prone hydrology of the lower Fraser delta initially choked overland movement, forcing early settlers and timber barons to rely exclusively on this massive aquatic highway to transport raw logs and export milled lumber. By detailing the monumental industrial effort required to construct Fraser Mills—which evolved into the largest lumber processing facility in the British Empire—and the grueling pioneer labor needed to clear the dense alluvial floodplains for viable agriculture, the text illustrates how large-scale economic expansion was strictly governed by the severe physical realities of this riparian topography. Ultimately, the account demonstrates that systematically harvesting these colossal timber stands and engineering robust mechanized milling infrastructure directly upon the riverbanks were the absolute prerequisites for transforming a rain-soaked, isolated wilderness into a globally dominant epicenter of Pacific seaboard timber manufacturing.

76 pages : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm

An account of the Hudson's Bay Company's operation at Fort Langley in southern British Columbia in the early-to-mid 19th Century

ix, 98 pages illustrations (some color) maps (on lining-papers) 27 cm