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While waiting for my next book, Becoming Vancouver: A New History, to be published -- delayed by the COVID situation -- I thought I'd introduce the project by telling some "tales of the city."
Following World War One, the southern shoreline of Coal Harbour developed as one of the city's busiest industrial areas. In particular it attracted boatworks,...
In the latest issue, just out, the folks at Geist magazine asked contributors what they were reading during the pandemic.
My response, with a twist, is here.
Back in February I mentioned my collection of deteriorating volumes from The Canadian Centenary Series.
Recently the Active History website had this fascinating look back at the series by Donald Wright, author of a first-rate biography of Donald Creighton.
Trigger warning: lots of 1960s sexism and general ignorance about...
While waiting for my next book, Becoming Vancouver: A New History, to be published -- delayed by the COVID situation -- I thought I'd introduce the project by telling some "tales of the city."
Early in the morning of July 19, 1952, a 52-year-old stevedore named Clarence Clemons got into a scuffle with police at the New Station Café on Main Street. The New Station had a reputation as a lively afterhours joint close to Hogan’s Alley. “It was world-renowned,” affirmed...
On March 7, 1913, poet and performer Pauline Johnson died at a private hospital on Bute Street in Vancouver's West End. She had moved to the coast a few years earlier after retiring from the stage and had been ill with breast cancer for some time.
The death of the "Mohawk Princess" sparked an unprecedented display of public respect. Many city notables attended her funeral...