Sunday, February 14, 2010
Sunday Church Feature
Valentine's Day
Happy 100th Birthday

2010 is the 100th birthday year of St. Agnes Anglican Church at 530 East 12th Street in the City of North Vancouver.  This "country church in the city" was started as the second mission church of St. John's Anglican Church. The name St. Agnes was chosen December 8, 1909. The church was built in 1910 by contractor H. W. Young.  In 1927 the church hall on the lane behind the church was built by the H. W. Young as well. 

The original entrance to the church sanctuary was through a door on the south west face of the building.  The altar was in the alcove on the east wall and the dark wood pews lined a center aisle in a traditional manner.  Beautiful stained glass windows decorated  the north, south and east  walls of the sanctuary.  The church hall was only accessible by going outside and entering through the hall's west facing door.  In the 1970's the alter was moved into the body of the church and the alcove was fitted with pews for the choir.  In the 1990's the entrance door to the church and sanctuary was changed to the south east side of the building.  The altar was moved to the west side of the sanctuary with a middle aisle and traditional pew placement. The new south east door made possible an entrance hall not only to the sanctuary, but also to the church office and church hall.  It was no longer necessary to go outside to go to the church hall for "coffee hour".  Around 2002 the configuration of the sanctuary changed again.  Now the altar was placed on the north wall of the sanctuary, between two of the stained glass windows.  The pews were arranged around the altar in a  horseshoe pattern.  The average Sunday Worship attendance is 54 and the number of households that are members is 72. The priest is the Rev. Keith Gilbert.

St. Agnes was a 13 year old girl of  Rome who was put to death because she refused to renounce her Christian faith. There is a church built over the spot where she was buried in Rome.  It can still be seen today.  Keats wrote a poem about her life "The Eve of St. Agnes". 


On Sunday mornings  a rope hanging on the south wall of the  sanctuary is pulled, and the church bell signals to the community that it is time for worship.  The congregation of the "country church in the city" is ready to greet its neighbors.

Thank You: To Shirley Marcino for confirming my memories of the 
              church sanctuary.
Photo: Taken January 2010 by SW.  (Note the peaked roof of the church hall
              can be seen behind the church.)
Resources: City of North Vancouver Heritage Inventory 1994.
             Sunday January 24th St. Agnes Anglican Church bulletin.

Saturday Travel Feature

A Castle in the Sand

This Castle in the Sand was built in 2006 during the Harrison Hot Springs, B.C. Sand Castle Competition. On the shores of Lake Harrison with the mountains looming behind not only sand castles but mermaids, lions, pirates, dragons, gargoyles, and even a whole army was sculpted. Builders came from all over the world to this the World Championship of Sand Castle Competitions.


Although the Competition starts each September, the Tuesday after Labor Day, an exhibition of sand sculptures is on display during the summer. The display may sound small, about a dozen displays, but it packs a punch since there is nothing like it.


Harrison Hot Springs is of course well known for its hot springs that not only give the town its name, but are available for bathing and help to warm up the lake water for swimming. The other big attraction of the area is the possibility of seeing a Sasquatch. This is a legendary ape like creature that is hairy, twice the size of a man, and has been reported to have been seen a dozen times. In fact, if you take a tourist boat cruise out onto Harrison Lake they guarantee you will see one.

The Sasquatch has been chosen as the model for one of the mascots for the 2010 Olympic Winter Games to be held in the Vancouver and Whistler. The fuzzy brown fellow is called Quatchi. He comes in different sized stuffed animals as well as appearing on other official Olympic products. In fact, you can even seen larger than life sized ones dancing around at Olympic Festivities.


To get to Harrison Hot Springs from Vancouver you need to drive about one hour and forty minutes east on the Transcanada Highway. There sits the town of 1,473 and one Sasquatch.

Link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/instamarv/sets/72157607549204123/

The Castle in the Sand was demolished in the fall of 2006.

Photo: Taken Mother's Day 2006 by SW.

Special Friday Feature
Special 2010 Olympic Feature
Let the Olympics Begin

On this the first day of the 2010 Olympic Games downtown Vancouver is dressed up and ready for them to begin. The Hudson Bay, The Private Residences at Hotel Georgia (See blog post Friday, January 1, 2010.) and even the eagle sculpture in the bottom left of the photo are wearing their best gowns.  These "gowns" will be worn through out the 2010 Olympic Games, February 12 to the 28th and the 2010 Paralympic Games, March 12 to the 21.

Where as The Private Residences at Hotel Georgia is wrapped in a Canadian Flag, The Hudson Bay features four storey banners of tones of blue and white. Doing their stuff on the banners are: a ski jumper, a speed skater, a bob sledder, a free style skier, a figure skater, and even spectators in Oylmpic hoodies and Olympic toques. Specific athletes pictured include: Canadian medal winning speed skater Clara Hughes, bobsledder Pierre Lueders, the American Lindsay Jacobellis, and a 2006 Olympic silver medallist in snowboarding. Almost 40 banners are mounted on the building’s upper exterior panels facing Seymour and West Georgia Streets. Each banner is 16 meters high and approximately five meters wide. with almost 40 banners celebrating the Games and Canadian Olympic and Paralympic athletes.


"Hudson Bay's Vancouver flagship store is a six-storey building in Downtown Vancouver. Located at 674 Granville Street, on the corner of Georgia, the cream terra cotta building with Corinthian columns was built in 1927. The current store was built on the site of another HBC store from 1913. The last additions were made in 1949. The original HBC store in Vancouver was a small storefront on Cordova between Carrall and Abbott. Another HBC building, the stone-trimmed brick Fur and Liquor Warehouse, was built on the railway side of Water Street during the warehouse construction boom in Gastown of the 1920s." Wikipedia.

As to the eagle it is part of this years B.C. Lion's Society Charity for Children with Disabilities public art project. The 135 sculptures of "Eagles in the City" were place through out B.C. in April 2009. Each eagle is individually decorated and will be auctioned off in April 2010. A tour map of the sculptures is available through the link http://www.eaglesinthecity.com/default.aspx?PageID=1001. Previous years the Orca-killer whale- and Spirit Bear have been the sculptures that have decorated the city, celebrated the spirit of B.C., and raised money for Children with Disabilities.

Photo: Taken January 2010 by SW.

Thursday, February 11, 2010
A Mountain and a River

From the front yard of 4020 Glenview Crescent you can see the North Shore mountains. A short block away are the waters of Mosquito Creek. Glenview Crescent is an idyllic street tucked away west of Highland Blvd. in the District of North Vancouver.

In 1954 this is the area on the corner lot that is 4020 Glenview Crescent where F. Hall decided to build his house. The construction of this house with four windows and a fireplace in the living room cost him $14,500. From around 1955 to at least 1960 Alberta and Doug Jackson owned the house. Doug was the vice president of Industrial Equipment. By 1971 George and Margery Bentham had moved in. George worked as an assessment officer at the Workman's Compensation Board. In 1980 and 1991 when the City Directory representative tried to contact the residents at 4020, there was no response. There was a response in 1995, from Marc Verschueren. The year 2000 phone book lists Marc as continuing to be at that address, with a view of the mountains and a short walk to the waters of Mosquito Creek.

Demolition Permit: Applied for December 2009.
Photo: Taken in January 2010 by SW.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010
How many ways are there to spell Maginnis?

How many ways are there to spell Maginnis? Well, there are three that come from Scotland: MacGinnis, McInnis, and McGuinness. McGuinness is actually a variation of MacGinnis. Then there is the Irish way to spell it, McGinnis. That is the way the street a block to the north west of Lynn Valley Park is spelled.

The man who built the house on the large corner lot of this street with the Irish spelled name was R. G. Walton. The address was 3615 Maginnis Avenue. The year was 1950. The price was $5000. And the corner was that of Frederick Road and Maginnis Avenue. By 1955 Themla and Arthur E. Trenchard had bought the house. Arthur was employed as a fireman for the city of Vancouver. Then in 1971 Mrs. Thelma Trenchard a widow is listed as the owner. In 1980 she was working as a clerk at Mountain Market and in 1991 as a cafeteria helper at Argyle Secondary School. She was retired by 1995/96. The phone listing in the year 2000 and the years 2008/2010 is under the name Arthur E. Trenchard.


So it seems that the white house with the horizontal clapboard siding, the blue scalloped shutters each with three diamond cutouts, and the white horizontal board fence with a double front gate has been the home of the Trenchards for over 55 years.  


The large corner lot is actually two lots.  It has been bought by Noort Homes and two homes will be built.


Demolition Permit: Applied for January 2010.
Photo: Taken in January 2010 by SW.
Link: http://www.houseofnames.com/xq/asp.fc/qx/maginnis-family-crest.htm

Tuesday, February 9, 2010
$10,000 Buys Cheviot Rd. Home

That's right, the house at 4373 Cheviot Road was built for $10,000, but the year was 1954. L. Nelson was the owner at the time of its construction.  In 1960 the owners of this one storey home were Donna and Thomas Dybhavn.  Thomas worked for Link-Belt as an engineer.  In 1971 Olga and Ronald Tainton owned the house.  Ronald was a personal administrator in a Canadian Government office.  However, in 1980 no one returned the calls for information from the offices of the City Directory.  But they did in 1991.  And that was Sandra and Henry Ducharme, retired.  That means it was the first year that they lived there.

Cheviot Road is in the Forest Hills area of the District of North Vancouver.  It edges the east side of MacKay Creek.  This short "Road" is just a stones throw from both Canyon Heights Elementary School and Handsworth Secondary School.  However, Handworth is on the west side of the Creek and MacKay Creek Park.  The Creek runs south through Murdo Fraser Park and Heywood Park and empties into Burrard Inlet at the slough on the west side of the Automall. South of the Upper Levels Highway the adjacent Mackay Avenue forms the western boarder of the City of North Vancouver.


Demolition Permit:  Applied for in November of 2009.
Photo: Taken in December of 2009 by SW.

Monday, February 8, 2010
On the Way to School

The house at 866 East 13th Street is indeed on the way to school.  It is on the block leading to Brooksbank Elementary School in North Vancouver District east of Grand Boulevard. It is also a very active street construction wise.  A second  house on the street has been demolished and a new one is under construction. Another is being extensively renovated by the North Vancouver construction company A Carpenter and a Gentleman. Two more houses  in the 900 block of East 13th Street, the block the school is actually on, are also under construction.


866 East 13th Street was built in 1952 for $6000 by J. A. Armstrong. In 1960 Lillian and Alfred A. Lewis a tin smith for T and G Roofing lived in the house. By 1971 Elizabeth and L. M. Shuttleworth had moved in. L. M. was a clerk at B.F. Goodrich. The 1980 and 1990 City Directories report that Elizabeth was living in the house and retired in those years.

It is interesting that the 700, 800, and 900 blocks of East 13th Street are in North Vancouver District where as the 600 block is in the City of North Vancouver. The 700, 800, and 900 blocks of East 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th Streets are in the City of North Vancouver as are all those at East 14th Street and above. But the City takes a jog at the 700 block of East Keith and the 8th,  9th, 10th, 11th, 12th and 13th Streets suddenly become part of North Vancouver District. This area of streets form a North Vancouver District rectangle at the eastern edge of the City. It is in this rectangle with the City to the North and the South that 866 East 13th Street and Brooksbank Elementary School are situated.  If this all sounds confusing think of the City as a  patch work quilt with a square patch of District inserted about 1/3rd of the way up on the right hand side.


Permit for Demolition: Applied for November 2009.
Photo: Taken November 2009 by SW.
Link: http://www.carpentergentleman.com/tour1/hb5.html