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The year began with a short visit to Powell River. Many nice hikes in that area, one of which took us to the top of Mt. Valentine with a wonderful view of the Salish Sea. That is the mill below us in the photograph above. Once the lifeblood of the town it is closed now and the property on the market. As far as one can tell the transition from company town has gone well; the community seems to be...

Canada's History Society has announced the winner of its Governor General's History Award for Popular Media, better known as the Pierre Berton Award.

This year the award goes to Thomas King, the prolific novelist, historian, humourist, broadcaster and I could go on. In...

 I braved the monsoon rains last week to attend the regular meeting of the Vancouver Historical Society where Gregory Betts was speaking about the Grateful Dead and their visits to the city back in the 1960s and '70s. You can watch the lecture yourself here on YouTube.

What I remember about the music of those years was not the Dead -- I was out of town for their concerts -- but the Jefferson Airplane. For me, the...

The 1907 anti-Asian riots are remembered as one of the most shameful episodes in Vancouver's history. A crowd of several thousand people gathered at city hall to support a rally against Asian immigration. Following the meeting a mob descended on Chinatown, trashing businesses and threatening residents, before moving on to Powell Street to attack the Japanese community. (The...