Eve Lazarus's Blog: Every Place has a Story, page 18
August 21, 2021
Ten Things You Won’t See at the PNE This Year
The first PNE was in 1910, and, not surprising, a lot of things have changed since then. Some things will be missed and others not so much. Here are 10 things you won’t be seeing this year.
From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History
1. A brill trolley bus
Unless it’s taken out of a transit museum, you won’t be taking a brill trolley bus to the fair.
August 13, 2021
S2 E19 The Night Club Murders
On February 22, 1975 country and western singer Debbie Roe, 22 finished her shift at the OK Corral, stopped to get gas and something to eat. Her body was found the next day on an isolated stretch of highway in Langley, BC. Just two months earlier, the body of Barbara LaRoque, 22 had been found nearby.
August 6, 2021
The Man who Blew up the Courthouse Lion
It’s been nearly 75 years, but I’m confident that the mystery of who blew up one of the courthouse lions in 1942 has now been solved. No one will be charged for this crime of course, but thanks to a reader—we’ll call him Dave—it was his grandfather who made a bang loud enough that Vancouverites thought the Japanese were invading the city.
July 30, 2021
S2 E18 On the Edge of Chinatown
At the start of 1985, things looked good for Jimmy and Lily Ming. They had two small children, owned their own home and worked in the family’s thriving Robson Street restaurant. But by the end of January, Jimmy and Lily had been kidnapped from their Vancouver house, the restaurant was closed and the rest of the Ming family lived in fear of their lives.
July 24, 2021
BC Ferries and the Russian Freighter
From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History
One of the highlights of taking a BC Ferry from Vancouver to Victoria is Active Pass, that narrow channel of water that runs through the Gulf Islands. It’s particularly interesting when two ferries are travelling in different directions at the same time, forcing them to hug the shore.
July 16, 2021
S2 E17 Sweet Sixteen: The Murder of Rhona Duncan
Sixteen-year-old Rhona Duncan was murdered in the early hours of July 15, 1976 after walking home from a high school birthday party. She was in sight of her North Vancouver house, when she was intercepted, raped and strangled. Although 45 years has gone by, Rhona’s friends still get together to remember her and to try and solve her murder.
July 10, 2021
Fraser Wilson and the (mostly) Working Man’s Mural
Story from Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History
Looking at the outside of the plain two-storey building at Victoria Drive and Truimph Street, you’d never guess that it houses a colourful mural that runs the full length of a 25-metre wall. The building is the home of the Maritime Labour Centre, and Fraser Wilson painted the mural in 1947.
July 2, 2021
S2 E16 Murder at the Good Earth
On January 7, 1976 Brenda Young was found murdered in her store the Good Earth in the Lower Lonsdale area of North Vancouver. It was a brazen murder and it felt like a hit, but why would anyone target this much-loved 38-year-old mother of four?
Brenda was an attractive, petite woman with long black curly hair, rosy cheeks and always smiling.
June 26, 2021
The Evolution of Devonian Harbour Park
From Vancouver Exposed: Searching for the City’s Hidden History
The name of the 11-acre green space at the entrance to Stanley Park known as Devonian Harbour Park has nothing to do with its indigenous history, the land’s connection to the Kanakas, the buildings that once dotted its landscape or Vancouver. The park was named after the Calgary-based Devonian Group of Charitable Foundations which forked over $600,000 to develop the site to its present look in 1983.
June 18, 2021
S2 E15 The Murder of Robert David Hopkins
This podcast episode is based on original research conducted for my book Cold Case Vancouver: the city’s most baffling unsolved murders
In 1954, Bob Hopkins was a 48-year-old printer who worked at the Vancouver News Herald, one of three daily newspapers.
