The Vancouver Board of Trade was jubilant on October 31, 1902 for that was the day that the Pacific Cable was completed. The Province newspaper stated that this was an “epoch-marking event in the history of the British Empire.”
With the assistance of 7,200 miles of electric cable, Vancouverites would now be able to communicate instantly with places as far away as Great Britain and Australia.
This fine home is also on Victoria Drive and it was built in 1911.
Sir Sanford Fleming had been pushing for this cable for years. This Scottish born engineer and inventor knew how great something like this could be to Canada and the world. Fleming is quoted as saying that it was the $1 million that British Columbia contributed "was the turning point, and from that time forward success was assured.”
Fleming was the man who proposed standard worldwide time zones as well as designing Canada's first postage stamp.
A special thanks was given to provincial cabinet minister Francis Carter-Cotton for he was the one that was instrumental in getting the province to make the offer.
The cable started its jump across the Pacific from Bamfield on the West coast of Vancouver Island. It ended on Fanning Island south of Hawaii. The ship Colonia was responsible for laying the 8,000 tonnes of cable that this required.
Communication through phones, computers, email or even hand written letters seems to easy and natural to us now that we forget how it started. Men risked their lives to lay cable underwater so that information could be transmitted more quickly.
I hope you find the beauty around you.
Once again I would like to thank the History of Metropolitan Vancouver website for the above information. And Wikipedia.
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