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Chronology Continued
[1757
- 1884] [1885 - 1891] [1892
- 1899]
[1900 - 1905] [1906
- 1908] [1909] [1910]
[1911] [1912]
[1913] [1914]
[1915] [1916]
[1917] [1918]
[1919] [1920]
[1921] [1922]
[1923] [1924]
[1925] [1926]
[1927] [1928]
[1929] [1930]
[1931] [1932]
[1933] [1934]
[1935] [1936]
[1937] [1938]
[1939] [1940]
[1941] [1942]
[1943] [1944]
[1945] [1946]
[1947] [1948]
[1949] [1950]
[1951] [1952]
[1953] [1954]
[1955] [1956]
[1957] [1958]
[1959] [1960]
[1961] [1962]
[1963] [1964]
[1965] [1966]
[1967] [1968]
[1969] [1970]
[1971] [1972]
[1973] [1974]
[1975] [1976]
[1977] [1978]
[1979] [1980]
[1981] [1982]
[1983] [1984]
[1985] [1986]
[1987] [1988]
[1989] [1990]
[1991] [1992]
[1993] [1994]
1916
You can sponsor this
year in the book! Click here for details.
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You'll note that this year includes events listed under "Also
in . . ." These are events for which we don't have a specific
date. If YOU know the
specific date of an event shown there, please
notify us . . . and cite the source! Many thanks!
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February 14 The first trans-Canada telephone
call—it was between Vancouver and Montreal—was placed.
The circuit ran 6,763 kilometres through Buffalo, Chicago, Omaha,
Salt Lake City and Portland, Oregon. Not until 1932 was a telephone
line for an all-Canada connection completed.
March 8 This was proclaimed Sock Day in Vancouver.
The IODE (Independent Order, Daughters of the Empire) had asked
for socks for men at the front.
April 21 The first congress of the new British
Columbia Chess Association began in Vancouver. The winner of the
tournament was entitled to be called the “Chess Champion of
British Columbia.” J.M. Ewing, a Scot by birth, was the first
champion.
May 4 The first convocation for conferring
of degrees was held by UBC.
May 16 The Vancouver World had an item
about the new post office—Postal Station C—opening today
at 15th Avenue and Main Street. Today’s it’s known as
Heritage Hall, home of several community organizations and a meeting
hall for local events.
June 2 The Buzzer, that publication
you get on the trolleys and SkyTrain in the lower mainland, began
publishing.
July 17 Lumberman John Hendry died.
Also July 17 Ranjit Mattu, star Vancouver
athlete, was born in Jullunder, Punjab, India.
July The second Hotel Vancouver, a spectacular
building, opened. There is a good article on it by Imbi Harding
in the October 12, 2001 Vancouver Sun, Page B5. It had a
brief life as a hotel, closing in May of 1939 when the present Hotel
Vancouver opened.
Labor Day Two PGE trains collided in West
Vancouver. One of them, the No. 2, built in 1910 in Philadelphia,
was restored and is now at the West Coast Railway Heritage Park
near Squamish.
September An application by Miss Rose Peers
for membership in the North Vancouver Board of Trade created controversy.
However, she was finally accepted as the first female member.
Fall The Hoffar Brothers, Henry and Jimmie,
were building a “hydroplane,” as seaplanes were then called,
the design copied from a photo of an Avro biplane they had seen
in the British periodical Flight. Jimmie taught himself how to fly
it.
November 8 June Hovick was born in Vancouver.
As June Havoc, she became a well-known actress. Her sister was Gypsy
Rose Lee, who was born in Seattle. In the musical Gypsy the
character Baby June is based on June Havoc.
November 23 Harlan Carey Brewster is elected
Premier. Two other decisions by B.C.’s voters this day were
notable: we approved Prohibition in the province, to come into effect
July 1, 1917, and we also approved giving women the vote. Brewster
died in office March 1, 1918.
December 13 Canadian Pacific opened its five-mile-long
Connaught Tunnel beneath Mount MacDonald at Rogers Pass. The avalanche-plagued
route over the summit of Rogers Pass is abandoned. (An avalanche
here March 4, 1910 had killed 62 workmen.)
December 17 Frank Griffiths, radio and TV
station owner, sports executive, was born in Burnaby.
Also in 1916
Vancouver aldermen voted to open civic offices to
women.
Holy Rosary Church, built in 1910, became a cathedral.
The Vancouver Institute was founded to offer lectures
during the winter term. It is still going strong. Lectures are held
on the UBC campus during the fall and spring academic terms.
A little-known episode in the life of Vancouver’s
Major James Skitt Matthews: while he was in hospital in London,
England recovering from severe war wounds, Matthews conceived of
a method of compressing paraffin wax and sawdust into walnut-sized
pellets, which could then be ignited and give off enough heat to
boil a quart of water. Matthews called them “Fire Cubes”.
The Anglo-American Oil Co. made and sold millions, but without profit.
Then the army’s commander-in-chief, Earl Haig, ordered Matthews
to supply enough for one army to test in the trenches. But then
the war ended and demand for the "Fire Cube" flickered
out. Some 17 years later Matthews would become Vancouver’s
first city archivist.
Ma Murray, the famous newspaper publisher, and her
family moved to the Ioco area (briefly). In 1921 they would move
back to Vancouver.
Malcolm McBeath, 35, was elected mayor, one of the
city’s youngest.
The first grain elevator was built in Vancouver.
Fred Deeley, Sr. acquired the Harley-Davidson franchise
here, becoming its second oldest dealership.
Actor John Drainie was born in Vancouver. Orson Welles
called him the greatest radio actor in the world. He died in October
1966. There is a good brief bio here.
The City passed a by-law reducing the number of aldermen
per ward from two to one. Until this year, aldermen hoping to be
elected by a particular ward had been required to live in that ward,
but a new by-law eliminated this requirement.
John Ridington (born in West Ham, England), hired
by UBC as a cataloguer in its library in 1914, was appointed the
university’s first librarian. In seven years he will expand
the holdings from 700 books to 55,000. By the end of his term of
office there were 125,000 volumes.
Surrey Council hired its first woman employee. Miss
C.E. Bauer worked in the Collectors and Assessors Office.
The people of the Squamish Nation, who have lived
on Howe Sound, the Squamish River and Burrard Inlet, migrated to
the inlet for jobs and consolidated into one band. The Halkomelem
people of the Burrard Reserve, who have a different Coast Salish
language, do not join them, although the two groups have many links.
West Vancouver began its municipal bus service, which
would become known as the “Blue Buses.”
The first annual Regatta was held at Dundarave pier
in West Vancouver.
The Dewdney Trunk Road reached Deroche.
Thomas Haney, after whom Haney was named, died.
The mainland portion of Eburne was renamed Marpole,
after CPR official Richard Marpole. He lived at the time on Marpole
Avenue. So now we have Richard Marpole, living on Marpole Avenue
in Marpole.
Thomas George Shaughnessy, president of the C.P.R.
from 1898 to 1918, became Lord Shaughnessy. Vancouver’s Shaughnessy
neighborhood is named for him.
The Dollar Mill at Roche Point on Indian Arm began
operations. Started by shipping magnate Robert Dollar, the mill
was a major employer for many years, but closed in 1942.
The responsibility for street planting of trees,
etc., in Vancouver passed to the Board of Parks and Recreation.
Stanley Park’s Lost Lagoon became landlocked,
an artificial lake created by construction of a causeway. It got
its curious name (now inaccurate) from poet Pauline Johnson, who
remarked how the lagoon disappeared at low tide.
Industrial construction began on Granville Island.
It was 36 acres in size, 10 feet above highwater mark, had 80 lots
and rents were $500 to $1,500 an acre a year.
Construction began on the Pantages Theatre on Hastings
Street. It will be finished in 1917. (It was demolished, replaced
by a parking lot.)
Thomas Carlyle Hebb is appointed a Professor of Physics
at UBC. He will serve to 1938. The university’s Hebb Building
is named for him.
The Mabel Brown was built in North Vancouver
for the Canada West Coast Navigation Co. She was a wood-hulled,
five-masted auxiliary schooner. The Mabel Brown name was given to
a class of lumber-carrying sailing ships built on the Pacific coast.
Eighteen were built.
The UBC Botanical Garden was established, the oldest
university botanical garden in Canada, today featuring 70 acres
of plants from around the world, set in a coastal forest, including
400 species of rhododendron.
Mussoc (the University of British Columbia Musical
Theatre Society ) was formed. Mussoc alumni include Ruth Nichol,
Jane Mortifee, Brent Carver, Richard Ouzounian, Jeff Hyslop, Patrick
Rose, Ann Mortifee, Victor Young, David Y.H. Lui and Margot Kidder.
The UBC Player's Club was also born and was one of
the city's only theatre troupes for much of the city*s early history.
The Vancouver Shakespeare Society was formed.
Eric Hamber became president of B.C. Mills, Timber
and Trading.
Charles R. Shaw, the first reeve of Burnaby, died
at age 82 in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
A proposal was put forth for a dam and two sets of
locks for Second Narrows, simplifying the bridging problem, and
eventually making the upper harbour into a freshwater lake, with
a canal east to Pitt River. You may have noticed this was not built.
1916 Studebaker Six Fifty Touring
Continued...
[1757
- 1884] [1885 - 1891] [1892
- 1899]
[1900 - 1905] [1906
- 1908] [1909] [1910]
[1911] [1912]
[1913] [1914]
[1915] [1916]
[1917] [1918]
[1919] [1920]
[1921] [1922]
[1923] [1924]
[1925] [1926]
[1927] [1928]
[1929] [1930]
[1931] [1932]
[1933] [1934]
[1935] [1936]
[1937] [1938]
[1939] [1940]
[1941] [1942]
[1943] [1944]
[1945] [1946]
[1947] [1948]
[1949] [1950]
[1951] [1952]
[1953] [1954]
[1955] [1956]
[1957] [1958]
[1959] [1960]
[1961] [1962]
[1963] [1964]
[1965] [1966]
[1967] [1968]
[1969] [1970]
[1971] [1972]
[1973] [1974]
[1975] [1976]
[1977] [1978]
[1979] [1980]
[1981] [1982]
[1983] [1984]
[1985] [1986]
[1987] [1988]
[1989] [1990]
[1991] [1992]
[1993] [1994]
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