pasttensevancouver:

Vancouver Harbour, Monday 1 July 1889

Source: Photo by Bailey and Neelands, City of Vancouver Archives #1376-375.51

Let’s go sailing.

pasttensevancouver:

Daddy, 1940

I was reading about that now world famous riot “kissing photo” in the Guardian, where Douglas Haddow wrote: “The irony here is that Vancouver has at last produced an iconic image that rivals those of Paris and New York, but it needed to shatter its own fantasy to do so.” While that’s a nice little and well deserved dig at Vancouver, Haddow’s not entirely correct, at least not if we include New Westminster as part of Vancouver.

This photo, captured by Province photographer Claud Detloff, went the 1940 equivalent of “viral,” meaning it was featured in Life Magazine, then Liberty, Time, Newsweek, and innumerable newspapers and other publications. There may be more famous Canadian photos, such as Yousuf Karsh’s curmudgeonly portrait of Winston Churchill (which made the front cover of Life), but this one is certainly iconic, and undoubtedly the most famous photographic image to come out of this neck of the woods. (Until now?) For more info, see what Chuck Davis wrote on the subject.

Source: Life Magazine, 21 October 1940

I can’t stop looking at this photo.