THIS WEEK IN HISTORY: 1888
The People’s Paper is launched when the Vancouver World hits the streets
A great newspaper starts with a great logo. And in early Vancouver, the best logo belonged to the Vancouver World, which was founded on Sept. 29, 1888. Or maybe that should read logos, because the paper kept changing them throughout its 36-year history. The coolest featured a globe with “Vancouver” written over top in flowing script, like the name of a sports team. It was flanked by “The” on the left and “World” on the right. The 1890s World logo featured two globes, which allowed it to show both sides of the planet. An early 1900s logo simply read “The World,” with the immortal motto underneath “The Paper That Prints The Facts.” The 1924 logo was quite wordy, incorporating Vancouver Daily World, a globe, and two mottoes, “the newspaper of the home” and “If it will help Vancouver and B.C., The World is for it.” The most elaborate logo was in 1921. It spelled out Vancouver Daily World, included the globe, and added a banner over top with a quartet of the paper’s attributes: “clean, fair, accurate, and sincere.” Thankfully, the World was often none of the above. Where rivals like the Province and NewsAdvertiser could be stodgy and dry, the World was passionate and committed to its liberal vision. It was, as its 1915 motto proclaimed, “The People’s Paper.” It was founded by John McLagan, who came to Vancouver from the Victoria Times. In his first editorial McLagan promised to “cater to the citizens of this city” by illuminating “the living forces building up the material, moral and social life of the city.” The first issue is notable for its detailed list of new construction in the city, ranging from houses (“Mr. James King has a residence near Georgia Street, $1,500”) to commercial structures (“on the corner of Richards Street the elegant A. G. Ferguson Block (is) nearing completion”). This kind of detail is gold to historical researchers like Don Luxton, who searches through scanned copies of the World on newspaper.com. “It’s very comprehensive,” said Luxton. “They would actually list building permits, so you can go back to the years (where the permits) are missing (from city records). That’s where we’re getting all our information. This is pretty important stuff, from a historical point of view.” In the early days, the World had a reporter known as “The Bohemian” who wrote colourful features on city life, such as the opium dens of Chinatown. It also published handsome “Bird’s Eye View” maps of Vancouver and New Westminster that purported to show every single structure in the cities. McLagan died in 1901, and his wife Sara took over the paper. “She was quite the character,” said Luxton. “She was managing editor/writer/reporter/proof reader, and the first woman publisher of a daily newspaper in Canada.” In 1905, Sara McLagan sold the paper to Louis D. Taylor, an ambitious American who would go on to become Vancouver’s longestserving mayor. Taylor bought the paper just as the city was undergoing a real estate boom, and jazzed it up with snappier graphics. The real estate ads came flooding in, and by 1910 the World claimed to be the “biggest newspaper on Earth.” By “biggest newspaper,” the World meant the number of agate lines of advertising annually (agate is a typographical measure used by newspapers). Much of the success was due to Taylor’s partner and future wife, Alice Berry, who was apparently much better at business than L.D. Flush with the ad money, Taylor decided to build the city’s tallest skyscraper, the 17-storey World Tower. Unfortunately, by the time it was completed in late 1912, the boom had slipped into a recession. He wound up losing the building, and in 1915, lost the paper, as well. It went through two more owners before it was sold to The Vancouver Sun, which converted the World into an evening edition of the Sun on March 12, 1924.