Sins of the City Tour (Vancouver Police Centennial Museum)

I’m always lucky to be blessed with amazing friends, and Chris Mathieson (the Executive Director of the Vancouver Police Centennial Museum) is one of them. We had talked about me possibly attending a Tweetup “Sins of the City Tour”, where a group of people from the local Twittersphere would be roaming the streets of Vancouver and listening to historical musings of our fair city’s criminal past.

I knew I was overbooked with work, but Chris (always a gentleman and always having my back) ensured that I scored a spot in this most amazing walking tour. Many of my local friends, including the good folks from Mojave, Gus and Russ, Corinna and Adam, Stacie and John, my always adored Emme Rogers, Tris, the very knowledgeable Lorraine, Dale McGladdery, Ian Alexander Martin, Jon Jennings, and many other good tweeps were there.

For me, historical tours of the city of Vancouver are always a highlight. Last year, when my friend Rebecca and I did National Digital Media Day, we roamed the streets of several municipalities. Rebecca very patiently shared many historical tidbits of Surrey and other areas of Vancouver (she writes a well-known series of blog posts on Vancouver history). So, I’m always fascinated when history is recounted in front of me. Chris is extremely knowledgeable and he really showed his expertise. It was also kind of neat to see someone whom I consider a good friend of mine in a working environment. I guess that’s kind of what my friends who attend my academic presentations feel when they see one of my talks. While I am not a very frequent visitor of the Downtown East Side, I am always fascinated and puzzled by the stories that are embedded in the walls, on the streets and in each building.

- Why did the women of the trade migrate from San Francisco to Vancouver?
- Why did the high-end brothels end up locating themselves on Alexander Street?
- Why has Japantown all but disappeared?

I am an inquisitive guy and I will have to take another Sins of the City tour so that my curiousity be satisfied. In the mean time, I would just like to invite you to participate in this most wonderful experience.

You should also know that the Vancouver Police Museum is a self-funded and self-running organization. Therefore, please consider donating to keep this amazing project running. I know that it will be hard for JT and me to score a visit to the Vancouver Police Museum unless we meet earlier on Sundays, but I just learned the great news that the Museum will be open from 9am to 5pm on Sundays too! Learn more about the Vancouver Police Museum here.

I took some video of Chris speaking about the history of the women’s sex trade in the Downtown East Side (sorry for the “mmmmhmmm” that you can hear from me, but Flip cameras have a way of absorbing the noise from the person holding the camera).

Related posts:

1. The Vancouver Sun Run goes all Web 2.0
2. Streams of History Project on Saturday February 7th (Fearless City)
3. The Vancouver Book of Everything
4. Travelling in Mexico City
5. Is Vancouver a toxic city?