Mike, Mark & Jack, New Westminster’s The Rhythm Pals, Canada’s best country group
In the 1950s my mother sang with the The Rhythm Pals, a New Westminster-based country music trio that was all the rage in the late 1940s, 50s and into the 1960s, in 1965, 1967, and 1968 winning the Juno Award as best Canadian country group, a few years after which they were inducted into the Canadian Country Music Hall of Honour, in 1989.
In my household growing up, it was Mike, Marc and Jack this, and Mike, Marc and Jack that, my mother keeping up her friendship with The Pals throughout the entirety of my young life. My mother loved to sing, sang all the time around our home and in the car, loved music of every description — when she was home there was always music in the house, Patti Page and Teresa Brewer her two favourite 1950s singers, later turning to Patsy Cline, all of whose music invested almost my every waking moment for years.
Looking back on it, I suppose my love for female vocalists originated with my own mother’s, if not exactly angelic but still melodic voice, her entire demeanour the very definition of joy when she sang. Driving around with my parents in the family car, the radio was turned up loud, my mother singing along with all of the artists of the day, save Nat King Cole, who she worshipped, and would not as his daughter did years later, ‘duet’ with him.
Above all else, though, my mother loved country and western music, a mix of Americana, folk and roots music that spoke of struggle and love lost, of tragedy and wont and lives not fully realized, the heartfelt music I grew up on and which, later in life, would emerge as my favourite musical genre, coming around to appreciate country music, after having as a teenager and for many years after rejecting the music my mother loved, finally coming around in my early 40s — I’ve loved Iris DeMent, Alison Moorer, Shelby Lynne, Kasey Chambers, Lucinda Williams, Lori McKenna, Miranda Lambert and Kacey Musgraves ever since. whose music has become the melancholy and thoughtful soundtrack that has informed my life this past 30 years.
In the late summer of 1958, my parents moved the family to Edmonton, to be closer to family and to be closer to the soundtrack of my mother’s life, roots and classic country music being far more popular on the Prairies than would ever be the case in the Lotusland Vancouver has always aspired to.
12221 81st Street, in northwest Edmonton, my family home from late 1959 through 1961
In 1960, with the help of my tall oak of a grandfather, my parents bought a house in northwest Edmonton, at 12221 81st Street, a working-aspiring-to-middle class neighbourhood, where I attended Eastwood Elementary for Grades 5 & 6, the new school and neighbourhood a step up from inner-city Edmonton, where we had rented for a year, and where I attended Sir John A. McDougall school in Grade 4 befriending all of the tough kids in school, helping them with their in-class & their homework, in exchange keeping me safe — to say it was a rough neighbourhood is to dramatically understate the matter. Still, I made it out in one piece, and was glad for the move.
As I say, my mother loved country roots music, the music of her youth, the music she sang, and the music that most spoke to her, that I believe kept her alive and her mind and spirit active — amidst the three back-breaking jobs she always held down, working at a puff wheat factory overnight for the entirety of our three-year tenure in Edmonton, working at a local bakery during the day, and the Swift Meat Packing Plant in the late afternoon and throughout the evening, ambitious and anxious to get ahead, or at least keep hers, and our heads above water, my father continuing his work at the Post Office, and surprising to everyone stepping up to the plate as our increasingly competent and loving father, to whom I’d help teach the ability to read, and with whom I’d spend endless hours quizzing him on aspects of his employment, in preparation for the quarterly tests of competence imposed by a draconian employer, the Canada Post Office.
Every now and then, though, my mother would get an evening off — she didn’t want to sit around the house “wasting time”, as she put it, she wanted to go out into the evening, be with people, to live and to feel free and to feel a part of the community, and if there was a country music concert at the nearby and walkable Edmonton Fairgrounds, all the better.
My mother loved to walk. One early Tuesday evening, she told my sister and I to put on our coats, that we were going out, saying to my father, “You’re coming along, too, to keep the kids out of mischief, to keep an eye on them so they don’t run away” — not that my sister and I ever did, we were homebodies, most evenings both my father and mother off at work, my sister and I at home watching TV or doing our homework, or visiting with friends in the neighbourhood, but back at home never later than 8pm.
On this particularly chill October 1960 evening, we made our way down to what appeared to us to be a deserted Edmonton Fairgrounds, although once inside the grounds and the closer we got to as our yet unknown destination, the clearer were the sounds of guitars being tuned up, and voices testing microphones — until we found ourselves arriving at a small tent, chairs for about 75 people, over the course of the half hour we waited for the evening’s festivities to begin, much to our mother’s displeasure, kicking around the sawdust on the floor, while looking around at the others who were in attendance, a few ragtag kids, but mostly adults in heavy, working class clothing, most drawn and seemingly weary with life, until …
Classic country music artists extraordinaire, The Wayfaring Stranger, Burl Ives; Montana Slim, otherwise know as Wilf Carter, and the Singing Cowboy himself, Hank Snow.
“Howdy, my name is Burl Ives, and this here to my left is Wilf Carter and standin’ next to him, the singing ranger himself, Hank Snow.”
And with that introduction, the small but fervently enthusiastic crowd came alive, as we were treated to a concert, and musicianship the likes of which I would not hear again till 1998, at a Lucinda Williams concert at The Vogue.
For the first and only time in my life, I saw my mother happy, in her element, dancing off to the side, a look of bliss on her face, her tired and aching bones revitalized with a renewed energy and strength, two and a half hours in my mother’s life that neither she nor I would ever forget, one of the best nights of my life, when I felt safe and loved amidst the music that had long been the soundtrack of my life, as it still remains to this day.
June is a big month for Vancouver’s civic parties, and all the candidates who are vying for a nomination with One City Vancouver, the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association, the Green Party of Vancouver, Vision Vancouver, COPE, and the good folks who are organizing with TeamJean 2018.
Each of the above named registered Vancouver civic parties will meet in June to select their candidates for City Council, Vancouver School Board, and Vancouver Park Board, with a surfeit of candidates likely to emerge.
Throughout the month of June — and into July, should it become necessary — VanRamblings will report out on the upcoming nomination meetings for each civic party, giving our readers fair notice of each nomination date.
First off the mark in the race to get their nominated candidates chosen is the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association, but not in a conventional sense.
John Coupar, NPA Mayoral nomination candidate introduces himself to party members
This upcoming Sunday, June 3rd, at what is scheduled to be an all-day nominating meeting that will be held at the Hellenic Hall, in the beautiful Arbutus Ridge neighbourhood, the NPA will choose only their party’s 2018 mayoral nominee — a choice between former Cedar Party candidate Glen Chernen; recent Park Board Chair and current Commissioner, the affable John Coupar; and the NPA’s corporate-backed-and-funded candidate for mayor, Ken Sim. The successful mayoral nominee will then set about to choose the team he wishes to run with in the 2018 Vancouver civic election.
Glen Chernen wants to lead the NPA, but says he’s battling ‘forces’ within the party
Democracy, thy name is not the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association.
Vancouver entrepreneur Ken Sim introduces introduces himself to party members
Vancouver Non-Partisan Association Board of Directors President, Gregory Baker — despite our being somewhat snarky above — weighs in kindly with the correct information in respect of the voting for the party’s mayoral nomination, with voting to get underway at 10am, and closing at 8pm. For the record: members of the NPA, past and present, and their elected contingent represent as a group some of the most compassionate, heartful persons of conscience and integrity we have run across in civic life — we remain grateful every day for their humanity, community spirit, ‘can do’ spirit and attitude, and their commitment to making life better for all of us.
Speeches begin at 6pm, with voting taking place immediately afterwards. Please note the correction above, from 2014 NPA mayoral candidate, Kirk LaPointe, and current NPA Board of Directors President, Gregory Baker.
The three NPA mayoral candidates have reportedly signed up in excess of 3,000 new members, with each candidate hoping and praying their supporters turn up for the vote. That’s unlikely, though — attendees at Sunday’s nomination meeting can reasonably expect many fewer that 1,000 party members to arrive to cast their ballot; it’s just a fact of life.
VanRamblings will be present for the NPA’s mayoral nomination meeting, and will report out online throughout the afternoon, and into the evening.
Although the video above was made for the purposes of last autumn’s City of Vancouver by-election, to fill a vacant seat on Vancouver City Council, the Green Party of Vancouver’s Pete Fry will once again be throwing his hat into the ring for the 2018 City of Vancouver civic election, his candidacy to be confirmed at a Special General Meeting of the party that will be held on Wednesday, June 27th, at 6:30pm, in the Heritage Hall, at 15th and Main. Pete Fry is a city builder; a longtime, effective community activist who has worked closely with the Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods; a democrat; wildly intelligent and passionate about the city, and probably more knowledgeable about city issues than any other candidate putting their name forward in the 2018 City of Vancouver municipal election.
Wherever you stand across the political spectrum, know one thing: as a passionate advocate for our city, as someone who listens and then acts on your concerns, and in the best interests of those with whom he comes into contact, who has committed to answering every telephone call, responding to every e-mail and snail mail that comes across his desk, while meeting regularly with constituents in community meetings across the city, you must save a vote for Pete Fry when it comes time to cast your civic ballot, at the advance polls, or on election day, Saturday, October 20th. Pete Fry on the Issues
Here’s where Pete Fry stands on some issues of the day, of ongoing and long concern to Vancouver voters. You’ll want to click on the links below.
Pete Fry on the loophole in the BC NDP’s finance reform legislation;
Pete Fry on the development at 105 Keefer, in historic Chinatown;
Pete Fry on foreign investment in our real estate market; and renter tax credits;
Pete Fry on the viaducts removal, and Vancouver’s eastern expansion;
Pete Fry on Vancouver’s housing crisis as a failure of government;
Pete Fry on tackling the roots of Vancouver’s housing affordability crisis;
Pete Fry on his run for Vancouver City Council, and why to vote for him.
On Friday, June 8th, from 6pm til 9pm at the Performing Arts Lodge, located at 581 Cardero Street, just north of Georgia Street (and very easy to find), the Green Party of Vancouver will host a meet and greet with their 2018 candidates for office, where Mr. Fry will be present. You’ll want to attend: the food is always great, the company & camaraderie even better. Get involved. Meet the candidates. We look forward to seeing you there!
Remember, though: save a vote for Pete Fry in Vancouver’s 2018 municipal election for Vancouver City Council. You’ll be glad you did.
Vancouver Municipal Election | Transcendence & the Holy Trinity Part 2: The Way of Out of the Misery of Our Town’s 2018 Civic Election Political Porn
In 2008, at the end of a contentious, strike-and-lockout prone Mayor Sam Sullivan Vancouver Non-Partisan Association civic administration, where his own party rejected him, before voters got a chance to do so, running Councillor Peter Ladner instead as the NPA Mayoral candidate in 2008, so dispirited was the electorate that on election day only 30.79% of eligible voters came out to the polls to cast a ballot, while 69.21% yawned.
Three years later, in 2011, a whopping 34.57% of Vancouver’s voters made it to the polls, while 65.43% of Vancouver’s eligible just stayed at home or spent the day lollygagging around on voting day, effectively saying to the candidates “to hell with you.” No one ever said life in civic politics is easy.
Things were really looking up when it came time to head to the polls in 2014 to re-elect a majority Vision Vancouver municipal government, an easy-to-follow and hard-fought campaign, that pitted the bike-riding, Happy Planet drinking voters against those dastardly bike-lane hating degenerates (but not really) in the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association. Oh woe is us. All neat and tidy, good vs evil, making it incredibly easy for voters to cast their ballot. And they did, in record numbers: of the 411,741 registered Vancouver voters, there were a record 181,707 ballots cast, putting the voter turnout in 2014 at 44.13%! Hallelujah, and love a duck.
What do the voting figures above mean for the 2018 Vancouver civic election? In the era of Trump, it’s hard to know. The rightist backlash we wrote about yesterday … had our friend Dave Pasin weighing in, who posted the following on Twitter …
“You miss the point. It’s not about nimbyism or the fear of a hyperbolic hell hole. The real issue is that citizenry don’t feel they have a real say in how the city is evolving. They feel used, abused and taken advantage of by supposed morally superior leaders.”
And here we thought that’s what we were writing. Meanwhile, Dave Pasin isn’t done, adding the following Twitter comment …
“Raymond, as one who travels to the U.S. on a regular basis, the U.S. is far from the hell hole you portray. The reality of what’s actually happening is far and away from politics and hyperbolic cable shows. I have found the country to be in a good place economically, and even socially.”
Hyperbole, thy name is VanRamblings. And it will be forever thus. Since recovering from cancer, we’ve given up a lot of things — fear, anger, hubris, being mean, not appreciating Vision Vancouver — but hyperbole? Nope, we’re wed to hyperbole, like we’re kinda wed to writing in the third person (keeps an ironic distance, don’tcha know) … well, mostly, anyway.
In 2018, then, we’ve got a spitting angry electorate, or as Bill says, a voting public who “feel used, abused and taken advantage of by supposed morally superior leaders” — you know, as we wrote yesterday, the types that have helped to make Vancouver a city that has focused on …
Reconciliation with our indigenous peoples, promoting the interests of women in the workplace, making Vancouver a racism-free zone, a nuclear-free zone, a city focused on the interests of our LGBTQ and gender variant communities, which has created Vancouver as a non-gendered bathroom zone, a city concerned with the interests of vulnerable citizens, a city that — working with our federal and provincial governments — is committed to building 6,000 units of co-op housing; 4000 truly affordable rental housing units; 2,000 social housing units; while supporting the construction of 2,000 co-housing units, all over the next ten years …
Where the used and abused part that Dave writes about arises, is from a lack of consultation with residents in all 23 of Vancouver’s neighbourhoods when it comes to the decision-making by Vancouver City Council, which riles up folks like the Grandview-Woodland residents who came out to express their opposition to a new detox and treatment centre, or the 680 units of transitional modular housing, where Marpole residents came out in droves to protest the construction of transitional modular housing units in their neighbourhood, which neighbours feared would introduce vulnerable drug dependent citizens into their neighborhood, creating a safety concern.
Over the course of the past 10 years, the majority Vision Vancouver civic administration has focused its governance on social issues, and making Vancouver an environmentally forward city (which Georgia Straight editor Charlie Smith, in a Twitter response to yesterday’s VanRamblings column, identified as a critical issue to our city and our planet’s future).
For the record, be it environmental initiatives or the bike lane construction programme undertaken by our Vision Vancouver civic government, the focus on active transportation, the construction of 680 transitional modular housing units, and all and more of the social justice initiatives that Vision has championed while in power at City Hall: we think they’re important social justice and environmental initiatives — and just like 65,844,954, or 48.2% of the American population, voted for Hillary Clinton to continue along the path Barack Obama had embarked on, while only 62,979,879, or 46.1% of the American population voted for Donald Trump — call them the deplorables, as Hillary Clinton did in a fit of pique (or candour), or the “I love the under-and-uneducated voters”, as Trump referred to his barely literate followers (who wore Trump’s words like a badge of honour). Still.
No matter what Dave Pasin has written above, life has not gotten better for African American men and women, nor for any segment of the immigrant or refugee communities, nor the Dreamers, the farmers, children in under-financed schools, nor the poor, the opioid drug-addicted & the vulnerable.
In the era of Trump, license has been given to mouth and give vent to the worst inclinations and intolerant beliefs of huge segments of our population, in the U.S. and in Canada, those who feel disenfranchised and locked out, and who are bereft of hope — the battle is on, then, for the hearts and minds of this portion of the electorate, who need hope, and a sense that there is justice for them, that they’re being heard, that they’re loved
1961. Vancouver aldermen A.E. Sprott, Dr. W.B. McKechnie, F. Fredrickson, H.D. Wilson, Angus Maclnnis & former Vancouver aldermen, at a dogwood tree planting ceremony.
As progressives, as the literate and well-educated in our population, if we’re not very careful, in 2018 — for all of our good intentions — the ground that the 2018 election could be fought on is one of intolerance, hatred of the other, preservation of self-interest, and a return to a meaner time, when our majority population … well, old white men, anyway, ruled the day, and if you were a person of colour, an indigenous person, an immigrant or a refugee escaping misery, or a barely tolerated, vulnerable member of our population, you were locked out of the decision-making.
In 2016, 65,844,954 good-hearted Americans didn’t want to see a return to the days of intolerance, hatred and fear — but it didn’t quite work out for them, who now find themselves living in the intolerant world of Trump. The Holy Trinity of Vancouver Civic Politics. Christine Boyle: Saviour
Vancouver’s civic election Holy Trinity | Sarah Kirby-Yung, Christine Boyle, Anne Roberts
The palliative in the coming civic election campaign, quite literally our non-hectoring saviour, and a charismatic voice of reason — although, at the moment, she doesn’t think she is and probably finds the notion and the writing of such to be an engagement in just a bit of hyperbole, being the humble person she is, but whether or not Ms. Boyle is ready for it, by the time late summer rolls around, it will become abundantly clear that 2018’s Vancouver civic election will become the Christine Boyle election, whether she is yet able to acknowledge it early on in her campaign for a seat on City Council, as a OneCity Vancouvercandidate for office, or not.
Christine Boyle’s campaign for office offers a message of hope that speaks to the best of us, much in the same way as Barack Obama in 2008.
One of the traits we most admire in Christine Boyle — an inherent feature of her personality and how she brings herself to the world, and a trait that will serve her well on the campaign trail, in the months to come — is her humility, because hers is a voice not just of sympathy, but of empathy for every one of us, a spiritual empathy that voters will feel deep within them, and which will inform the 2018 Vancouver municipal election.
Humility, empathy in civic politics in the city of Vancouver. Unusual that. But also good, as well as engaging and transformative traits for a budding civic politician, traits that will serve her (and us) well — because it means that for even the angriest voter, for those who feel disenfranchised, abused and used, as Bill McCreery writes above, across every neighbourhood in our city, who feel unheard, have come to feel ignored and disrespected, in Christine Boyle — a United Church minister of heartening and consoling countenance — she will come to represent what can be for all of us …
Christine Boyle not only does not represent a threat to anyone, as a figure of humility, grace and compassion, she is also the embodiment of hope, her voice one of sympathy and generosity, and a preternatural wisdom.
Christine Boyle’s candidacy and the acknowledgment of the transformational role she will play in the 2018 Vancouver civic election — well, it’s a little ways off yet, for her, for the voters of Vancouver, and for her political opponents, as well. Maybe recognition will come as late as the third or fourth all-candidates meeting she attends in September, when it will become clear to Ms. Boyle, as it will to the rest of us, that she is the leader we need, hers a candidacy for office that seeks to appeal and speaks to the best of us, for all of us, Christine Boyle as the hope of our future.
Looking back at the 2015 federal election, in the early part of the federal campaign, Justin Trudeau struggled, he did not find his voice, did not say what people most needed him to say — that he was his father’s son, whose legacy for which, as he stated, he was “incredibly proud,” on that September 26th Monk debate night when Justin Trudeau first knew that he would become Canada’s 23rd Prime Minister; soon after, and within days, so did everyone else, as in the final three weeks of the 2015 federal election campaign, Justin Trudeau & the Liberal Party of Canada’s fortunes catapulted into the stratosphere, rising from 27% in the polls in the days prior to the Monk Debate, to an astounding 39.47% on election day. Soon, very soon, Christine Boyle will find herself on that same trajectory.
For Christine Boyle is the leader we need, hers the voice of generosity of the human spirit, circumspect wisdom and prudent understanding, a candidacy for office which appeals to the best in us — a distaff and soon-to-be-beloved Tommy Douglas for the 21st century, hers a once in a lifetime candidacy that is certain to emerge in this currently nettlesome civic election season, as the hope of our future, the person who speaks for and to the rage-filled, reactive and fear-filled neighbours we see on our TV screens at night — whose concerns she will address, whose voices she will hear, and most important, on whose wishes she will act, to make ours a city for everyone, whether you live in Dunbar, the Downtown Eastside, Kitsilano or Shaughnessy, Hastings Sunrise, Grandview Woodland or the West End, Fraserview, Riley Park, Killarney, along Cambie, or in Mount Pleasant, False Creek, Marpole or West Point Grey, in any neighbourhood in our city.
As you might imagine, though, Christine Boyle will not achieve for us that which needs to be done, the affordable housing that must be built, the property taxes that need lowering, the child care centers that need to open, the children in our city who must no longer go to school hungry, the homeless and the indigent who through no fault of their own live in poverty and wont, the hollowing out of our neighbourhoods that have made some once thriving parts of our city virtual ghost communities — no, Christine Boyle is going to need help, she is going to need a comrade in arms, another transformative political figure in our city, a planner …
Sarah Kirby-Yung. A person of conscience, an idea person who knows how to think outside the box, a generational candidate, political figure and comrade, who possesses a way of speaking to the people, while not as practiced and charismatic as Ms. Boyle’s, nonetheless speaks to the heart — and much to her credit, and the good fortune of those who live in Vancouver — and to the mind, who in her tenure at Park Board achieved the near impossible in having cetaceans in captivity banned in Stanley Park — in the process thwarting Non-Partisan Association policy, and reversing a key plank in the 2014 civic election Vancouver Non-Partisan Association platform, who is wily and smart and knows how to get things done, and who will become best friends with Christine — and, no, at this point they have not met one another — and even though, supposedly, they are on the opposite sides of the political spectrum, Sarah Kirby-Yung set to become British Columbia’s Premier in the next mid-decade, while her friend-yet-still-to-be resides as Mayor in Vancouver, as one of the most beloved political figures to ever emerge in the history of Vancouver civic politics.
Anne Roberts. And then there is the Coalition of Progressive Electors (COPE) candidate for City Council, past head of the journalism programme at Langara College — where she transformed the life of one of the people I most love in this world, a social justice warrior from the first time we met when she was just nine years of age, Justine Davidson (who just yesterday, gave me a hug — which oughta keep me going for some time now) — a former and most beloved Vancouver City Councillor, making a difference for the better in all our lives during her 2002 – 2005 tenure on Council, the parliamentarian in Vancouver civic politics’ holy trinity, who will get along with Sarah Kirby-Yung, and who Sarah will come to love, each moment Sarah and Anne spend together meant to be cherished, and who together will get things done, get those things accomplished that Christine Boyle has promised on the campaign trail, who will mentor Christine in the ways of civic governance and accomplishment, these three women about to become best friends, soon, and long, long, long into the future.
In 2018, we like NPA Mayoral nominee John Coupar just fine, and we’re pretty sure that Vision Vancouver mayoral candidates Ian Campbell and Taleeb Noormohamed are pretty good guys, and we’re downright impressed with Ben Bolliger, Brandon Yan and R.J. Aquino, candidates for Council all with OneCity Vancouver. Pretty much across the board, we’re grateful when candidates come forward to offer themselves for service in the public weal.
Fierce, accomplished women possessed of wisdom and grit will lead us into the future
But in 2018, a new era has dawned, an era where it is time for tough, psychologically healthy, exceptionally bright, capable and principled women to lead us, women who know how to work with others, know how to bring about change, and bring people — all people — along with them.
But, y’know what — just in case you haven’t been reading the news, or haven’t been following the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements as closely as you oughta have been, or maybe you were one of three or four folks across the North American continent who didn’t see that it was Patti Jenkins who made the zillion dollar grossing Wonder Woman last year. You did, you’re aware, you follow the news, you’re informed? Then tell you what, let us remind you of something you already know, in your heart & in your mind …
2018 is the year of the woman, in Hollywood at the box office, and at the voting booth in the U.S. — where at last count, 43 women of conscience defeated troglodyte white men in American by-elections over the course of the past eight months, and in our home in Vancouver in 2018, women rule, and women will rule, and come Saturday, October 20th, Vancouver’s holy trinity of women city councillors will assume control at Vancouver City Hall.
Mike, Mark & Jack, New Westminster’s The Rhythm Pals, Canada’s best country group
12221 81st Street, in northwest Edmonton, my family home from late 1959 through 1961
Classic country music artists extraordinaire, The Wayfaring Stranger, Burl Ives; Montana Slim, otherwise know as Wilf Carter, and the Singing Cowboy himself, Hank Snow.
