These three office buildings were some of the earliest built in the city. Seen here in 1889 on Granville Street, south from the corner of Georgia were the Donald Smith Block, the Lord Durham Block and the Lord Elphinstone Block. We think all three were built in 1888, and all were part of Canadian Pacific Railway’s efforts to create an instant ‘new city’ on the CPR’s own land, some distance from the more established former Granville townsite down on Water Street.

The Donald Smith Block on the corner was designed by Bruce Price, an American with impeccable credentials as a designer, based in New York. He produced a series of designs from 1886 to 1888 for CPR sponsored buildings, including this 4-storey building named for Lord Strathcona, the Scottish born Canadian co-founder of the CPR (with his first cousin, Lord Mount Steven). As a CPR Director there was an expectation that Sir Donald would invest in a building to encourage the growth of business in the new city (and particularly that part controlled by the CPR).

Next door was the Lord Durham Block. The architect was T C Sorby (whose role was reported in a Victoria newspaper). We were not completely sure if the Lord Durham of the day, The 3rd Earl of Durham, John Lambton, was associated with the CPR, but a contemporary 1888 publication certainly implies that he was. There’s also a building permit in 1902 for repairs to the building issued to ‘Durham, Lord’.

Lord Durham’s grandfather, an English peer, the 1st Earl, also called John, had earlier connections to Canada. He was a political reformer who in December 1837 was asked by Lord Melbourne, the British prime minister, to solve the Canadian situation after rebellion had broken out in both Upper and Lower Canada. He was promised virtually dictatorial powers as governor-in-chief of the British North American colonies and high commissioner, but didn’t last in the job very long. After his short stay in Canada he wrote a report in 1838 that proposed merger of Upper and Lower Canada and the creation of responsible government, in which the governor general would be a figurehead and the legislative assembly would hold a great deal of power. In the responsible government, the legislative assembly would be elected by the people, and the party with majority would hold power – as long as they held support, they would keep power. The merger would eventually come ten years later.

There’s a woodcut of the Lord Durham Block in an 1888 publication which shows a very English looking building. In 1889 the Daily World reported “The alterations to the Lord Durham block are approaching completion. The store windows, and those of the upper storeys as well, have been enlarged, and the general appearance of the block has been so changed that it would be difficult to recognize it. The new upper cornice is a great improvement to the building. T. Tompkins, the contractor, has reason to congratulate himself on the success of the work, as the building looks very much improved since the alterations have been made.” There’s no way of being sure, but we think the photograph above is the revised building – there’s an 1893 image that shows the building looking the same as it does here. While we haven’t identified the architect, we can rule one candidate out: a Daily World article in 1888 reported that Bruce Price of New York was the architect of a number of new buildings with the exception of the Lord Durham and Lord Elphinstone Blocks. It reported that each of the three were costing about $26,000, and that Mr. Tomkins was contractor for all of them. The Lord Durham Block was where the congregation of Christ Church met while they tried to raise the funds to build their church; often in cramped and stuffy conditions if reports from 1889 are accurate.

The third building is the Lord Elphinstone Block, designed by Montreal architects John and Edward Hopkins, a father and son team who also picked up another CPR commission for the Opera House up the street. Unlike Lord Durham, we are quite certain of Lord Elphinstone’s involvement in the CPR – he was their man in London. He was one of the British subscribers who bought shares in the company, and was also a founding director of the Canada North-West Land Company (with Donald Smith) incorporated in 1882 to buy five million acres of land along the route of the railway from the CPR, (later changed to a mere 2.2 million aces) including  forty-seven towns on the CPR main line. We can probably rule out the possibility of the Hopkins’ designing the Lord Durham Block, as the list of their works is comprehensive because it comes from the ledgers recording their income.

Despite their early importance, the buildings didn’t last very long. In 1912 the Birks Building went up here, only for it to be tragically replaced in the mid 1970s by the uninspired Vancouver Centre.

Image source: City of Vancouver Archives CVA Str P73

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This undated image is probably from around 1910, showing the newly expanded Vancouver Opera House. Pretty soon after the Hotel Vancouver was underway the Canadian Pacific Railway sought to make their part of the new city even more attractive by building a theatre next door to their hotel (to the south). Grandly (but fairly inaccurately) called The Opera House it was designed by Montreal architects John and Edward Hopkins in 1890, a father and son team who also picked up another CPR commission for the Lord Elphinstone Block, an office designed in 1888. The first vesion of the opera house can be seen below. (An earlier 1888 design by Bruce Price, ‘in the grecian style’  seems to have been abandoned).

(Confusingly there was another Opera House built at the same time, the Imperial Opera House on Pender Street – and there was also Hart’s Opera House on Carrall Street, the oldest of the three, but that was described as a ‘glorified shed’ with burlap walls and doubled as a roller rink – the CPR’s was easily the classiest).

The new street railway conveniently ended in front of the Opera House, completing in 1889 not very long before the Opera House opened in around 1890. It cost $100,000 to build and apparently was run at a loss, but that was made up for by the passenger traffic it attracted. Mr A P Horne of the CPR Land Department  recalled the first year of operation in a conversation with Major Matthews.

 “We engaged Sarah Bernhardt, the famous European actress, for two nights and one matinée, that was in 1890, and then again we had another play, ‘Willing Hands and Honest Hearts,’ in which John L. Sullivan, celebrated prize fighter, was principal. It was rather funny, one morning when we presented to Mr. Browning, as he insisted we do, a statement of the expenses and receipts, he picked up the paper and remarked, ‘Very satisfactory, you made quite a profit,’ and I, just a young man, perhaps thoughtlessly remarked the John L. Sullivan had been quite an attraction. Mr. Browning replied, ‘There was no fighting, was there?’ and I answered, ‘Yes, in the third set. He brought someone with him to knock out.’ Mr. Browning was astounded, and said he did not know what Mr. Van Horne would think of it; that he would have to tell him; but we never heard any more of it.”

In 1894 the Imperial closed, and the CPR had a monopoly. They ran it until 1896 then handed management to Robert Jamieson who managed several other BC theatres. While serious drama often played to a limited house (with 1,200 seats a small audience was noticeable) the Province newspaper in 1898 “complained about the vulgarity of ‘Leavitt’s Spider and Fly Burlesque Company’ while conceding that “a good many people appeared to enjoy themselves immensely”.

In the same year, 1898, the Savoy opened as a music hall, and a year later the Alhambra opened as a theatre. By 1906 US interests were booking the Opera House and by the time the Pantages Theatre opened on Hastings Street in 1908, Vancouver was an integral part of the North American touring circuit. There was a major refurbishment and enlargement of the theatre in 1907, started in May and completed in September, designed by E W Houghton of Seattle. The proscenium arch was widened by seven feet, the posts supporting the balcony were removed, the back of the theatre shifted into the foyer to add five extra rows of seating (bring capacity to over 1,700), and the front-of house space was rebuilt and widened. Despite this, the CPR were thinking of offloading the theatre, which they did in 1909 for $200,000 to a local consortium, who promptly flipped it for $300,000 to US based Sullivan and Considine.

The new owners as the Orpheum Theatrical Co brought in world class acts like Anna Pavlova and Ellen Terry who both appeared in 1910. They hired local architect James J Donnellan to expand and rebuild the theatre in 1912 at a cost of $160,000 after a fire destroyed all but the walls. The new design added offices on Granville Street and lasted until 1969 under a variety of changing names until it was demolished as part of the site assembly for the Pacific Centre Mall

Image source: Opera House, Library & Archives Canada, City of Vancouver Archives, Opera House 1891 CVA Bu P509

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