We’ve already seen this corner with its 1899 building, the Alhambra Theatre. Here’s what appeared around 1914, and lasted for less than 15 years; the single storey retail that in our 1918 image was home to Norman Tullis’s tire shop. The most likely builder of these stores was D A MacDonald – there’s a 1914 permit for over $3,000 of repairs where Mr MacDonald was owner, architect and builder.
There are too many MacDonalds in Vancouver to successfully identify anything else about D A MacDonald. There are almost no references to anybody called Norman L Tullis, although a Scottish tanner of that name wound up the company where he was a partner in 1905, so that might be his previous life before embarking for Canada. Our Mr Tullis was manager for Wood Milne Tires operating from 815 W Pender from 1914 to 1915, initially in partnership with W G Sotham. Mr Tullis only appears to have been in the city for four years, by 1919 T M Ramsay was at the Howe and Pender location, described a manufacturer’s agent (as Mr Tullis was).
Today the Stock Exchange tower, designed by Townley and Matheson in 1928 and completed in 1929 at a cost of $600,000 awaits the construction of the Exchange Tower – a contemporary office building that will see the existing heritage office upgraded and incorporated into a much larger building.
Image source: City of Vancouver Archives CVA 99-689
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Changing Vancouver 