When a certain set of lights in a downtown Vancouver office building blinked out at the end of the working day, and the distinctive shape and colour of the family car showed up on the Lions Gate Bridge soon after, Clara Coles' husband, Bruce, was on his way home.
As the vehicles crested the high point at mid-span, Bruce Coles and his fellow commuters would shift into neutral and coast down the slope of the bridge. This was during the war years when gas for automobiles was in short supply.
Although Clara dismisses her visual acuity, saying "There weren't that many cars then and it was easy to tell them apart," her eyesight was sharp. From her vantage point at home on Sentinel Hill, Clara could read the names of the ships as they passed under the Lions Gate Bridge, the CN and Union steamships and later, the Empress liners. "I can still read their names," she says. "Of course, they're much larger now, the names and the ships.
"I've seen pretty wild things in the harbour," Clara says. March 6, 1945, the day the freighter Greenhill Park exploded, is unforgettable. "The tugboats had the nerve to go in and tow the ship. Frank Wright hauled it out through the Narrows and docked it at Siwash Rock."
Clara was born May 6, 1915, at home on Tempe Crescent in North Vancouver. A couple of house moves and 10 years later, in 1925, her father, architect William Bow, built a home for his family on Tempe Crescent.
For Clara, the adventure of going "over town" is a vivid memory. Down Lonsdale by streetcar, past the gardens and fruit orchards, past the water troughs set out at intervals for the horses, through the business district and onto the ferry, where her mother would settle beside a friend for the voyage across the inlet. Some shopping and a stroll to admire the gorgeous seasonal window displays at Spencer's, Woodward's and The Bay. They would travel back home the same way, with Clara's little brother trying to identify his birthday gift from among the mysterious packages. Years later, Clara would drive "over town" with her own children on the Lions Gate Bridge, which opened, unofficially, in 1938, the year that Clara and Bruce married.
After four years in Toledo, Ohio, where Bruce worked in the insurance business and Clara "missed the oceans badly, and the boats tooting and the mountains," the Coles returned to Canada. Despite the wartime housing shortage, a stone cottage turned up for rent on Sentinel Hill. It was an odd place, recalls Clara.
The stairs went through the dining room, the fireplace and oil stove were in the kitchen, and a heater built into a cupboard warmed the upstairs.
By 1946, the Coles were living in a new home on Sentinel Hill, designed by her father. William was associated with Alfred "AJT" Taylor, a far-sighted entrepreneur and a driving force behind the erection of the Lions Gate Bridge. Taylor's offices were in the Marine Building where William converted the building's observation deck into a residence for the Taylors.
Over the years, as the four Coles children grew up, attended Hollyburn and Cedardale schools, and West Vancouver high school, family holidays were passed with swimming, sailing and beachcombing on Galiano Island, the Sunshine Coast and finally, Savary Island.
The home on Sentinel Hill holds books and art created by Clara and Bruce, their children and their friends. A painting in progress is always on the easel in Clara's studio, where, every Monday for years, she hosted classes in batiking. Paintings, sculpture, wooden bowls and furniture, the bounty of a creative family, is enhanced by the constant backdrop of the Lions Gate Bridge.
As always, there is much that requires Clara's attention: family and friends, her garden, painting and fitness class, and this month, two anniversaries. Seventy-five years ago, on May 29, 1939, the Lions Gate Bridge was opened officially by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. This weekend, Clara Bow Coles is with family, friends and canine companion, Molly, celebrating an anniversary of her own, her entry into the world 99 years ago, on May 6, 1915.
Laura Anderson works with and for seniors on the North Shore. 778-279-2275 l[email protected]
