( maT

eagiyh

PI

oN Ci

ers mural Li
it

yy iF
Ext DY

esuttliaecatlinveeen Nivenrvasraveeenee tA

T Vancouves

a

[INGE Be

le

75 Years Old

Vancouver Today

By HAL GRIFFIN

. 75 Years Ago

‘es A CLEAR night, from lookout points on Burnaby

Mountain, you can stand with Vancouver literally
at your feet, Its lights fill the horizon, aglow with multi-
colored: neon at the centre, strung across the darkness of
Burrard Inlet far up. the slopes of the North Shore moun-
tains, Spilling across the Fraser River into the burgeon-
ing areas of Surrey and Richmond.

Even for those. who have

Watched. the city grow, it’s’

h
ard to believe that all this

had it

S

avo, beginnings 75 years

os the same © vantage
nt in 1792. one of Captain

€

nore Vancouver’s men would
ve seen
igh

a in the night—the camp-

ate the Native villages at
care emayhtun: where Bel:
at 1, now stands, Whoi-Whoi
thet, ee Arch, Chay-
Ulches at Prospect Point; Hom-
More th, at Capilano. And for
tek an half a’ century the
Fraser pened little’ until the
ne River gold rush in 1858

ght adventurers by the

und
2 a to camp at Second

-In thei

Bers, ir MuAke came the log-

Shars Abe men who cut the
lumbey or the. Burrard Inlet
shack trade and built their

Sin the four-block area

only pinpoints’ of

centering on Carrall Street,
where “Gassy” Jack Deighton
built his first saloon in 1867.
‘This was Gastown or . Gran-
ville, . the settlement which
gave rise to a city.

To the east was Captain Ed-

ward Stamp’s sawmill, soon. to}

become the Hastings sawmill,
-founded. on 100 acres of land
west of Heatley Avenue
bought at one dollar an acre.
Now, less than a century later,
after millions of dollars have
been extracted from it in rents
and real estate deals, much: of
it is officially designated as a
blighted area to be rebuilt. as
a slum clearance project.

But it was the building. of
the Canadian Pacific Railway
that set thé future pattern cf
Vancouver, the city whose 75th
anniversary of incorporation
was celebrated on April 6.

RIGINALLY the end. of
O steel was to have been at
Port Moody, whose harbor Sir
Charles Tupper, then minister
of railways in the government
of Sir John A. Macdonald, de-
scribed in 1883 as “‘the best on
the Pacific Coast.” With the
perspicacity of a politician who
had been deeply implicated in
the earlier CPR scandal, Tup-
per accused the CPR of want-
ing to compel the- government
to. spend more millions to ex-
tend the railway. to. Coal Har-

bor and provide port facilities: |

The CPR was. even. more
concerned in outdoing the spec-
ulators who held land at Port

1884, CPR vice president W.C:
Van. Horne let it be known
that the line would be extended

to. Coal. Harbor through central

Burnaby — and the company
quietly acquired the right. of
way along the south shore of
the inlet.

Vancouver today bears the
imprint of that coup, which
netted the CPR: millions, in. a
waterfront. without adequate
access roads. Burnaby, as a-re-
sult; has only one small public
beach along its entire inlet
waterfront.

Moody. After. a. visit to the},
future site of Vancouver in|:

Magazine Section

eee A a a

has arisen

today. See

APRIL 6, 1886 — APRIL 6, 1967
Seventy-five years ago, on April 6, 1886, the s
ment of Granville was incorporated into the City
Vancouver: From the fire that. same year which wiped
out the infant-city the present great Pacific metropolis

In this article, Hal Griffin, one of B.C.’s leading Jaber
historians tells of Vancouver’s rise and its poe

ettlé-
of

=OR a city born with an in-
[= comparable natural. endow-
ment of -sea’.and lakes, moun-
tains. and! forests, Vancouver

today affords an example of
how anarchistic private de-
velopment can despoil the fin-
est inheritance. The exceptional
instanees -of foresight merely
accentuate decades of mediocre
civic administration in the in-
terests of those who have taken
far more:from Vancouver than
they ever gave.

Even. the’ wisdom. of those
who set aside Stanley Park—
originally an admiralty reserve
where loggers were already at
work before it was formally
dedicated im 1889: — is offset

subsequently: tried: to encroach
upon.it asthe city grew.

False. Creek, which could

to link the salt water port of
Vancouver with the fresh
water port of New Westmin-
ster, with a huge saving in
shipping costs, was partially
filled to to remain an. eyesore
in the heart of the city.

Polluted beaches, ravaged

slums offer their own indict-
ment of corporate greed. And
the process continues. Burnaby
Lake, long. acknowledged as
potentially the finest . recrea-
tional area left in Greater V.ar-

by-: the greed of others who

have been extended by canal

mountain slopes and spreading |

couver, lies silted up and -wéeed
infested _ while
croaches on its shores.

Pon taaea ‘monopoly of pub-

industry -en-

lic transportation by the B.C.

Electric: compounds the prob-
lem of moving commuters.from

the suburbs, while grass grows

on'a right of way. which, under
public ownership,

And, looking to the future, the
money contemplated
ways might better be spent.on
the beginning of a subway
radiating’ east, west and seuth_
from the city centre a the -
blades of a fan to link up with
surface. systems.

Under the magic of

Vancouver assumes the guise

could. pro-: ,:
vide fast electric train service. .

for free-.,

its lights; *

of a fairyland.:The cold light of

day reveals the ugliness that-is
not mitigated by the séafing
lines of the B.C: Electrie build-
ing, the monuments to big. bus-
iness - dictation. and. makeshift

planning created by successive-

civic: administrations.

Big business has left its im-
print. To begin the transferma-.
tion of Vancouver inte a
worthy of its heritage; the
labor and other progressive or-

ganizations which have fought

at every step for slum -clear-
ance and parks, playgrounds
and swimming pools, must win

a hand in the administration, ~

recently.

Aprik. 14, 1961—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 5

.

city~-

Photo: shows. delegates: from Congo attending the Third
All-American People’s Conference which was held in ‘Cairo

sneha Me at