1918:

The city is taken completely off-guard when, in protest over the murder of labour martyr Arthur “Ginger” Goodwin, the Vancouver Trades and Labour Council organizes a 24-hour general strike, the first of its kind in Canadian History.

“Though the possibility of a ‘general strike’ was talked of yesterday,” reports the Vancouver Province, “few people imagined that it would actually occur. Today at noon, when the street cars faded off the street, and the facts began to be realized the city was literally thunderstruck. Many people waiting on the downtown corners refused to believe that the proposed strike had been carried out.”

Goodwin, a coal miner labelled a “socialist orator” by the newspaper for his repeated attempts to agitate for an 8-hr work day, has been involved in numerous unsuccessful strikes across the country for close to 10 years. Blacklisted in many provinces as a communist, and suffering from the black lung, Goodwin was forced to flee into the BC forest when, after being repeatedly deemed unfit for duty, he was mysteriously (and some say suspiciously) drafted for the Canadian Army. Goodwin was tracked into the woods near Cumberland, BC, where, for reasons unknown, he was shot in the back by a special constable for the Dominion Police.

The General Strike will be received with considerable animosity by the public, with 300 men storming the VTLC’s headquarters on Dunsmuir Street, where the crowd will assault several individuals, force two labour agitators to kiss the Union Jack, and twice attempt to toss Secretary Victor Midgely out the window. By the following morning, the strike will be all but crushed, with the city’s newspapers glossing over mob involvement, and praising their actions against the city’s “undesirables.”

“This kind of thing will ruin the province,” gripes Minister of Parliament S.J. Crowe. “If a few Red Socialists with pro-German ideas are going to run the whole country, it is about time we gave up, and believe me, I for one am not prepared to accept that proposition just yet.”

IMAGE: Arthur “Ginger” Goodwin, in happier times. Image courtesy of the Cumberland Museum

Top headlines from Vancouver and beyond for August 2 2011:

Vancouver Coastal Health announces a pilot program to hand out free crack pipes to addicts as research suggesting a link between crack use and HIV grows. As is generally the case when the government hands out drug paraphernalia, the public debate is fierce and polarizing. Health authorities view it as an important step in reducing the spread of disease and facilitating outreach. For others it’s pure numbers - the cost of a crack pipe is considerably less than the cost of HIV treatment. For others still, the idea is too much to fathom: “This is absolutely INSANE !!! Our tax dollars being paid out to support ILLEGAL activities !! I mean really,, whats next ?? Free pistols and bullets for bank robbers ?? How about a bullet proof vest because too many robbers are getting injured and costing the health care system ?/” user Sazooky over at the CBC asks.

After losing close to 400 hectares of industrial land to more profitable residential and commercial development over the last 40 years, Vancouver is fighting to preserve the 10 per cent of land that’s responsible for 50 per cent of the jobs in our city. Evidence is suggesting the fight is working, with planning director Brent Toderian telling the Globe that he’s seen a boom in industrial-land proposals in the last few months.

On a related topic, City Council voted to approve a controversial rezoning of Shannon Mews, a heritage site at Granville and 57th that will be converted to high-density development. The marathon council session, continuing until 2am, was attended by vocal residents and heritage groups who opposed the development.

BORED AT WORK BONUS: Long Live the Jart

1928:

Locals swell with pride in all corners of the city as Percy Williams, a Vancouver sprinter, wins two seperate gold medals at the Amsterdam Olympics.

“Percy Williams, the Vancouver sprinter who has so decisively ‘cleaned up’ at the Amersterdam Olympiad, will probably need an extra trunk to bring back the two laurel wreaths with which he is to be crowned,” reports the Vancouver Sun, “And the host of congratulatory messages that have been sent him from the ends of the earth.”

Williams, whose medals are for placing first in both the 100-metre and 200-metre dash, will receive congratulations from acting mayor Frank Woodside, several provincial premiers, and Prime Minister Mackenzie King himself. In addition, he will be courted by a number of prestigious American universities, and receive all manner of prizes, including a congratulatory pistol. Over the next two years, Williams will go on to win a gold medal at the inaugural British Empire Games, set a world record for speed in 1930, and would win 19 of the 21 track meets he’d attend (despite the best efforts of the American organizers), and, in 1975, would be declared Canada’s all-time greatest Olympic Athelete by the Associated Press.

However, an injury in 1930 would end his career, and, after years of selling insurance, and living in constant arthritic pain, Williams would choose to take his own life, shooting himself with the Olympic congratulatory pistol in his mother’s Vancouver home in 1982.

IMAGE: Percy Williams, being carried by teammates after his victory at the 1928 Summer Olympics.

2009:

Vancouverites head for the shade, and turn up their air conditioners as a blistering heat-wave furnishes the city with the single hottest day ever recorded in its 123-year history. The 33.8 degree high, the result of an offshore high-pressure system that effectively blocks cooler air from the Pacific, beats out the previous record set back in 1960, and, when combined with heavy smoke from provincewide forest fires, makes the summer truly something to complain about.

“Metro Vancouver’s air advisory for the Lower Mainland asked residents to reduce emissions, and and ease up on strenuous activities if they are elderly or have cardio-respiratory conditions,” reports the Vancouver Province. “[Mayor] Robertson urged overheated Vancouverities to drink plenty of water and seek refuge at air-conditioned libraries, community centres, parks, pools and even the Sunset Ice-Skating rink.”

However, on the bright side, seasonal water temperatures at Kitsilano Beach and English Bay are a full five degrees warmer than usual, bringing more than 14,000 people to Kits alone, and forcing the city to double the number of lifeguards on duty.

“We born-and-bred Metro Vancouverites are simply not meant for the heat,” complains the Province’s Shelly Fralic. “We whine. And moan. If we wanted to be roasted alive, we say to anyone who’ll listen, we’d move to the centre of the universe. Or Toronto.”

IMAGE: Swimmers at Greer’s Beach (now Kitsilano Beach), circa 1889. Image Courtesy of the Vancouver Archives.

Top headlines from Vancouver and beyond for July 29 2011:

Metro Vancouver approves a new 30 year growth strategy following unanimous endorsement by local governments. With an additional 1-million people expected to move into the region over the next 30 years, consensus was reached on the basic priorities for the region: containing urban spaces and building compact, diverse, high density centres; preserving industrial and agricultural land threatened by higher market values for residential and commercial uses; and increasing transportation choices, thereby reducing the region’s dependence on the automobile.

According to Police Chief Jim Chu, the VPD will be increasing its presence at the Vancouver fireworks this year by 25 to 30 per cent, although, as is the fashion of the time, Chu will not provide the exact number of officers that will be on duty. Perhaps more interesting than the increased police presence and the “parents control your kids” and “we’ll be pouring out yer booze” tough talk, is the use of a Citizens’ Crime Watch team - 150 plainclothes citizens who will be watching for liquor violations and other criminal activity for the first time at the fireworks. “The public will never know these volunteers are out there, but we want everyone to know that just because you don’t see a uniform doesn’t mean no one is watching,” Chu says in the Vancouver Sun.

BORED AT WORK BONUS: Mississippi’s Corrections Reform

Photo Credit: Liam Hanham

1957:

At 9:45, in the skies above their Inglewood Avenue home, a Mr. and Mrs. Johnson of West Vancouver catch sight of a flying saucer.

The object, described as “round”, and “very bright, larger than a dime (at arm’s length)”, in a report made to the Vancouver Flying Saucer Club (the city’s source for all things extraterrestrial), is observed for more than 15 minutes, travelling across the sky at great speed. Other details are spotty, but the object (seen by four other witnesses, according to the report) also gives off a bright white light.

1957 has been- and will continue to be an unusual year for UFO sightings, with “two luminous, rose-coloured saucers” sighted by Mrs. Frank Irene Sirianni on Broughton Street in April (according to the Flying Saucer Index), as well as the observation of a “bright light in the sky” in New Westminster in September. “Was watching a quite spectacular aurora display,” the New Westminster report states, “when attention suddenly drawn by appearance of bright light in sky. It travelled in a perfectly flat trajectory, then suddenly vanished as the flicking off of a light.”

IMAGE: UFO, sighted by Leonard Lamoureux over Vancouver City Hall, circa 1937. Subsequent examination by UFO Experts have questioned whether it is in fact a flying saucer, or simply a watermark defect on the negative.

Top headlines from Vancouver and beyond for July 28 2011:

The bad press continues for Bell Mobility, ordered by the federal Competition Bureau to pay $10-million in fines for making misleading advertisements last month, they are now making headlines after what they say is a technical glitch is resulting in the overcharging of customers. Kelowna resident Amy Johnston, interviewed by the CBC after discovering overcharges in excess of $30 a month, finds the company’s response particularly troubling: “They’re requiring their clients, who are paying a lot of money for this service, to go through their Bell bills line by line and isolate the problem themselves. It just feels like a problem that they know about and something that they should be employing their employees to go through with a fine-tooth comb.” While landline telephones are regulated by the CRTC, there is no such regulation for mobile services, and Bell is not required to tell customers of billing overages, the CBC reports.

A new study, led by SFU professor of Earth Sciences Andrew Calvert, has found that a fault line beneath the Olympic Peninsula is deeper than scientists had originally thought. While no one is sure what exactly this means, or why it’s news, the Globe has published a piece drawing comparisons to the 2004 Sumatra earthquake, a megathrust quake resulting in deadly tsunamis and the displacement of over 1.6-million people. “I’m not sure we are overdue, but it is certainly getting more likely,” Prof. Calvert told the Globe, noting there is a megathrust earthquake on the Pacific Coast every 500 to 600 years.

Details are thin on the CRTC’s decision to give British Columbians a new area code: 236 will begin accompanying the existing 604, 778, and 250 numbers at an unspecified date in the future. In case that story seems a little thin to you too, dig the Sun’s article on the subject, buttressed by a picture of a scantily-clad businesswoman holding a Blackberry.

BORED AT WORK BONUS: The Gun

Top headlines from Vancouver and beyond for July 27 2011:

Dozens of citizens gathered at City Hall yesterday to protest what they call the “broken” planning and rezoning process in Vancouver. Randy Helten, organizer of the demonstration and president of West End Neighbours, told the crowd that the City is ignoring and misinforming the public, and that the planning department appears as an advocate for developers rather than residents. As the city wrestles with a housing affordability crisis and the need to shelter an additional 70,000 residents over the next ten years, density looms large, as does the opposition to it.

Environment Minister Terry Lake’s decision to support a mass-burn incinerator for Metro Vancouver’s garbage has prompted outrage from opponents in Vancouver and the Fraser Valley. Tentative approval was given for the plan to burn trash and convert it to electricity contingent on the implementation of alternative air quality protection technologies. While many residents and politicians are concerned, scientists in the region point to the farming, sprawl, and commuter traffic as the main sources of air pollution in the region. “If we’re trying to get emissions down, there’s a lot they could be doing in the Valley that I don’t see them doing — not allowing sprawl, taxing property development more to put in their own transportation systems and so on,” the CBC quotes Marc Jaccard, professor of sustainable energy at SFU.

The banishment of a homeless man from Saltspring Island, after he was involved in theft and an altercation with the police, has raised the ire of the B.C. Civil Liberties association. The island, home to former rock stars, politicians and the otherwise well-to-do, banished another person from their community last June following a domestic disturbance, and lawyers are arguing that it sets a dangerous NIMBYist precedent, where problems are displaced rather than resolved. “Saltspring Island is an island, not an island unto itself,” BCCLA Executive Director David Eby soundbites for the Globe.

BORED AT WORK BONUS: Tuna’s End

1938:

At approximately 1:45 in the afternoon, a small blaze starts on CPR Pier D, at the foot of Granville Street, and, within fifteen minutes, has grown into what will become the largest and most famous of Vancouver’s waterfront fires.

“I turned around to write a few words. Then back again,” writes William Short, of The Province. “The whole picture of the fire had changed. More than half of the pier was then in flames and white smoke started to come from a point where the Granville Street entrance should be.”

Despite vailant efforts by the Vancouver Fire Department, the flames are soon more than 100 feet high, and two firemen fighting the blaze are forced to leap into the harbour to save their own lives. It is only after the total destruction of the pier, and the CPR office located there -not to mention a VFD Hose Wagon that’s crushed by flaming debris, that the fire is finally put out, at 4:52pm.

“Cause of the blaze,” the paper reports, “was not immediately known.”

IMAGE: CPR Pier ‘D’, engulfed by flames, circa 1938. Image Courtesy of the Vancouver Archives

1888:

At roughly one o’clock in the mornning, after more than fifty years of faithful service, the S.S. Beaver, one of the most important steamships in BC’s history, runs aground at Prospect Point.

“We were going to Nanaimo for bunker coal before going north to some island, Harwood or Thurlow Island,” Assistant Engineer William H. Evans will later recall, “and from the time we left the dock until we were on the rocks was not very long, I think I was having a sleep and don’t actually know who was on board except the crew, or if there were any except the crew. Anyway, I think the tide was pretty near high water, but still running in, because the captain hugged the shore pretty tight to get past the eddy off Observation Point, and the first thing I knew she hit, and that settled it.”

Built in 1835 as the first steamer commissioned by the Hudson’s Bay Company, the 101-foot paddlewheeler has, in its time, carried James Douglas to Fort Langley, where he was sworn in as BC’s first governor, played host to the province’s first murder trials (which were held on its deck), and charted over 1000 miles of coastline as an official survey vessel.

However, strong currents and pilot error will ground the ship permanently off of Prospect Point, where it will remain, slowly decaying, as a destination for sightseers and picnickers.

“We all got off,” Evans will explain. “We were in too much of a hurry to pack up, and believe me, it would not have taken any of us three minutes to pack up, because in those days we travelled light. We all got off into the water and waded ashore; walked through the park to the Sunnyside Hotel, and we were at rest, and peace. There was a peaceful calm settled down on us. The barkeeper, when he saw us, thought we had gone nutty because we had not long before left the bartender with goodbyes, and promised we would see him again, by and by, but he did not expect to see us that quick.”

The Beaver will sink in 1892, however wreckage will remain visible off of Prospect Point until it finally breaks apart in 1982.

IMAGE: The SS Beaver, grounded off of Prospect Point, circa 1900s. Image Courtesy of the Vancouver Archives