POST # 435
On the corner of East Hastings and Dunlevy sits one of Vancouver's hidden treasures, The Patricia Hotel. The hotel's foundation has resided here in the heart of Strathcona - the city's first neighbourhood - since 1910. Originally designed as a doctor's office, construction began in 1910, but the owner passed away before completion - as did the intentions for the building. Shortly thereafter, the building was converted into The Patricia Hotel, which opened in 1913 with a total of 180 rooms and a communal bathroom on each of its five floors.
Much of the hotel's history spawns from its pub which opened in 1914. Although currently known as Pat's Pub and Brewhouse, it originally opened as The Patricia Cafe. When alcohol prohibition came into effect in 1917, the hotel like many others in the city converted its bar into a cabaret which featured live music & dancing. In an attempt to recover lost alcohol sales through a cover charge, The Patricia Cabaret's manager recruited some of the most influential jazz musicians of the time to form the venue's house band. Most notable of these was Oscar Holden, Ada "Bricktop" Smith and Ferdinand "Jelly Roll" Morton who lived upstairs in The Patricia Hotel while he played in the Cabaret downstairs.
Oscar Holden stayed on at the Patricia Hotel for quite a few years, leading the ten piece orchestra that went on to make the Patricia Cabaret one of the finest cabarets in all of Canada. Eventually Jelly Roll Morton left the Patricia to tour down the coast before landing back in Vancouver several years later. Ada "Bricktop" Smith moved on to Harlem, where she helped get Duke Ellington his first major gig, before she landed in Paris and opened her own club, "Chea Bricktop". John Steinbeck got thrown out of her club, Cole Porter wrote "Miss Otis Regrets" for her, T.S. Elliot wrote a poem about her and F. Scott Fitzgerald has said his biggest claim to fame was that he discovered Bricktop before Cole Porter did. Before all that though, Bricktop was famous for her voice and was singing at the Patricia.
To this day the Pub's original wood floor and exposed brick walls serve as a reminder of the rich history captured within during those early years as well as in the years since.
Beneath the main floor of The Patricia Hotel exists an expansive basement thick with its own history. In addition to housing a boxing ring that played host to many big ticket matches right up until the 1950's, the basement's showers and change rooms were used by both soccer and baseball teams who played in Oppenheimer Park as well as by migrant workers who worked night shift in nearby Japantown and Chinatown.
The Patricia Hotel has had only a few owners throughout the course of its expansive lifetime. The current owner took over in 1984, closing the hotel shortly after for extensive renovations that fitted each room with a private washroom. As such, many of the hotel's smaller rooms have maintained the historic style of separate vanity and shower facility. The owner also preserved the historic style in the common areas of the hotel including the high-ceilinged lobby, the lobby's lacquered wood steps and the detail in the wood runners of the upstairs hallways.
For the history buffs.
grateful for every breath,
Paul
The Thoughtful Wanderer
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