Jack Webster and the 1963 Prison Riot at BC Pen
BC Penitentiary was a maximum-security federal prison that opened in 1878 and was plagued with riots throughout its 100-year life. There was the 1975 riot and hostage taking that resulted in the death...
View ArticleRolie Moore, the Flying Seven and Burnaby’s Hart House Restaurant
I had the pleasure of having lunch with the delightful George Garrett at Hart House last week, a restaurant I’ve wanted to visit ever since I first heard that one of its inhabitants was the amazing...
View ArticleVancouver Vice
Catch Aaron’s talk at the Vancouver Police Museum and Archives next Saturday May 14 about his latest book Vancouver Vice. For details and ticket information see Vancouver Police Museum: One of the...
View ArticleThe Dupont Street Train Station and the Marco Polo Restaurant
Long before the Vancouver Film School occupied the building at East Pender and Columbia Streets, there was a railway station that was later repurposed into the legendary Marco Polo restaurant. Story...
View ArticleHow the Melbourne Hotel became No5 Orange
The Melbourne Hotel became No5 Orange in 1971, after 67 years as a hotel and beer parlour The Melbourne Hotel opened in August 1904 at Westminster Avenue and Powell Street. According to the daily...
View ArticleThe Industrial School for Girls
The Industrial School for Girls operated out of 868 Cassiar Street from 1914 until 1959 and was known as the “house of horror.” Now a residential condo, Cassiar is one of the properties featured on...
View ArticleGim Wong: Kick-ass Dragon Man
On June 3, 2005, 82-year-old Gim Foon Wong set off on his Ride for Redress. Starting at Mile Zero in Victoria, he planned to arrive in Ottawa July 1 on his Honda Goldwing motorbike, accompanied by his...
View ArticleMount Pleasant Stories
Mount Pleasant Stories: Historical Walking Tours, by Christine Hagemoen Walking Tour #1: We had a lot of fun road-testing Christine Hagemoen’s Mount Pleasant Stories: Historical Walking Tours this...
View ArticleFire takes out King Edward High School
On June 19, 1973, a three-alarm fire broke out at the old King Edward High School at West 12th and Oak Street. The building was destroyed, but remnants remain on the old site, now part of Vancouver...
View ArticleMalcolm Lowry (1909-1957)
Malcolm Lowry may be North Vancouver’s most talented, paranoid alcoholic. He wrote Under the Volcano, his most famous book, from a shack in Cates Park. Lowry died on June 26, 1957. Under the Volcano:...
View ArticleCold Case Canada Podcast: Introducing Season 4
On Friday March 10, I held a Facebook live event through my Facebook page Cold Case BC, and the podcast group page Cold Case Canada. It was a good excuse to introduce myself to the thousands of new...
View ArticleGloria Moody: The Highway of Tears
Vanessa was four years old when her mother, Gloria Levina Moody, was murdered. Her brother, Dan, was three. Gloria, who everyone called Lee, was from the Bella Coola reserve of the Nuxalk Nation. She...
View ArticleLynn Valley’s Cedar V Theatre
In March 1953, Steve Chizen was putting the final touches on the Cedar V Theatre on Lynn Valley Road. It would be North Vancouver’s third theatre—the Odeon sat at the corner of Lonsdale and 14th...
View ArticleLindsey Nicholls: Vanished
On the day that 14-year-old Lindsey Nicholls disappeared, she was last seen walking down Royston Road, outside of Comox on Vancouver Island. It was August 2, 1993—the Monday of the BC Day long...
View ArticleBurnaby’s Oak Theatre – Then and Now
The Oak Theatre sat at Kingsway near Royal Oak Avenue in Burnaby from 1937 to 1963. Opening night with CKWX’s Billie Browne, was August 4, 1937. He introduced feature film White Bondage, comedy shorts...
View ArticleThe Box-Cutter Murder: Gladys Wakabayashi
Twelve-year-old Elisa Wakabayashi waited for two hours for her mother to pick her up after school. Ordinarily, her mother arrived promptly at 3:00 p.m. At 5:00 p.m., Elisa called her father to give...
View ArticleThe Tomahawk Restaurant
In 2000, I signed a contract with a Toronto publisher to write Frommer’s with Kids Vancouver. I was a freelance journalist with three kids under eight, and part of the job was to road-test every...
View ArticleThe Search for Brenda Byman
In 2019, I was asked to put a post up about Brenda Byman, a 12-year-old girl who went missing from outside Invermere, BC on May 7, 1961. Despite one of the biggest searches in the province’s history,...
View ArticleTrans-Canada Air Lines
I put up a post on April 28 to mark the day that Trans-Canada Air Lines flight 3 took off from Lethbridge on a routine flight to Vancouver. The Lockheed Lodestar never made it, and 47 years would pass...
View ArticleThe Nightclub Murders
Gail Sandra Rogers, 26 known as Sam to her friends, was last seen on February 17, 1975, after working a shift as a go-go dancer at the Penthouse Night Club on Seymour Street. Gail’s sister Karen...
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