The Vancouver old map shows evolutions of Vancouver city. This historical map of Vancouver will allow you to travel in the past and in the history of Vancouver in British Columbia - Canada. The Vancouver ancient map is downloadable in PDF, printable and free.

The first European to explore the coastline of present-day Point Grey and parts of Burrard Inlet was José María Narváez of Spain, in 1791, although one author contends that Francis Drake may have visited the area in 1579. The historical city is named after George Vancouver, who explored the inner harbour of Burrard Inlet in 1792 and gave various places British names. The explorer and North West Company trader Simon Fraser and his crew were the first known people of European race to set foot on the site of the present-day city. In 1808, they travelled from the east down the Fraser River, perhaps as far as Point Grey as you can see in Vancouver historical map.

The Fraser Gold Rush of 1858 brought over 25,000 men, mainly from California, to nearby New Westminster (founded February 14, 1859) on the Fraser River, on their way to the Fraser Canyon, bypassing what would become Vancouver. Vancouver is among British Columbia youngest cities; the first European settlement in what is now Vancouver was not until 1862 at McLeery Farm on the Fraser River, just east of the ancient village of Musqueam in what is now Marpole as its shown in Vancouver historical map. A sawmill established at Moodyville (now the historical City of North Vancouver) in 1863, began the city long relationship with logging. It was quickly followed by mills owned by Captain Edward Stamp on the south shore of the inlet. Stamp, who had begun lumbering in the Port Alberni area, first attempted to run a mill at Brockton Point, but difficult currents and reefs forced the relocation of the operation in 1867 to a point near the foot of Gore Street.

The historical settlement which came to be called Gastown grew up quickly around the original makeshift tavern established by "Gassy" Jack Deighton in 1867 on the edge of the Hastings Mill property as its mentioned in Vancouver historical map. In 1870, the colonial government surveyed the settlement and laid out a townsite, renamed "Granville" in honour of the then-British Secretary of State for the Colonies, Lord Granville. This site, with its natural harbour, was selected in 1884 as the terminus for the Canadian Pacific Railway, to the disappointment of Port Moody, New Westminster and Victoria, all of which had vied to be the railhead. A railway was among the inducements for British Columbia to join the Confederation in 1871, but the Pacific Scandal and arguments over the use of Chinese labour delayed construction until the 1880s.

The Vancouver vintage map give a unique insight into the history and evolution of Vancouver city. This vintage map of Vancouver with its antique style will allow you to travel in the past of Vancouver in British Columbia - Canada. The Vancouver vintage map is downloadable in PDF, printable and free.

The vintage City of Vancouver was incorporated on April 6, 1886, the same year that the first transcontinental train arrived. CPR president William Van Horne arrived in Port Moody to establish the CPR terminus recommended by Henry John Cambie, and gave the city its name in honour of George Vancouver. The Great Vancouver Fire on June 13, 1886, razed the entire city as you can see in Vancouver vintage map. The Vancouver Fire Department was established that year and the city quickly rebuilt. Vancouver population grew from a settlement of 1,000 people in 1881 to over 20,000 by the turn of the century and 100,000 by 1911. Vancouver merchants outfitted prospectors bound for the Klondike Gold Rush in 1898. One of those merchants, Charles Woodward, had opened the first Woodward store at Abbott and Cordova Streets in 1892 and, along with Spencer and the Hudson Bay department stores, formed the core of the city's retail sector for decades.

The dominance of the economy by big business was accompanied by an often militant labour movement. The first major sympathy strike was in 1903 when railway employees struck against the CPR for union recognition as its shown in Vancouver vintage map. Labour leader Frank Rogers was killed by CPR police while picketing at the docks, becoming the movement first martyr in British Columbia. The rise of industrial tensions throughout the province led to Canada first general strike in 1918, at the Cumberland coal mines on Vancouver Island. Following a lull in the 1920s, the strike wave peaked in 1935 when unemployed men flooded the vintage city to protest conditions in the relief camps run by the military in remote areas throughout the province. After two tense months of daily and disruptive protesting, the relief camp strikers decided to take their grievances to the federal government and embarked on the On-to-Ottawa Trek, but their protest was put down by force. The workers were arrested near Mission and interned in work camps for the duration of the Depression.

Mary Ellen Smith, a Vancouver suffragist and prohibitionist, became the first woman elected to a provincial legislature in Canada in 1918. Alcohol prohibition began in the First World War and lasted until 1921, when the provincial government established control over alcohol sales, a practice still in place today. Canada first drug law came about following an inquiry conducted by the federal Minister of Labour and future Prime Minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King as its mentioned in Vancouver vintage map. King was sent to investigate damages claims resulting from a riot when the Asiatic Exclusion League led a rampage through Chinatown and Japantown. Two of the claimants were opium manufacturers, and after further investigation, King found that white women were reportedly frequenting opium dens as well as Chinese men. A federal law banning the manufacture, sale, and importation of opium for non-medicinal purposes was soon passed based on these revelations. Amalgamation with Point Grey and South Vancouver gave the city its final boundaries not long before it became the third-largest metropolis in the vintage country. As of January 1, 1929, the population of the enlarged Vancouver was 228,193.