Only the most compelling stories and the most talented authors are able to make history jump off the written page and transport readers to the foreign country that is the past. For most, physical remnants such as authentic artifacts, photographs, and historic landmarks offer a more tangible connection to yesteryear. A few weeks ago our archivists re-discovered an even clearer window into the past, eighty-year old video recordings from the early days of Rainbow Lodge. Needless to say, we were pumped.
Now digitized, the video provides us with some of those engaging details that give history geeks hot flashes, and that inform niche interests in ways that other media simply can’t match.
This short clip shows Alex Philip taking guests for a leisurely sail around Alta Lake on a late summer day. Note the same unmistakable skyline of Mounts Currie, Weart, and Wedge that greets present-day Rainbow Park sun worshippers.
In another video equine enthusiasts actually get to see Jean Tapley’s horseback style as she races one of the “Bob’s” around the Rainbow Lodge yard.
A third clip conveys the raw industrial power of an old steam train better than any photo ever could. Sometimes Alta Lake’s snows were heavy enough to bog down the plow trains, so they would often charge full steam ahead through the snow to keep up their momentum. I’m still amazed by the man riding on top (note how the burly train-rider chose a sideways, snowboard-style stance as the most stable, or, maybe, the most fun).
All of these clips have been uploaded to our Youtube Channel. Take a visit and browse our other videos to gain an even greater window into the past.
Beyond its success as a tourist destination, Rainbow Lodge’s success also attracted a growing number of year-round and seasonal residents, planting the seeds of the community that eventually became Whistler.
The Vancouver family of Reginald and Mildred Brock was just one family among the growing number of city-dwellers who began building vacation homes in this beautiful valley. The Brock’s first discovered the valley when Mrs. Brock came to visit a friend’s cottage in 1927 and instantly fell in love with the lakeside community, as so many others have since. Two years later the Brock’s purchased two lots on the southwest corner of Alta Lake and hired Bert Harrop to build their cottage, which they named Primrose.
The Brock’s Primrose Cabin near the south end of Alta Lake.
Every summer thereafter, the Brock’s visited Primrose along with their five sons– Patrick Willet, Byron Briton, David Hamilton, Thomas Leith and Philip (Pip) Gilbert. For Mr. and Mrs. Brock, Alta Lake was a peaceful summer retreat from their busy city lives. For their youngest child Pip, it became the jumping off point into a vast mountain wilderness just waiting to be explored.
Pip had an especially strong draw to Whistler and would often come up on his own. Of course there was no Greyhound for a teenaged boy to ride—there wasn’t even a road—but that was no obstacle for Pip. After riding a steamship, most people hopped on the PGE railway to complete the day-long voyage from Vancouver to Alta Lake.
The boat would get there at about 2 o’clock and if we felt like spending 50¢ we could take a taxi as far as Cheakeye, but sometimes we didn’t even want to do that. Believe it or not, 50¢ seemed like a lot of money! So we walked the whole 38 miles quite often.
Even if folks were tougher back then, Pip Brock still stands out as exceptionally hardy—a trait that would serve him well in the mountains. As Brock plainly stated of the frequent 10-hour treks, “nobody else wanted to do the walking” so he usually went alone.
Despite the lengthy hike, upon arrival, Pip didn’t rest up one bit. Instead he usually kept hiking right up into the surrounding mountains. He climbed some of the closer peaks as a teenager and began to gain notoriety among the locals for his mountain jaunts.
Pip was able to parlay his love for the mountains into paid work up high. In the 1920s and 30s the City of Vancouver had substantial interest in developing the hydro-electric potential of Garibaldi Park’s many glacial lakes and streams to power the rapidly growing metropolis. For several summers Pip worked for the Vancouver Water Board hydro surveys, measuring water storage and hydro-electric potential in the mountains he loved so much.
Pip atop Whistler Mountain, early 1930s
At the age of nineteen Pip made his first newsworthy ascent. It was Easter 1933, and with a new set of skis which he had purchased from Woodward’s department store (he later described them as “terrible”), he climbed to the top of Whistler Mountain and then proceeded to ski back down. Locals and visitors to Rainbow Lodge’ had been hiking to nearby summits like Whistler for some time, but this was the first ski ascent and descent of Whistler Mountain—thirty-two years before the arrival of lift-accessed skiing to the mountain. Locals didn’t believe the brash teenager’s claim until Pip pointed out his ski tracks through a set of binoculars.
At the time serious mountain folk remained sceptical of skis’ utility as a means of travel. Once, when he dropped in on Harry Horstman’s Sproatt Mountain cabin on a set of skis, the indignant prospector retorted ‘What the hell you got them planks fur? I can get around twice as fast on my snowshoes as you can on them slitherin boards!” Even most recreational mountaineers, accustomed to the North Shore’s steep wooded slopes, thought skis’ potential as a mountaineering tool were dubious at best. One Vancouver climber went as far as to publicize a mock award for the first person to ski-climb the Camel, a vertical climbing crag that never holds any snow.
Brock was among a small group of mountain-lovers who saw the great potential that skis held among the Coast Mountains’ vast glacial expanses. As Brock recalled in a 1992 interview with the Whistler Museum, “most mountaineers thought that skiing was impure and indecent. But a few of us being frivolous, realized the fun and value of skis for winter touring.” Brock soon befriended these other early converts, most notably the renowned climbers Don and Phyllis Munday. In 1930 the Mundays had begun their own (successful) experiments with ski-mountaineering in their widely publicized expeditions to Mount Waddington, the incredibly rugged and isolated highest peak in the Coast Mountains.
Thanks to his own ski-mountaineering experience, the Mundays invited Pip along as a packer on their 1934 expedition, which also featured high profile American climbers Henry Hall and Hans Fuhrer (who eventually scored the prestigious first ascent of Waddington in 1936). Their party made an epic attempt on the highly technical, dangerous, and still-unclimbed peak—after eight years this was to be the Mundays’ last attempt on Waddington—and they also made several ascents during their four-week-long expedition.
The following summer Pip would return with the Mundays to a new, largely unexplored set of mountains just to the north of Waddington. Their goal was to pursue more pioneer ascents in this superlative landscape, but this climbing trip would be cut short by an unexpected tragedy.
To learn about the tramautic loss of Pip’s parents, and his further ski-mountaineering adventures in the mountains surrounding Whistler, read part two here.
*Note: this post was originally published in July 2011*
While deep snowpacks, sprawling ski lifts and downhill dirt made Whistler the international mega-resort it is today, it was actually fish that brought the valley’s first fun-seekers. And it was 100 years ago, this summer.
In a community as young as Whistler, 100 years is nothing to sneeze at. In celebration of the centennial of the Philip’s fateful first visit to this valley, the Whistler Museum and partners are hosting a 5-day series of free events, entitled “100 Years of Dreams.”
John Millar in front of his cabin, where you could get a plate of steller’s jay pie for 50 cents.
Around the turn of the twentieth century, the Whistler Valley–then known as Alta Lake–was home to a handful of trappers, prospectors, and loggers. Life was rough and the only connection to the outside world was the Pemberton Trail, a rugged path leading from Squamish (then Newport) to Lillooet and the interior goldfields.
In the spring of 1911, a local trapper named John Millar (for whom Millar Creek in Function Junction is named) was in Vancouver selling some of his furs and picking up provisions. One day a hungry Millar stopped by Gastown’s Horseshoe Bar & Grill where he struck up a conversation with the restaurant manager, Alex Philip.
Millar’s description of his secluded mountain valley struck a chord with Alex, who had recently moved to BC from Maine with his wife Myrtle. It was the Philips’ dream to one day open a fishing retreat in the Canadian wilderness, so they were enthralled by this string of glacier-fed lakes teeming with trout. They took Millar up on his offer and made the 3-day trek to Alta Lake that August.
The Philips on the Pemberton Trail, en route to Alta Lake, August 1911.
It was perfect. They fell in love with Alta Lake, instantly recognizing that this was the place to pursue their fishing-retreat dreams.
In 1913 they returned and purchased 10 acres of land on the west side of Alta Lake from another local trapper, Charlie Chandler. To raise money Alex returned to managing the Horseshoe in Vancouver, while Myrtle’s family, the Tapleys, moved out from Maine to help build their lodge.
The next summer Rainbow Lodge–named after the bountiful rainbow trout in Alta Lake–was ready to go. That same year the PGE railway, running from Squamish into the BC Interior, opened up, making Rainbow Lodge a much more accessible day-trip from Vancouver.
Rainbow Lodge
The Philips jumped at the PGE’s offer of running “fisherman’s excursion” packages in partnership with Rainbow Lodge. The first such trip brought 22 men up from Vancouver, who returned to the city raving of the great fishing and grand mountain views. From that moment on the Philips had little trouble attracting business.
Rainbow Lodge quickly became the centre of the Alta Lake community. By the 1930s the Philips had added 45 outbuildings to support their growing operation, including a general store, a horse-stable, tennis courts, and a dedicated railway station. Rainbow Lodge advertisements boasted that it was the most popular tourist resort west of Jasper.
An expanded Rainbow Lodge and surrounding facilities, ca 1930.
It may seem modest compared to the excess and grandeur of Whistler today, but Rainbow Lodge and the Philips deserve credit for recognizing Whistler’s unique beauty and promoting it to the outside world. They’re one of the biggest reasons why you live here today (or wish you did).
Alex and Myrtle Philip were the first in a long line starry-eyed visionaries to visit the Whistler Valley and encounter a landscape grand enough to fit their dreams. 100 years later, the Whistler Valley continues to be re-shaped by the Philips’ special brand of hard work and bold ambition.
3 remaining guest cabins at Rainbow Park. Jeff Slack Photo.
Whistler prides itself on being a pretty dog-friendly community. Our community-run animal shelter is more than three decades old, and dogs even have their own dedicated section of beach at Rainbow Park. Canines have always been prominent citizens in this valley; one could even argue that they were more important during the early days of Alta Lake, when they helped with the essential tasks of hunting and shooing away bears, as well as warming hearts like only dogs can.
Dogs appear in tons of the photos in our archives, so much so that you start to feel like you know some of them personally. You find dogs out on the hunt, hiking high up in the mountains, chasing horses, playing around the lake…
One prominent pooch, a spaniel named Binkie, led an especially unique life.
Growing up on the idyllic shores of Alta Lake, from a young age Binkie led a particularly leisurely lifestyle. In her abundant spare time she developed the habit of standing on her hind legs like a person.
Binkie was clearly quite proud of her bipedalism, and she was always keen to show off for the camera.
Binkie became a minor celebrity thanks to her unique skills, even landing a holiday-card contract with Hallmark…
What started out as an attention-gaining stunt morphed into something much greater as Binkie began to recognize the meditative qualities of prolonged balancing on her hind legs.
Binkie’s devotion increased with time, and she soon came to prefer Rainbow Lodge’s quiet winters, when she could practice in peace. It became a common early-morning ritual to find Binkie in her favourite spot behind the lodge, having stood all through the night.
Binkie’s focus became the stuff of legends. As remarkable as it was, however, sometimes her dedicated practice interfered with the busy work of running a popular tourist resort. Look how unfazed Binkie was by this fuming-mad horse that clearly had places to be and things to do.
The photographic record gets sparser in Binkie’s later days, but clearly she continued to experiment with balance, meditation, and focus. Many local yoga teachers consider Binkie to be a guru of sorts, a pioneer practitioner of what is today one of Whistler’s most popular and fastest-growing activities.
Whistler’s history is full of visionaries such as Binkie. Uncovering such stories broadens our perspective on this seemingly young community, and opens our eyes to new possibilities. Binkie was truly ahead of her time, and her story can offer inspiration to us all.
[Just in case it wasn’t clear, we might have fabricated certain elements of this story. All of the photographs are actual, unedited images of Binkie from our archives. We promise that all the other stories on our blog are truthful.]
