, ,

Out and About: Wood Patterns in the Shipyard

This past winter, if you took a break from skating at North Vancouver’s new outdoor rink at The Shipyard Commons, and wandered inside, you likely saw wooden objects hanging outside the washrooms. Bright and colourful and unusual shapes, but what are they?
, ,

Get Zooming with these Archival Backgrounds from the NVMA

f you’re anything like us, you’ve been spending a lot of time on Zoom lately. Usage of this popular teleconferencing platform has exploded in recent weeks, as the COVID-19 pandemic has forced many of us to work from home and connect to friends, family and colleagues virtually. In our weekly team meetings here at the NVMA, we’ve been having a lot of fun with our Zoom backgrounds. This got us thinking that it might be fun to provide some North Vancouver history and heritage themed Zoom backgrounds for our friends, supporters and community at large.

National Volunteer Week: Honouring Our Incredible Volunteers

We are grateful to have such a committed, energetic and passionate group of volunteers and Friends Society members. We really value the contribution they make and want to say a massive thanks to them during National Volunteer Week.

Volunteer Spotlight: Eric Jamieson

Sunday, April 19, will mark the start of National Volunteer Week in Canada. This is a coast-to-coast-to-coast celebration of the commitment, dedication, generosity and selflessness of Canada’s almost 12.7 million volunteers. In North Vancouver, some volunteers are working from home to ensure that NVMA’s activities continue despite social distancing. As you will read, Eric Jamieson is doing just that as he builds on the contributions he has made over many years.

Check out these Database Search Tips and Tricks!

Want to explore our collection but don’t know where to start? We’ve created a quick start guide to help you search the Archives of North Vancouver database like a pro!
, ,

Launching the Jack Cash Exhibition

In March 2019 the Archives started preparing for an exhibition on prominent North Vancouver photographer, Jack Cash. He was born in 1918 to Gwen Cash, the first woman general reporter in Canada, and had big shoes to fill. Instead of words, Jack used images to tell stories. The archival photographs, logbooks, cameras, and ephemera included in the Jack Cash exhibition are part of a larger donation to the Archives by Cash's son, Derek Cash. The Archives has worked closely with Derek Cash to prepare the exhibit at the Community History Centre in Lynn Valley. In March 2020, the temporary closure of the Archives presented an opportunity to digitize parts of the exhibition and launch it online! We are excited to expand the reach of this exhibition and to have it included as part of the Capture Festival online events.

Lynn Valley’s First School: A Difficult Start

In 1902-1903 Lynn Valley was mostly forest, loggers, and a mill. There were no streets -- only a wooden tote road (also called a “skid road”) used to carry logs from the Hastings Shingle & Manufacturing Company (by Mill Street) down to Moodyville. Sawmill workers and their families lived not far from the mill, near the tote road which served as their “main street.” By 1903 there were several school-age children, but no school. So in Fall 1903, it was decided to build one.

Nikkei Artifacts for the New Museum

For nearly 15 years, archaeologist Bob Muckle and his students from Capilano University have been excavating a significant site deep within the woods of the Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve. Buried beneath the moss and ferns of the North Vancouver forest, Bob Muckle has uncovered the remains of a small Japanese community that inhabited the area from the 1920s until the early 1940s...