Street fair was a dry run for what would become PNE
The first Vancouver Exhibition (the PNE’s original name) wasn’t held until 1910. But a dry run for a permanent exhibition took place a decade earlier, with the Vancouver Street Fair and Carnival.
According to a story in The World, street fairs had become popular in the U.S. after an unscrupulous landowner had foreclosed the mortgage on the fairgrounds of “an unpretentious city in northern Ohio.”
“It was his purpose to extort from the managers of the fair association several times the value of the grounds for their use as an exposition,” said The World. “They rebelled and called a council of war. (They decided to hold the fair) in the streets of the city, (and) it proved to be a popular and instantaneous success. Originally it was a typical agricultural fair in miniature, ( but) it grew and grew.”
The Vancouver Street Fair kicked off on Aug. 5, 1901, with a big parade featuring exotic animals.
“The lions, monkeys, tigers and mountain goats brought forth screams of delight from the little folks who were on the streets in thousands,” said The World.
Not all the screams came from kids.
The next day the newspaper reported that “a man named Berg was struck on the arm by the big lioness (after) the man got too close to the bars of the cage.
“Berg was taken to a doctor’s office and the injured limb dressed. The muscles of the arm above the elbow were badly torn. A little girl also had a narrow escape from being severely injured by the animal, and in future a careful watch will be kept upon the brute.”
The fair was located in the four blocks on Hastings and Pender between Burrard and Howe. Many of the performances took place in tents set up on the street, like a circus. Performers included flying trapeze artists the Austin Sisters and a high diver named Captain Rose, whose act involved climbing 65 feet into the air and diving into a 24-foot-long, five-foot-deep tank.
“No person should miss seeing it,” said The World.
“The price, which is at 60 cents — 10 cents at the first gate and 50 cents at the second — is not exorbitant.”
Many performers claimed to be from far-flung lands, including Hadji Cheriff, “the chief of the Arabs.”
“He came to America in 1882 and for many years was with P.T. Barnum,” said The World.
“He can converse in more than a dozen tribal languages, besides speaking Spanish, Italian, French and Japanese. He acquired these linguistic accomplishments on his extensive travels throughout the world.
“Without a doubt there is no one in the world who can spin a gun as Hadji Cheriff can. He is the champion sharpshooter, and has a record of whirling about on a pedestal for two hours without showing signs of giddiness.”
Cheriff was so well-known in his day that Thomas Edison’s film company made a couple of silent movie clips about him. An 1894 short shows him throwing a knife and then doing pirouettes, while an 1899 short shows his prowess spinning a rifle. Both can be found on YouTube.
Many local merchants set up display booths, à la today’s PNE Showmart. Taxidermist John Pugh displayed what he claimed was “the largest caribou head in Canada,” Thorpe Brothers showed off their line of sodas, and there was a $1 raffle for a Stanley locomobile, a steam-driven car.
(A Stanley had been the first automobile on Vancouver streets on Sept. 25, 1899.)
Vancouver was still quite small in 1901, with a population of 27,000 (another 16,000 people lived in the suburbs). There aren’t any figures in The World about how many people attended the street fair, but it probably wasn’t a big success, because there wasn’t another one.
Civic leaders did get together in June 1902 to discuss putting together a permanent exhibition grounds, however.
“After a thorough investigation,” said a June 7, 1907, story, “they unanimously concluded that the Indian reservation, near Greer’s Beach, was the only site convenient to the city possessing all the necessary conveniences and qualification.”
Greer’s Beach is now known as Kitsilano Beach, and the Indian reservation is today’s Vanier Park. But when the Vancouver Exhibition opened in 1910, it was at Hastings Park.