Vancouver School District History

Chapter Nine – The Nineties

April 23, 2020

 VSB personnel pose outside new Vancouver School Board building (1999) I. INTRODUCTION Setting the stage – An outline of major events in the World, Canada, British Columbia, and Vancouver.   A. THE WORLD          Clockwise from top left: Desert Storm battlefield, World Wide Web icon, Sarajevo (Boznia and Herzegovina), Rwanda [...]

Chapter Eight – The Eighties

April 14, 2020

      I. INTRODUCTION Setting the stage – An outline of major events in the World, Canada, British Columbia, and Vancouver. A. THE WORLD             It can be argued that the most transforming events of the 1980s were the invention of the personal computer and the                                [...]

Chapter Seven – The Seventies

December 23, 2019

Opening of the Britannia Community Services Centre, 1976   I. INTRODUCTION Setting the stage – An outline of major events in the world, Canada, British Columbia, and Vancouver.    A. The World 1971     Idi Amin, a military officer, declares himself President of Uganda. A year later, he orders the expulsion of South Asian [...]

Chapter Six: The Sixties

November 15, 2019

Expo 67 – Montreal   I.  INTRODUCTION In 1967, Canada celebrated its Centennial. – the uniting of the British colonies of Canada, Nova Scotia, and new Brunswick to form the Dominion of Canada. Prime Minister Lester B Pearson spoke for many Canadians in his speech at the official opening of Expo 67, a six-month international fair held [...]

Chapter Five: The Fifties

February 1, 2018

  Introduction During the 1950s, Vancouver experienced an economic boom, rapid growth, a dramatic rise in the school population, an increase in ethnic and cultural diversity, and the threat of annihilation in a global nuclear war. The children who entered school during this decade were part of an enormous post war ‘baby boom’.  The rapid [...]

Chapter Four: 1931 – 1950

April 24, 2017

High School Cadets on Parade (1944).   The two decades beginning in 1931 were dominated by two events: a disastrous stock market crash on October 24, 1929, which triggered a lasting global economic depression, and a six-year world war which began on September 01, 1939, following Germany’s invasion of Poland. These events threw Canada [...]

Chapter Three: 1911 – 1930

April 24, 2017

Vancouver Technical High School as it looked shortly after it opened in 1928. For many years, it was the largest technical school in Western Canada. Only boys attended the school until 1940, when it became co-educational.   Introduction This period was marked by ‘boom and bust’ cycles in the global economy, a brutal world war, and a [...]

Chapter Two: 1891 – 1910

April 19, 2017

Vancouver High School: Senior Class (1892)   1. Introduction  During these two decades, Vancouver experienced a population explosion and rapid economic growth. Government restrictions on immigration dictated that the ethnic character of the population remain white and English speaking. Many new elementary schools were built, as well [...]

Chapter One: 1872 – 1890

June 3, 2015

 Hastings sawmill built on the south shore of Burrard Inlet by Captain Edward Stamp in 1865. “Although he would not live to see it, the visionary sawmill on Burrard Inlet that Stamp started would reign as Vancouver’s first and longest lasting industry into the 20th century, paralleling the history of the developing world of the day. [...]