A Year in Five Minutes: Vancouver 1952

In 1952, “the most powerful person at City Hall” started his reign and a comment from a visiting performer brought about cold war tensions.

By Chuck Davis, The History of Vancouver
Photos courtesy of Vancouver Archives

The Crown

On February 6, 1952 King George VI, aged just 56, died, and his daughter Elizabeth, 25, became Queen. She heard of his death while on a holiday in Kenya with her husband, Prince Philip. Vancouver and the rest of the British Commonwealth mourned the passing of the King. A 21-gun salute was fired at Brockton Point February 7 to mark the succession to the throne of Elizabeth II. Her coronation would occur June 2, 1953.

W.A.C.

On August 1, 1952 New Brunswick-born William Andrew Cecil Bennett became premier of BC. He will serve to September 15, 1972, just over 20 years, making him our longest-serving premier and, many say, our best.

Gerald Sutton-Brown

In September Gerald W. Sutton Brown, an engineer from Lancashire, started as Vancouver’s town planner. In his 1983 book, Vancouver Limited, Donald Gutstein called Sutton Brown “the most powerful person at City Hall, his power verging on the absolute.”

“Sutton Brown,” says John Punter, in his book The Vancouver Achievement, “was the first port of call for developers. It was Sutton Brown who, from 1959 onward, proposed Vancouver’s freeway system and associated major redevelopment.” He conducted much of the city’s affairs behind closed doors, with no public input. The 1972 victory of TEAM—bringing in people like Art Phillips, Walter Hardwick, Setty Pendakur and May Brown—would bring an end to Sutton Brown’s autocratic ways: he was dismissed and replaced by Ray Spaxman.

Paul Robeson

The great American bass Paul Robeson was to have performed in Vancouver in January, 1952. He had performed at the Orpheum February 7, 1946, and 3,000 fans in the sold-out theatre kept him coming back for more and more. But a hint of troubles ahead could be seen in the Sun’s warm review by Stanley Bligh. Bligh wrote of that 1946 concert: “In addition to his great success in the artistic field, the eminent Negro has won an outstanding place in the world by his firm stand on the question of racial equality, his knowledge of languages, international economics and his wide sympathy for the oppressed peoples of the whole globe.”

That sympathy would get him into trouble.

Robeson’s knowledge of languages was impressive. Besides his native English, he spoke Hebrew, Chinese, Norwegian and Spanish. That came from his extensive travels . . . which included trips to Russia. In an interview, Robeson had told the Sun: “I deeply believe Russia is now the world’s most positive force for good, if we will help her.”

But now it was 1952, and the cold war had the US in a deep freeze. Robeson’s opinions, and his favorable view of the Communist Party (although he was never a member), resulted in a refusal by the U.S. to allow him to return to Vancouver for the concert. He was stopped at Blaine. Local unions organized a free outdoor concert at the Peace Arch, and it attracted 25,000 people on the Canadian side, 5,000 on the U.S. side.

Robeson is now back in favor. The U.S. has issued a postage stamp to honor him.

Also in 1952

On January 25, at 8:30 p.m., CBR 1130 moved to 690 on the dial and changed its call letters to CBU. For more, look here.

On February 1 and 2 Louis Armstrong and the All-Stars appeared in the auditorium of Kitsilano High School.

Tolls were removed from Pattullo Bridge on February 12, 1952.

On February 18, The Vancouver Daily Province was renamed The Vancouver Province. It will become The Province (its original 1894 Victoria name) on June 12, 1956.

Vancouver got its first taste of 3-D movie making April 4 with a really bad movie set in Africa and called Bwana Devil, starring Robert Stack. Look out for that lion!

After an appearance in Trail, Duke Ellington came with his band and played a gig from April 11 to 19 at the Palomar Supper Club in Vancouver.

Jack Wasserman’s first column in the Vancouver Sun? We’re not positive, but April 16, 1952, Page 29, looks promising.

On April 19 the last streetcar on Oak Street ran.

On April 23 the food pages in the Sun discussed the local introduction of a new-fangled thing called a “Caesar Salad.”

The present Lumberman’s Arch was installed at Stanley Park July 15. It replaced the original, which had been brought to the park in 1912 after briefly looming over the intersection of Hamilton and Pender Streets to honor the visit to Vancouver by the Duke and Duchess of Connaught. By late 1947 it had deteriorated, and so was demolished. This much simpler version—a single leaning log—was put in its place.

The Greater Vancouver Tourist Association changed its name in 1952 to the Vancouver Tourist Association. On July 18 the Vancouver Sun noted that the Association had no women on its board. But the place was busy. From the Sun August 15: “The postman rings four times daily, and statistically one-and-a-half persons per minute come into the over-crowded offices at the corner of Georgia and Seymour which house Vancouver’s Tourist Bureau . . .”

The UBC Law Building was opened September 4, 1952 by Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent. The law faculty had opened in September of 1945. By the early 1950s the Faculty had outgrown its accommodations and Dean George Curtis began plans for a permanent Faculty of Law Building. Curtis, the first Dean, served in that capacity from 1945 to 1971 and the building was named for him.

Sweet, dithery US movie actress ZaSu Pitts, 58, appeared in Vancouver from October 18 to 21 in The Late Christopher Bean with the Everyman Theatre. During her visit here, ZaSu was startled to learn Canada was not a British Colony. The Internet Movie DataBase lists her in 204 movies.

On October 19 the first sod was turned for St Anselm Anglican Church at Cleveland Way and University Boulevard.

Vancouver had two notable visitors on October 20, 1952: Governor General Vincent Massey (our first Canadian-born GG, sworn in February 28 of this year) was in town, and so was singer Jeannette MacDonald, performing at the Georgia Auditorium.

The official opening of the Frederic Wood Theatre at UBC occurred December 6, 1952. The first production was Earle Birney’s play Trial of a City (original title: Damnation of Vancouver). The production was directed by Joy Coghill, a member of Sydney Risk’s company and a former student of Dorothy Somerset.

Fred Amess became Principal of the Vancouver School of Art.

The Mau Mau rebellion began in Kenya. One observer: 14-year-old Vancouver-born future B.C. politician Gordon Wilson.

A 1952 Hollywood movie titled Hurricane Smith starred two Vancouver-born actors, Yvonne De Carlo and John Ireland.

The West Vancouver Chamber of Commerce was incorporated.

Vancouver city council approved the naming of several city streets after famous golf courses. That gave us Seigniory, Leaside, Uplands, Bonnacord, Scarboro, Bonnyvale, Brigadoon and Bobolink.

Vancouver-born (1908) Sydney Risk founded the Holiday Theatre for children.

The BC Lions Society for Children with Disabilities was founded. They’re also known as the Easter Seal people. “Under both names,” says their web site, “our Society mandate is to support children with disabilities throughout British Columbia.”

Departures

James Inglis Reid died November 16, 1952. He was 78. His famous high-ceilinged butcher’s shop at 559 Granville, which had opened in 1915, was almost as famous for its signs as for the special meats and haggis it sold. The most celebrated sign read: “We hae meat that ye can eat.” The meats included Ayrshire bacon, Belfast ham, black pudding and oatmeal-coated sausage. The Scottish-born (Kirkintilloch) Reid had come to Vancouver in 1906, at 32. Another Scot, H. Nelson Menzies, joined him in 1917. Long service was a constant at Reid’s. When the shop closed in December 1986—forced out by Pacific Centre expansion—its manager, Gordon Wyness, had been there 41 years.

Elsewhere

On January 15, 1952 Ian Fleming began writing Casino Royale, the first James Bond book.

The first H-Bomb was detonated on Eniwetok Atoll, northeast of Papua New Guinea, November 1, 1952.

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Chuck Davis is a Vancouver writer who has written, co-written, or edited 15 books. Most of them are on local history, and he describes his next book, The History of Metropolitan Vancouver, as the capstone of his career.