VANCOUVER BC Canada – Genealogy Approved Websites and Resources – A Baker’s Dozen - April 2023 Day 13 - The Finish

Today is the end of our Baker's Dozen (13 Days) of Online Resources for Vancouver Genealogy Research.

These are 'tried and true'. But, of course, you will find information on Vancouver city and people all over the Internet. 

Here are just a few more examples. Hope one or them at least brings you new information!

Library and Archives Canada

Many of the LAC databases have info, for e.g. the World War I personnel files, the Immigrants from China, 1885-1949 database, the censuses, the book collection, and the maps. Not everything is digitized, but some are, for e.g.,

"Atlas of the city of Vancouver, 1912", Ricketts, Tascherreau & Co. Ltd., :1 atlas (24 pages): b&w ; 57 x 99 cm. Fire insurance plans, Copyright expired. Library & Archives Canada: R6990-915-0-E, Box number: 2000762000. https://recherche-collection-search.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/home/record?app=fonandcol&IdNumber=3932441&q=Vancouver 

Here is the main page for LAC searches currently. Don't forget to 'Search – Theses Canada' and 'Voila' too: https://library-archives.canada.ca/eng/collection/search-collections/pages/search-the-collection.aspx 

The Internet Archive! Here's a favourite of mine. And one for fun! (Especially if you are a 'reader'.)

Souvenir of Vancouver, Album, Photographs, no date, Clarke and Stuart: Vancouver, BC, Canada. 

From the collections of Queens University in Toronto,  W.D. Jordan Special Collections and Music Library. Downloadable: https://archive.org/details/souvenirofvancou00unse/page/n19/mode/2up

The official catalogue of the books contained in the Free Library, Vancouver, BC, 1897. 

(from microfilm). Contributed by Canadiana.org. Digitizing Sponsor: University of Alberta Libraries. (Original in the Vancouver Public Library collections.) 

The catalogue was available for 10 cents then. Expensive. Downloadable: https://archive.org/details/cihm_16313/page/n15/mode/2up  

Don't forget the BC Archives. Many interesting Vancouver items in the Collections, as well as the larger provincial collections for Vancouver, for e.g., early police records, and wills - covered in an earlier post, Day 10.  

For items shown online, search with 'Digital Object Available'. 

A copy of this photograph is in the BC Archives and available online but it was damaged. Here it is shown as published in The Province, showing participants in the Canadian Pharmaceutical Convention held in Vancouver in August 1929 - men, women and children too. 

The BC Archives copy though has more information with it: " 'A.I. Commercial Photo Service Vancouver, B.C.' is embossed into the bottom right corner."  It seems to me. many, if not most, people will be recognizable in the newspaper photo, more than in the BC Archives copy. Best to look at both.

Pharmaceutical Convention, August 1929, Vancouver, BC. 16 Aug 1929, Friday,The Province (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) Courtesy, Newspapers.comThe BC Archives copy is titled: "Seventeenth Annual Convention of the Canadian Pharmaceutical Assn. at Grouse Mountain Vancouver, B.C. August 13 to 16, 1929", Public Domain, Accession number: 193501-001. https://search-bcarchives.royalbcmuseum.bc.ca/seventeenth-annual-convention-of-the-canadian-pharmaceutical-assn-at-grouse-mountain-vancouver-b-c-august-13-to-16-1929

HAPPY SEARCHING 

VANCOUVER BC Canada – Genealogy Approved Websites and Resources – A Baker’s Dozen - April 2023 Day 12

 Nearing the last of our Baker's Dozen of Vancouver Resources but never least -

The City of Vancouver Archives - 90 years young this year - an essential source for Vancouver research.

I like to point people to this page which has guides to research at the Vancouver Archives, including genealogy, house history and more: https://vancouver.ca/your-government/research-at-the-archives.aspx 

The guides for genealogy include Directories (1882 to 1996; also some BC Directories), Mountain View Cemetery records, Voters' lists (1886 to 1992), News clippings, Private-sector records, Photographs and Books. Download the Genealogy Reference Guide for more details: https://vancouver.ca/your-government/genealogy.aspx 

AuthentiCity, the Vancouver Archives blog, has articles on many collections, like the recent one on the historical by-laws of Vancouver, Point Grey and South Vancouver where my own family lived: https://www.vancouverarchives.ca/ 

If you can't visit in person (yet), you should know that the City has been in the forefront of digitization and you will find many items online, including maps and photographs and other records. 

A New Map of Vancouver...with the compliments of Spencer's, Vancouver's largest department Store. Front page, fold-out brochure advertising Spencer's Department Store, Spencer's furs, and David Spencer Ltd. with an oblique aerial map of the Lower Mainland, and a road map of routes into Greater Vancouver, 194-. Courtesy City of Vancouver Archives AM1594-: MAP 293-: LEG1800.069. Public Domain. https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/a-new-map-of-vancouver

And speaking of books (as I often do), don't forget the Vancouver Public Library's Special Collections. The Library's Vancouver History page has a list of recommended books and many links to other resources, including 'This Vancouver', Vancouver stories collected in images, audio clips, and videos: https://www.vpl.ca/guide/vancouver-history 

VANCOUVER BC Canada – Genealogy Approved Websites and Resources – A Baker’s Dozen - April 2023 Day 11

 Well... on Day 9 of this Vancouver Genealogy Challenge, I encouraged you to learn about Vancouver's history, neighbourhoods and transportation by looking at streetcar development. 

Today, Day 11, I'm introducing you to a wider source for Vancouver history - the Vancouver Historical Society: http://vancouver-historical-society.ca/index.html

The Society meets regularly at the Museum of Vancouver and, if you can't attend, the meetings are live-streamed on YouTube where there are archived talks you can catch up with: ::https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqrxLzWptopnfoBjkHTgn1w 

The Society's next meeting is May 25, 2023. The speaker is John Belshaw on "Reckless Riders and Reckless Writers: Cycling Accidents in the News since 1886". 

Further into the website is "The Story of Vancouver": https://www.vancouver-historical-society.ca/blog/ where you can "Read Vancouver’s history from the beginning to the present like you haven’t seen it before by theme and topic through quotes, photographs and a written narrative."  I recommend this as an easy way to learn about or review the City's history. 

There's a nice list of Sources too which includes a good number of very useful books, all of which should be available through Vancouver Public Library or at one of Vancouver's great bookstores.

The photographs add a lot to Vancouver's story. These are mostly from the collections of the City of Vancouver Archives  and the Vancouver Public Library, Special Collections. 

Staff at the News-Advertiser Building, Vancouver, BC; Date: 189-. Photographer, Bailey Bros. Courtesy Vancouver Public Library, Special Collections: Accession # 19842. Public Domain. 

VPL Special Collections: https://www.vpl.ca/digital-library/historical-photographs-bc-and-yukon

Just for genealogy fun: Can you think of just 2 ways to find out more about these people working for the News-Advertiser in Vancouver in the 1890s?