LITERARY LOCATION: Captain George Vancouver statue, City Hall, 453 West 12th Avenue, Vancouver.

The ultimate expert on all historical matters pertaining to Vancouver, Chuck Davis, routinely asked students in Vancouver area schools to name the person who this statue behind City Hall represents. His listeners always guessed it was George Washington. In this way Chuck Davis could kindly begin the process of educating his audiences as to how little they knew about their city. As a congenial radio host, quizmaster, newspaper columnist, author and master gatherer, Chuck Davis continuously popularized B.C. history from the publication of his magnum opus, The Vancouver Book (1976), until his death in 2010.

QUICK REFERENCE ENTRY:

Once upon a time, there was a crusty, cranky, self-inflated, Welsh-born, New Zealand-raised amateur historian in Kitsilano named Major James Skitt Matthews who, having fought at Ypres in WWI, insisted he should be empowered to serve the City of Vancouver, both officially and unofficially, as its chief historian for almost 40 years. Matthews interviewed pioneers, including the namesake of his neighborhood, August Jack Khahtsahlano, and remained fiercely protective of his work until his retirement at age 91 in 1969. He died a year later.

In terms of omnivorous knowledge about Vancouver, trivia-buff and master gatherer Chuck Davis was the obvious successor to Matthews ever since Chuck Davis' Guide to Vancouver (1973). Thereafter Davis, as a congenial radio host, quizmaster, newspaper columnist and author, devoted his life to being the expert on the city's history and its environs. His landmark volume, The Vancouver Book (1976), for which he was listed as general editor, was long regarded as his foremost accomplishment, even though it was eclipsed in size by his 882-page omnibus, The Greater Vancouver Book (1997), co-produced with business partner John Cochlin. Self-published under his Linkman Press imprint, this enterprise proved disastrous on a financial level. "Memo to self,"; Davis wrote, "never publish, only write."; An unstoppable public servant, and perhaps a glutton for self-punishment, Davis then proceeded to predict his next project, The History of Metropolitan Vancouver, which he promised would be "the Mother of all Histories of Greater Vancouver.";

Born in Winnipeg in 1935, Chuck Davis was in broadcasting for many years, beginning with the Canadian Army radio station, before he returned to B.C., a place he had first visited at age nine. His eagerness to spread lively information about Vancouver, while gaining precious little compensation for his indefatigable services, made him worthy of a civic stipend, but unfortunately he never received any ongoing support. Mayors Gregor Robertson and his predecessor Sam Sullivan were both in attendance when Davis received the George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award for an outstanding British Columbia literary career on October 14, 2010. It was Davis' last public appearance. His acceptance speech can be viewed at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYGUG6eXNOU

Chuck Davis died at Surrey General Hospital of lung cancer around 6 a.m. on November 20, 2010, three days after his birthday, survived by his wife and daughter.

On May 5, 2012, Chuck Davis was posthumously honoured with the Lieutenant-Governor's Medal for Historical Writing for his final book The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver (Harbour Publishing 2011 $49.95). Davis had described this magnum opus as "the capstone of my writing career."; On the following Saturday, May 12, the book that Chuck Davis considered to be "the capstone of my writing career" received the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize and the Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award at the Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema in downtown Vancouver.

FULL ENTRY:

Chuck Davis was easily the most knowledgeable person about Vancouver. As a congenial radio host, quizmaster, newspaper columnist and author, he continuously popularized B.C. history. Most notably, he compiled and edited The Vancouver Book in 1976, followed by an 882-page omnibus called The Greater Vancouver Book in 1997. The latter was co-produced with John Cochlin. The monumental publishing enterprise with Linkman Press proved disastrous on a personal level ("Memo to self: never publish, only write.") but Davis' massive reference work has only been eclipsed by the Encyclopedia of British Columbia as the most essential reference work about B.C. An unstoppable collector of information, Davis worked for many years on The History of Metropolitan Vancouver destined to be 'the Mother of all Histories of Greater Vancouver'. He was in broadcasting for more than 30 years, beginning with the Canadian Army radio station, CAE, in Werl, West Germany in 1956. He married his wife Edna in 1965. They have one daughter, Stephanie, born in 1972. And he played killer Scrabble. After 66 years in Vancouver, having arrived at age nine, he had interviewed an estimated 2,800 people.

In October of 2010, Davis was diagnosed with terminal cancer but was determined to complete his most ambitious project, the exhaustive, year-by-year omnibus to be published as The History of Metropolitan Vancouver. "I don't think there's anyone more passionate about the city," said former Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan. On October 14, 2010, at the Fletcher Challenge Theatre at Simon Fraser University's Harbour Centre campus, Chuck Davis received the 17th annual George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award for an outstanding literary career in British Columbia from Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson at an event coordinated by Alan Twigg of B.C. BookWorld in conjunction with the release of Twigg's book, The Essentials: 150 Great B.C. Books & Authors. Approximately 200 people attended the ceremony, including many of the province's foremost authors and publishers.

CITY/TOWN: Surrey

DATE OF BIRTH: November 17, 1935

PLACE OF BIRTH: Winnipeg, Manitoba

ARRIVAL IN BRITISH COLUMBIA: 1944

EMPLOYMENT OTHER THAN WRITING: Broadcasting

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver (Harbour Publishing 2011) $49.95)
Palace of Entertainment: The Orpheum Theatre -- manuscript, never released.
Vancouver Then & Now (2001) Magic Light Publishing, Ottawa. 1-894673-08-5
Where Rails Meet Rivers: The Story of Port Coquitlam (2000) Harbour Publishing
The Greater Vancouver Book (Editor-in-Chief) (1997) Linkman Press, Surrey
Top Dog!: A Fifty Year History of B.C.'s Most Listened to Radio Station (1993) Canada Wide Magazines
Reflections: A History of North Vancouver District (1992) Opus Publishing
The Greater Vancouver Appointment Book (1990) New Star Books
Reflections, One Hundred Years: A Celebration of the District of North Vancouver's Centennial (1990) Opus Productions
Vancouver: An Illustrated Chronology (with Shirley Mooney & Henri Robideau) (1986) Burlington, Ontario: Windsor Publishing
ExpoPulse! (1983) Chuck Davis Features
Turn on to Canada (1983) Douglas & McIntyre Educational
Chuck Davis' 1982 Vancouver Appointment Book (1981) New Star Books
Kids! Kids! Kids! And Vancouver! (with Daniel Wood) (1977) Fforbez Enterprises
Chuck Davis' Vancouver Appointment Book (1980) New Star Books
The Vancouver Book (General Editor) (1976) J.J. Douglas Ltd.
Two Weeks in Vancouver (with John Ewing) (1976) Government of Canada
Chuck Davis' Guide to Vancouver (1973, 1975) J.J. Douglas Ltd.

AWARDS:

Winner of the 1998 Vancouver City Book Award
(for The Greater Vancouver Book)

Simon Fraser University Chancellor's Distinguished Achievement Award for 1998 (for The Greater Vancouver Book)

2012 Lieutenant-Governor's Medal for Historical Writing for The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver (Harbour Publishing 2011).

2012 Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize for The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver (Harbour Publishing 2011).

2012 Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award for The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver (Harbour Publishing 2011).

[Photo by Jason Vanderhill]

[BCBW 2012]

Review of author's work by BC Studies:
The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver