Thanks to all the owners who are hosting our Centenary signs for our 5th year. As in a few previous years, we have concentrated the signs in one area – on a couple of blocks just east of The Drive on 2nd and 3rd Avenues. Easy to visit on your next visit to Continental Coffee! … Continue reading 2016–17 Centenary Houses
We had another interesting meeting last Thursday evening. Claire Shepansky gave an excellent presentation on her recent project which was to document and analyze the residential displacement caused by the building of the Britannia Community Centre in 1973-1974. The regular monthly feature on Neighbourhood Changes discussed Heritage Conservation Areas (as is being mooted for Mole … Continue reading Meeting Notes — June 2016
We had another lively, informative, and well-attended meeting last Thursday evening. After introductions: We took note of our fifth anniversary on 5th May Centenary Signs Campaign All the previous year's signs have been collected Maria and Donato have assembled a number of possibilities on the west side of Grandview It was agreed we will look … Continue reading Notes From The May Meeting
During a recent debate on the future of Commercial Drive, Jak King briefly described the historical/social processes that have created the Drive of today. These remarks may be of interest to our readers: "From its founding in the early years of the 1900s through to the Second World War, the Drive was a rather staid … Continue reading Getting To Today On The Drive
Today -- May 5th -- is the fifth anniversary of the very first meeting of the Grandview Heritage Group! Modest though we may be, I believe we are all proud of our achievements over this time. Here's to the next five years!
As mentioned in the minutes to the last meeting, GHG and GWAC are co-sponsoring one of this year's Jane's Walks (named for famed urbanist Jane Jacobs). The walk along the Drive -- with the theme Human Scale Urbanism -- will be led by Lewis Villegas and Steve Bohus. Jak King will tag along to offer … Continue reading Human Scale Urbanism On The Drive
The GHG had another interesting and productive meeting last night with a fine turnout for a warm "early summer" night, After introductions, Jak attempted to show a short video entitled "Living In Gunter's World" which takes viewers through a short history of surveying measurements and how that has directly affected the shape and history of … Continue reading Meeting Notes: April 2016
First, a reminder that GHG's first walking tour of the year is this Sunday. It is a walk and talk through the older industrial section of Grandview north of Hastings. It begins and ends at Pandora Park. Details can be found in this post. In addition. the Vancouver Heritage Foundation is holding a tour of … Continue reading Walking Tours
Join heritage expert John Stuart as he explores Grandview's industrial heritage. Sunday 10th April 2016, 11:00am Free (though donations to GHG are always happily accepted) Tour begins and ends at the facilities building at Pandora Park, Garden & Pandora "A feature of recent town planning has been the separation of work and living spaces. Today communities … Continue reading Grandview Heritage Walking Tour
In January, I wrote of the anniversary of the first meeting of the Grandview Ratepayers Association. Since then I have received correspondence from our friend Jim Wolf of New Westminster. He has sent the following image, probably taken in 1911, of Maxwell Smith, the Ratepayers' first President. Jim writes that Maxwell Smith was also a … Continue reading More on Maxwell Smith
Our February meeting ranged over a number of topics: • Cynthia Low, the ED of Britannia Community Services Centre, attended the meeting to ask whether GHG would be willing to coordinate a research project on the history of First Peoples in the Grandview area. It would involve consultation with Elders, a review of historic documentation, … Continue reading Notes from the February 18th meeting
As mentioned in the report on this month's meeting, I gave a presentation on the growth of Grandview using the data collated in the growing Grandview Database. This post is a brief and attenuated version of that report. In the maps that follow, the following streets are highlighted to allow orientation: It has often been … Continue reading The Growth of Grandview 1901-1915
The GHG had another well-attended and fascinating meeting last night, covering a wide range of topics: Eric took us through a long list of items on the regular Neighbourhood Update segment. We discussed the recent fires on Lily Street and Commercial Drive; land assembly around Broadway; new buildings on E. Peder and Ferndale; and another dozen … Continue reading Meeting Notes, January 2016
"The Grandview Ratepayers' Association was formally constituted last evening at a meeting held at the Grandview schoolhouse, the following officers being elected: President Maxwell Smith; vice-president J.J. Dougan; secretary-treasurer, J.R. Shannon. A constitution was adopted and immediate steps will be taken to secure recognition from the ratepayers' central executive. The the attention of the city … Continue reading GV Ratepayers’ Organized 105 Years Ago Today
We had a very large turnout for last Thursday's Grandview Heritage Group monthly meeting. So many in fact we have begun to think about alternate locations; but we'll let that lie until the new year. Welcome one and all! Again, as usual, we had a wide-ranging discussion. Michael gave a presentation on basements. Typical early … Continue reading Notes From November Meeting
Stephanie Ann Warner's blog has a great list of all the available on-line tools for researching all things local and Vancouver Island, with a few sources from elsewhere. Check it out!
In the menu above, you will find a listing: "Grandview Database". This is an historical catalog of roughly 5,000 properties in Grandview, nearly 1,200 of which no longer exist. Each entry lists in chronological order all the information known about that lot or property, including, where appropriate, details of the properties that existed on that … Continue reading The Grandview Database: An Introduction
The October meeting of the Grandview Heritage Group was very well attended, including a very welcome visit by Patrick Gunn of Heritage Vancouver. Although a presentation took up much of the meeting, we were also able, as usual, to discuss a wide range of other topics. Jak King presented his Database of Grandview Properties which … Continue reading Notes From The October Meeting
The new season of meetings kicked off on Thursday with a good attendance. As usual, the discussion was wide-ranging and fascinating. We began as usual with our Around The Hood segment in which Eric leads us through an illustrated tour of various changes, sales, rumours etc within Grandview. This month we covered 17 properties. In … Continue reading Notes From The September Meeting
Here is our map for the set of houses, at least 100 years old, we have chosen this year. There is a large cluster of them on Ferndale Street, reflecting the legacy of builder George Tyson more than a century ago. This is the fourth year of our project to celebrate Grandview's Edwardian-era heritage buildings. … Continue reading Centenary Signs 2015–16
grandviewheritagegroup.ca 