Did They Really Say That?

What Do The Guide Books Really Say About Vancouver?

Have you ever wondered about some of the information you read in your guide book? Most books do a very good job of getting the facts about our city correct but some times... This page is a collection of bits and pieces I come across from time to time.

Lonely Planet: Minor Quibbles

"Vancouver kicks off the year with an icy dip in English Bay called the Polar Bear Swim, a New Year's Day event since 1819."

The Polar Bear Swim was started here in Vancouver by Peter Pantages but not until 1919.

"About 36,000 people of Chinese descent live in the city's thriving downtown Chinatown, centered on Pender St at the base of the peninsula."

Vancouver's Chinatown is a vibrant place to visit but the Chinese population is dispersed throughout the city of Vancouver. The Strathcona neighbourhood to the east is home to about 3,000 Chinese residents, add that to the 1,000 or so living in Chinatown itself. The figure of 36,000 might refer to the total Chinese population of the city in the 1950s. They author also has pulled some fanciful notions of how Chinatown was settled, involving pig farms etc.

"Also in Vanier Park are a swimming pool, tennis courts and other sporting grounds."

Actually it's Kitsilano Beach with the pools, tennis courts etc.

"A number of beaches offer good surfing. Long Beach in Vancouver Island's Pacific Rim National Park reputedly has the best waves in BC, though the water's very cold."

Look at a map and see where Long Beach actually is. Don't plan a day trip.

Lonley Planet: What Book did They Read?

"The Vancouver area was first inhabited by the Salish Indians. In 1867, a white town sprang up around the bar of one 'Gassy' Jack Deighton, so named for his tendency to talk - or so the story goes. The settlement became known as Gastown. After being linked by rail to eastern Canada, the town took its name from the British explorer Captain George Vancouver, who spent all of a single day on the site in 1792. In 1869 the Canadian Pacific Railway settled in the area and brought with it rapid development. In 1887, the first ship docked from China, and Vancouver began its boom as a trading center and transportation hub."

The Vancouver area was first inhabited by the Central Coast Salish people. Within that grouping are various nations such as the Squamish and Musqueam which settled in parts of what was to become Vancouver. In 1865 Captain Edward Stamp built a sawmill on the southern shore of Burrard Inlet about a mile from the present day Gastown. Around the mill workers built small homes (shacks really), while farther east along the shore of the inlet, at the end of the Douglas Road from New Westminster, was the town of Hastings. Captain Jack Deighton (Gassy Jack) came to Burrard Inlet from New Westminster in 1867 to set up a saloon. Legend has it that the mill hands brought lumber from the mill to assist in the construction. The government noticed the growing population on the inlet, especially in the vicinity of the saloon, and a townsite was surveyed in 1870 and named for Lord Granville, the colonial secretary, though the local nickname Gassy's Town stuck. In 1885 the CPR announced that Granville would be the western terminus of the transcontinental railway. The following year, in April the town was incorporated as the City of Vancouver (it got a new name because the CPR President thought Granville unsuitable for the new terminus, he chose the name from a map showing Vancouver Island) it was burned to the ground in June of the same year. In 1887 the first transcontinental passenger train pulled into Vancouver.

In their Vancouver guide Lonely Planet have so many dates incorrect it's hard to tell what books they were reading. In their BC guide they manage to provide at least three dates for the Great Fire of 1886. You expect better.

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Frommer's: Minor Quibbles

"The Hotel Vancouver - At 900 W. Georgia St. (tel. 604/684-3131), the hotel is owned by the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR), just as the city itself was for many, many years. In return for agreeing in 1885 to make Vancouver its western terminus, the CPR was given 2,400 hectares (6,000 acres) of prime downtown real estate--nearly the whole of downtown. The Hotel Vancouver is built in the CPR's signature chateau style, complete with verdigris-green copper roof. It's worth stepping inside for a moment to experience the Gatsbyesque ambience of the lobby."

And from the section on heritage buildings:

"John S. Archibald and John Schofield designed the Canadian-Pacific Railway's Fairmont Hotel Vancouver. Replacing a smaller hotel on the same site, the dignified French Renaissance structure took 10 years to complete. The current Hotel Vancouver is owned by the CP Hotel controlled Fairmont Hotel Chain."

It was not built by the CPR but the Canadian National Railway in return for being allowed to fill a portion of the eastern end of False Creek for its new station and freight yards. The hotel was managed by the Hilton chain in the 1960s and 70s. The lobby is a new renovation that does not reflect the hotel's original art deco interior. Canadian Pacific built 3 hotels in Vancouver (Actually, only one hotel was built with two major additions, but the additions were so large they effectively destroyed the original) at Georgia and Granville. The last one was a magnificient Mission Revival building with its famous roof top garden which was demolished in 1949.

"Sam Kee Building--The world's thinnest office building--4 feet 11 inches deep--was Sam Kee's way of thumbing his nose at both the city and his greedy next-door neighbor. In 1912, the city expropriated most of Kee's land in order to widen Pender Street, but refused to compensate him for the tiny leftover strip. Kee's neighbor, meanwhile, hoped to pick up the leftover sliver dirt cheap. The building was Kee's response. Huge bay windows helped maximize the available space, as did the extension of the basement well out underneath the sidewalk (note the glass blocks in the pavement). The building is now home to Jack Chow insurance."

Sam Kee was a business not a person. The Sam Kee Company was owned by Chang Toy. Chang built the building on a small lot left over from the road widening. His original building was purchased by the city for about 40,000 dollars - so he was compensated for the loss. The space under the sidewalk was a bath house and a barber shop. And the building is really six feet wide. According to some guide books the basement is the entrance to a secret tunnels system under Chinatown! There never were tunnels in the area despite fanciful notions of early newspaper writers and the like.

"Yaletown - Vancouver's former warehouse district, Yaletown was originally where roughneck miners from Yale (up the Fraser Valley) came to drink and brawl."

The area gets its name from the town of Yale because the CPR had its engine house and shops there while building the railway into Vancouver. The workers brought their belongings and in some cases their homes with them as the CPR moved all its operations to the False Creek yards. The workers set up house on the escarpment above the yards, which became known as Yaletown. That residential area was replaced by industry and warehouses taking advantage of the proximity of the railroad.

"Shaughnessy - Shaughnessy's a terrible place to wander around, but it's a great place to drive. Designed in the 1920s as an enclave for Vancouver's budding elite, this is Vancouver's Westmount or Nob Hill. (Distances within the neighborhood are a little too great for a comfortable stroll.) Shaughnessy was the idea of Richard Marpole, general superintendent and executive assistant of the CPR. He proposed development of an exclusive and prestigious residential area. In 1907 the railway hired Montreal landscape architect, Frederick Todd, and Danish engineer, L.E. Davick, to lay out curving streets and generous lots. Although lot prices were comparable to other Vancouver neighbourhoods, the CPR protected Shaughnessy's exclusivity by requiring that all houses built in the area cost at least $6,000."

Despite the author's note, the neighbourhood is a great place for a walk. Driving through will not give you a chance to peek through hedges or see some great garden vistas and you'll miss the pleasure of a walk. Distances are no greater than any other neighbourhood. In Vancouver Walks, with Michael Kluckner, there is a great Shaughnessy walk - look for it in bookstores everywhere. And I give frequent walking tours in the area.

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