History

Archaeological evidence shows that coastal Indians had settled the Vancouver area by 500 B.C. British naval captain George Vancouver explored the area in 1792. In the winter of 1824 the Hudson's Bay Company starting setting up a network of fur-trading posts on the Pacific slope. In the 1870s Vancouver was founded as a sawmill settlement called Granville. The city was incorporated in 1886 and renamed after Captain Vancouver. In 1871 British Columbia, assured by Canada that its entry would bring it the railway, joined Confederation. Now British Columbians were also Canadians. When the CPR announced Vancouver would be the railway's terminus, the town's population was about 400, four years after the railway arrived, it was 13,000.

The tiny city, made up mostly of wooden buildings was just over two months old on June 13, 1886 when a raging fire that started with a sudden freak squall blowing in sparks from clearing fires to the west destroyed it in a time recalled as anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes. The Great Fire left a pitiful scattering of buildings. Within hours of the fire rebuilding the city began, this time using bricks.

Before World War II, communities developed in the Lower Mainland around historic crossroads and strategic spots for river navigation. Always, their existence depended on some kind of local industry focusing their attention inward, towards the main street, the post office, the cafe and the bar in the hotel. After the War attitudes toward automaobiles changed and many people bought into new subdivisions on the outskirts of the old country towns because they wanted affordable space and could now drive easily to their jobs elsewhere in the region. Secondly, many municipal councils rezoned large areas for shopping malls, such as Richmond Centre, Coquitlam Centre, Surrey Centre, and Langley's Willowbrook.

Vancouver is now Canada's third largest city after Toronto and Montreal.