Drivers and Detectives

1036 Odlum Street, built in 1908, is a part of a group of four homes on the street built between 1908 and 1910 by Vancouver builder J.L. McKenzie.

This house was briefly the home of Vancouver City Police Detective Donald A. Sinclair. Sinclair's photo is beside the door of the men's washroom in the Vancouver Police Museum. I have written on the museum previously, (see this entry) but I didn't get a photo of the men's washroom.

Further down the block is 1018 Odlum Drive. In that home, Dugald Carmichael once lived. Twenty years before residing on Odlum Drive, Carmichael worked as a conductor for the Vancouver Electric Railway and Light Company. In fact, he had the distinction of driving Vancouver's first street car on its first trial run.

Three of the houses on the opposite side of the street were moved there in the 1940s from the 1200 block of Venables.

Did you know that on August 21, 1949, the biggest earthquake in B.C.'s history occurred off the Queen Charlotte Islands? It registered 8.1 on the Richter scale. Damage was minimal since the major force of the quake was felt in the uninhabited west of the islands. However, the Province reported that a clock at the home of Mrs. Laurie Sanders on Imperial Street in Burnaby stopped.

In 1949, the only link to West Vancouver was Marine Drive. On November 27, the Capilano River - swollen by a violent rainstorm - swept away a large section of the road. In addition, the river also swept away part of a bridge over the Capilano. For ten days West Vancouver remained cut off from the rest of the city.

On August 29, 1950, workers from the firm Eccles-Rand Limited checked out Vancouver's first atomic bomb shelter. The company had built it in an unidentified backyard in Shaugnessy. I wonder if it is still there.

I have to thank Bob_2006 at flickr.com for the information on the house and to the History of Metropolitan Vancouver website for the fun facts.

I hope you find the beauty around you.

Karen Magill, Vancouver, Donald A. Sinclair, history, Dugald Carmichael, History of Metropolitan Vancouver British Columbia, Canada, the Province,Marine Drive