Tweed Jacket Man

When we left off on Monday, Mary Brown and Shirley Parsons, legal secretaries working late at 508 Hornby Street, had just found a man in a tailor's shop being beaten by another man in a tweed jacket with a cane. A man in white overalls had answered Mary's cry for assistance while Shirley ran back to the office to call the police.

So Mary, the man in the tweed jacket and the man in overalls are standing by the front door of the tailor shop and Mary has just accused the man with the cane of beating the third man laying on the floor of the shop. Now, another man - this one in a blue overcoat who appeared to have been drinking - joined them. The man in the overalls, not believing Mary's story, said, "Yes, he must have been having a fit." He then stood aside and allowed the man in the tweed jacket walk out of the store. The tweed jacket man proceeded down Hornby Street towards Pender.

At that moment, the man who had been beaten sat up and said, "It's a hold-up, please help me."

Mary told the two men standing there to stop the tweed jacket man but they made no effort to do so. Mary was scared but also angry and she went after the assailant on her own.

Tweed jacket man had reached Pender Street and turned East. Mary rushed to the corner and looked along Pender but tweed jacket man was nowhere to be seen.

He hadn't had time to reach the other end of the block so it stands to reason that he must have ducked into one of the buildings.

Mary walked back to the parking lot behind her office building and looked beneath the cars in case he was hiding there but tweed jacket man had disappeared. She walked back to the store to check on the man who was injured. She then saw the man in the blue overcoat get into a car and drive off.

At the store, Mary saw that the man in the overalls was gone but she was joined by Shirley who told her the police were on their way.

The two women then went into the store to check on the victim. He was an elderly man and he had managed to pick himself up and was sitting in a chair. He was shaking badly but his injuries did not appear to be serious. He was holding a wallet in his hands and told the women that tweed jacket man had robbed him of $8.00.

He asked Mary to hand him his hat, which was lying on the floor of the cubicle. She did so. He placed the hat on his head and told her that his assailant had come in and asked for a pair of trousers. Tweed jacket then called the tailor into the changing cubicle to check the fit. That was when the tailor was attacked.

Constables Nebisuk and Burton came into the store as the man was telling his story. They were responding to Shirley's telephone call.

Thanks to Joe Swan and his book Policebeat for the above information.

I hope you find the beauty around you.

Karen Magill

Steve Brodie

This photo is from the Province Newspaper. This is Steve Brodie, after the men were evicted from the post office in June of 1938.

Steve Brodie was a Scottish orphan who came to Canada at the age of 14. He worked as a farm labourer and at 18, the young Brodie befriended a Marxist ex-newspaperman. Then the depression hit Canada and Steve, like many men of that time, started 'riding the rods' and criss crossing the country looking for work. He wasn't successful and ended up in the relief camps in B.C. (riding the rods means sneaking aboard the freight trains and getting a free ride somewhere.)

Brodie joined the fight to press the government for "work and wages". He joined 1500 others in the On-to-Ottawa trek in 1935. That journey was stopped in Regina by police bullets and billy clubs. That is where the young man lost a few teeth. 

Steve looked back at that journey and didn't see anything to celebrate."It was one of the battle's we lost... It was a desperate attempt on the part of the unemployed to draw attention to our plight."

This young Scot made history in 1938 with the sit down strike at the post office. He paid it for too. As I stated last week, numerous people were hurt and Brodie was the target of the police wrath.

The man who drove the injured Brodie to the hospital, reported to the Vancouver Sun newspaper: "Brodie had his hands over his head. He was trying to fight off two cops in front of him. There were three behind him, pounding on him with their billies. He fell. They still pounded on him." An RCMP Sergeant stopped the beating when he spotted a newspaper photographer recording the event. Brodie regained consciousness 24 hours later in St. Paul's hospital.

Later, when asked, Brodie would tell of the postcards the men received during the occupation. People would tell them what a great thing they were doing. As appreciative as he probably was for the support, Brodie also noted that 'everyone was waiting for someone else to do something'.

As we know from our history books, the Great Depression ended in 1939 when the world went to war. Steve Brodie joined the merchant marines and after the war, he went to work at the Esquimalt dockyard. But he was still the fireball of before and delighted in needling guests on a call-in radio show. He never ceased to challenge others on issues such as unemployment, poverty and capitalism.

What many may not know is that this natural leader was a devoted and loving grandfather. When he lost his battle with liver cancer on December 6, 1997 at the age of 87, Grampa Steve had five grandchildren and thirteen great grandchildren. 

Whether you agree with the stand this man took or his politics, you have to admit that he had a great fighting spirit and earned his place in history.

I would like to thank the Livable4All website for the information on Steve Brodie.

I hope you find the beauty around you.