Lilia D'Acres crossed the Lions Gate Bridge for the first time in 1970.
She was at the wheel of a Caravelle convertible just delivered from France, on her way to the North Shore and a career as a teacher of literature.
D'Acres had sailed under Lions Gate six years earlier, aboard the PO liner Oronsay, en route to the Antipodes. It was the first time on water for the young woman whose love of words had taken her out of the farmlands of northern Alberta and on to university. D'Acres worked her way around the world, touching down in commonwealth countries where her education degree would be useful.
For those who work and live on the North Shore, the bridge is both barrier and connector. D'Acres appreciated the bridge for its beauty and as a conduit to the literary world. Like most of us, she knew the bridge as Lions Gate, not by its official name, the First Narrows Bridge. Beyond that, its influence on her life was slight.
D'Acres' attention was on raising her son and on teaching. Any available time and energy went to advocating for the literary arts. She created the first directory of British Columbia writers for North Vancouver schools, worked at BC Bookworld and the Sunshine Coast Festival of the Written Arts. She co-produced the B.C. Book Prizes the first year the George Woodcock Prize was awarded and established the George Woodcock Centre for the Arts and Intellectual Freedom Fund.
Don Luxton is also an advocate for heritage issues. For years, Luxton and the Heritage Vancouver society campaigned to protect Lions Gate from demolition. A victory for heritage preservation came in 1998 with the decision to retain and refit the existing structure.
During those years of advocacy, information about the bridge flowed in. The elements that made Lions Gate unique, construction and engineering innovations, financial and land deals hammered out in the clashes of titanic egos, became chapters in a story that Luxton and D'Acres knew must be told.
"We thought we understood the bridge's history, and it turned out to be so much more," says Luxton. People were generous with information. Doors opened freely.
D'Acres talked with men from bridge maintenance, from the original construction crew and with the engineers. She interviewed the family of A.J.T. Taylor, the visionary entrepreneur behind the creation of the bridge, and the Squamish people, upon whose traditional territory it stands.
More stories surfaced among the feats of construction and engineering.
Seventy-five years ago, on May 29, 1939, the Lions Gate Bridge opened officially. Mary Agnes Capilano, whose grandfather had met Captain George Vancouver, waited to greet King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. The royals did not stop. "This was the only time that we could present my grandmother to the Queen," said Chief Simon Baker, "but the car drove past us. It was terrible for my grandmother."
Taylor, the driving force behind the creation of the bridge, was not invited to the opening ceremonies. Nor is his name on the plaque commemorating Lions Gate's designation as a national historic site in 2005, the plaque unveiled in 2010, still not installed.
Hearing the stories of the bridge from those who were there, observing the connections interwoven as intricately as the span's suspension cables, changed
D'Acres' relationship with Lions Gate entirely. At the launch of D'Acres' and Luxton's book, Lions Gate, which was published in 1999, Baker and the Taylor family were among the guests. D'Acres made sure of that.
Lions Gate, the book, is also a marvel of design and production. Winner of numerous awards, it is still in print. D'Acres has completed a successor to the work, yet-to-be-titled, covering another feat of engineering unique to the bridge, the replacement of the entire suspended structure in 2002.
D'Acres' engagement with the arts continues, with gallery openings and poetry readings, plans to attend the Edinburgh Fringe Festival later this year, and development of a play about the last days of Virginia Woolf. It is a vibrant and positive life, fuelled by D'Acres' enduring love of words and by a daily dip in the ocean, with our city's icon, Lions Gate, an integral element of her life and of ours.
Laura Anderson works with and for seniors on the North Shore. 778-279-2275
