Here’s the Pender Hotel in 1977, although at that time it was called the Wingate Hotel. Today it has a new name, Skwachays Lodge, and it’s effectively a new building. It was first a new building in 1913 when it was called the Palmer Rooms and it was an investment property designed by W T Whiteway for Storey and Campbell. They were owners of a manufacturing company making saddles, harnesses and trunks, with a new warehouse and manufacturing building just up the street on Beatty Street. We looked at the owners of the company when we described the history of that building.

This was a $40,000 investment, which was only a fraction of the budget that the same architect had three years earlier for the World Building, (today known as the Sun Tower), just across the street. Whiteway still managed to add some fancy architectural details in terra cotta with some elaborate pressed metal work on the cornice. Structurally the building wasn’t sophisticated – steel columns supporting millwork floors. In 1946 it was acquired by Lai Hing, who lived in the building and operated his hotel business under the Wingate Hotel name for over 30 years.

More recently it was acquired by B C Housing, one of over 20 SRO buildings that were bought to stabilize the stock of older, cheaper rental space, and to improve the state of the buildings, both structurally and in terms of facilities. After years of neglect (and with some harrowing stories of former activities in the building), the Pender Hotel was the only one found to be beyond repair. Instead a completely new building was constructed in 2012 behind the original (and now seismically stable) façade. Joe Wai, who designed the adjacent native housing building to the east, was the architect.

Today the building is run by the Vancouver Native Housing Society, and provides 24 housing units for artists and 18 hotel rooms, each one designed by first nations artists on a specific theme with names like the Hummingbird, the Moon and the Northern Lights suite. They’re available for first nations medical stay guests as well as tourists. As a social enterprise, the hotel needed at least 50% occupancy, but initially that wasn’t being achieved. The idea of adding the themes made all the difference, and now the hotel is recognized around the world and in high demand. As well as the first nations designed rooms there’s a sweat lodge on the roof, as well as a totem pole called ‘Dreamweaver’, carved by Francis Horne Sr, and a Haida designed screen by Eric Parnell as well as a Fair Trade Gallery at street level.

Image source: City of Vancouver Archives CVA 1135-19

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We saw these warehouses on Beatty Street as they were in 1927 in an earlier post; here they are as they were in 1974.

On the left is Storey and Campbell’s 1911 warehouse, designed by W T Whiteway which cost $60,000 to build. Jonathan Storey and Roderick Campbell, Jr., were both from Ontario, and in 1892 founded Storey and Campbell which began by selling leather items like harnesses, saddles, and trunks. They initially acquired the saddle-making business of D S Wilson, who moved to Los Angeles; Storey and Campbell expanded the scope of the business over the years – in 1921 their listing said they dealt in shoe findings, leather harness and saddlery, trunks, bags, valises and gloves. The street directory makes it clear that this was a significant manufacturing operation that was large enough to employ a chauffeur and an elevator operator as well as many saddlemakers and leather workers. The advert on the right is from 1932, when they had added golf bags to their range.

The historic building statement claims “As times changed and horses and wagons were replaced, the company also became sole agents in British Columbia for Studebaker commercial trucks. They eventually covered the area from Vancouver to Winnipeg.” We can find no evidence of that at all – a series of dealerships had the Studebaker brand sales over the years – none of them were Storey and Campbell.

In 1901 Jonathan Storey was aged 32, two years older than Roderick Campbell, who was married to Annie. The street directory said he was called Johnathan and put him in a new house at 1771 Haro Street, the same as the Campbell family, with the saddlery business based at 154 West Hastings. Annie had previously been Annie Storey, and the partners were brothers-in-law.

The Campbells moved to a house on the 2000 block of Haro, but Roderick died unexpectedly in 1919, after an operation to remove an impacted tooth. His will was complex, and led to an internal family split. Annie Campbell had to sue her brother, as the Daily World reported “Mrs. Annie Campbell, 1001 Georgia street west, widow of the late Mr. Rod Campbell, is asking the assistance of the court in an attempt to compel her brother, Jonathan Storey, the defendant, to sell property, which they own jointly, and with the proceeds to purchase her interest in the firm of Storey & Campbell Limited. Mrs. Campbell estimates her interest at $159,200.

Following the death of her husband, November 22, 1919, Mrs. Campbell stated today she discussed with her brother the proposal that he should acquire her interest in the business. The agreement was verbal, she said, and was made during the course a trip in her automobile in July, 1920″.

We don’t know how the case was settled, but Annie lived on until 1947, and in 1921 Jonathan Storey was still managing director of the company (as he was in 1951), and was also running the Vancouver Trunk and Bag Limited based on Charles Street. William A Cambell was vice-president of the company, and lived in the Hotel Vancouver – although as far as we can tell he wasn’t a relative of Roderick.

Like some others on the street, the warehouse was constructed with a steel-frame and exterior brick walls, which provided a measure of fire protection. Unusually for the time it had a sprinkler system and was connected with the fire department. There was a showroom and offices on the ground floor and mezzanine. Loading and unloading occurred at the lane and railway tracks, with a large freight elevator next to the loading dock. The building’s storefront underwent alteration in 1940, designed by architect Thomas Kerr, known for the design of several local theatres. Storey and Campbell remained in the building until 1951, when they sold the dry goods business to the Gordon Mackay Company Ltd. of Toronto, reportedly the largest textile distributor in Canada at the time. The building was converted to 48 apartments in 1996, designed by K C Mooney.

Next door, in the centre of the picture, today’s Bowman Lofts building was converted to residential use in 2006, 100 years after it was first built. The original building was five storeys (although seven on the lane as there’s a significant grade drop, and the rail sidings at the back of the warehouses were over 20 feet lower than Beatty Street). It was developed by Richard Bowman, whose history we examined in relation to another warehouse he built on Homer Street. He operated Bowman’s storage, with a warehouse on Powell Street, but this building was never occupied by his storage business. We haven’t been able to track the architect of the original structure, but seven years later another two storeys were added, designed by F Rayner and costing $5,000, but the building you see today was severely damaged by fire in 1929 and rebuilt in 1944 with a new façade designed by Townley and Matheson.

The building was initially occupied by two manufacturing companies owned by prominent businessman W J Pendray: the British Columbia Soap Works and British America Paint Company Ltd. (BAPCO), both headquartered near Pendray’s home in Victoria. The soap works was sold to American commercial giant Lever Brothers after Pendray’s death in 1913. The building remained the local warehouse for BAPCO Paints for many decades. It was also associated with the Vancouver Rubber Co, later Gutta Percha & Rubber Co. Ltd. The flammable nature of these industrial products was the cause of a fire that gutted the building in 1929. A third company, Tilden, Gurney and Co also occupied the building when it was first built. They were an Ontario stove manufacturer, based in a huge building complex in Hamilton. Miller & McDonald, a sash and door company occupied the rear of the premises. In 1907, James Little, the janitor of their premises trapped his foot between the floor and the elevator. It took an hour for the firemen to find him, and his leg had to be amputated, and it was unclear whether he would survive. The newspaper of the day published all the gory details: “While at work greasing the guys of the elevator the ladder on which he was standing slipped, throwing him in such a position that his foot was caught by the moving elevator, horribly mangling it and breaking the bone of his leg just above the ankle. No one else was in the building at the time of the accident, and it is supposed Little lay suffering for more than an hour before being discovered. The ambulance from the Vancouver general hospital was – telephoned for but it was fully thirty minutes before it arrived. It came without a surgeon and with only one man, the driver. No one was there to relieve the injured man. weak from loss of blood and suffering excruciating pain. T. Smith, a glazier for Miller & McDonald, volunteered to accompany the poor old man to the hospital. On the way a freight train at the Beatty street crossing blocked the street for several minutes. No effort was made to break the train to allow the suffering man to be hurried to the hospital It was found necessary to amputate the foot. The patient’s condition in precarious owing to the advanced age of patient. James Little was employed as janitor by Miller & McDonald Sash and Door company. He is seventy – five years of age and has been in their employ for about two months, he has no relatives as far as known.”

The Paint Company commissioned the 1944 rebuild, but later the building changed to clothing manufacturing and offices. A two-storey addition, set back from the facade, was constructed as part of the building’s rehabilitation and conversion to condos, designed by Ankenman Marchand and Gair Williamson Architects.

Image source: City of Vancouver Archives CVA 778-6

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