Tag: Dave Murray

This Week in Photos

This Week In Photos: May 31This Week In Photos: May 31

May 31, 2018 Whistler Museum 0 Comments

1980

Here today, gone tomorrow – the continuing battle of graffiti artists on the old firehall at Mons was finally ended Tuesday, May 27 when municipal crews tore the building down.

Hydro uses a giant trailer and steering unit to move a new transformer into Rainbow substation at Mons.

Package 16 is quick to start work. The first of the Phase II parcels to start work in the Town Centre this year. Jim Cook’s pumper truck helps fill forms with cement from Cardinal Concrete.

The uphill, sunny east side of the new Blackcomb daylodge waits for glass and interior work to be done.

A cabin is ignited, ready to shoot a dramatic scene for Gold Key Entertainment’s movie “Up River”.

1981

Jeff Heinzman and Michael Smith of the High Country Band bringing an easy-to-listen country touch to the Mountain House.

Liam McCarthy takes tractor lessons from Ed Mitchell at the Coast Mountain Outdoor School.

Stanley Smith pins Rotary President’s Pin on Bob Brown.

T.J.L. Contracting lay sewer force main along Rainbow Drive.

One of the many houses in Garibaldi that are being moved as residents sell out before the June 10 deadline.

1983

Dave Murray studies the Southern Cross timing computer during the Canada West Ski Area Association’s trade show in the Whistler Village Inn.

Fire Chief Lindsay Wilson kills two birds with one hose. While checking out the pressure on one of the municipal fire engines he provides 800 gal./min. worth of relief for a parched Alpha Lake Park.

“Stop that” squealed friends of Cindy Thomson, but they didn’t really mean it as temperatures soared to 36C Sunday. Lost Lake proved to be a haven for those seeking relief from the unseasonable heat wave.

From small beginnings great things sometimes grow. Toiling under 30plus temperatures, Christopher Forrest and Jody Edgon began excavations by the shores of Lost Lake on Monday. Unlike their elder counterparts, small contractors can dispense with building permits and zoning bylaws and focus on the job at hand.

1984

Sunday was one of the first real days of spring this year and the Myrtle Philip School diamond was the scene for a local fastball game between Pemberton Legion and the Whistler squad. Whistler lost 13-5 to the Pemberton team.

A true adventurer, Briton Paul Claxton passed through Whistler last Wednesday on the first leg of a solo cycling expedition to Alaska by gravel road. Clayton, 21, is an Oxford physics graduate on leave from his research job and says his 3,000 mile trip, leading to the brink of the Arctic Ocean, is the first of its kind. The determined cyclist is ready for anything. Last Tuesday he wheeled his custom built, $1,400 10-speed into the Daisy Lake campground where he spent the night under a picnic table. His only real worries, however, are bears and the man-eating Canadian mosquito.

Kelly Norton doesn’t like holding the tail of an 18 1/2″ Rainbow Trout that her dad, David, caught early Sunday morning. Kelly’s brother Michael doesn’t seem to mind though. Mr. Norton is wondering, however, if there’s any more fish like the one he caught still in Alta Lake. He says it’s the largest he’s seen in years.

Movers managed to transport the 5,300 lb. safe into the new credit union office in Village Square Monday after they also shifted the 4,500 lb. night deposit vault. North Shore Community Credit Union is all set for its Saturday opening.

Singer Paul Ciechanowski, hired by the Whistler Resort Association for summer village entertainment, opened the season Saturday in Village Square.

This Week in Photos

This Week In Photos: April 12This Week In Photos: April 12

April 12, 2018 Whistler Museum 0 Comments

The photos we share through This Week In Photos are only a very small part of the Whistler Question Collection. The full collection can be viewed online here. If you see a photo you love, photos from our collections can be purchased, either online or by contacting us, and certain sizes can even be printed for you at the museum!

1980

And a fly-over view of the Whistler Village, or what there is of it so far.

Somebody was spending a lot of time in a helicopter this week – here they flew over Cheakamus Lake amid the mountains of Garibaldi Provincial Park.

BC Tel and BCR towers on the west bluff of the Black Tusk.

WORM’S EYE VIEW of the new drugstore and office building in the town centre. This building should be one of the first to be finished this summer.

Question Editor’s Assistant BJ (Brad) Cooper.

1981

Nancy Greene-Raine takes to the polls April 11 with help from Pat McMillan.

Joe Cannon, with his personality-plus, gave the Question this comment on life during his April 10 show at the Brass Rail. His flexible voice worked its way masterfully around tunes from Bob Dylan to Gordon Lightfoot to Elvis the Pelvis. Cannon has quite a remarkable way with audiences, not to mention photographers.

The Municipal Hall on a snowy, windy day.

Mrs Turner’s class thanks Mr Strathers after their field trip to the drugstore.

A class also took a trip to visit the local RCMP detachment.

1982

Some Whistler residents could do with a few lessons in tidiness and cooperation. This scene at the Mons garbage compactor tells a story.

The latest development in the Cheakamus Canyon project is the diversion which carries vehicles through the rock cut rather than around one of the most dangerous corners on Highway 99.

The Mountainside Inn has come a long way from the pouring of its foundations,

A friendly game of charades is played out in someone’s living room.

1983

A gift of two mountains was presented to Washington Governor John Spellman (right) by Mayor Mark Angus (second from right) during his tour of Whistler last week. Washington hopes to develop its Early Winters Resort. Governor Spellman was accompanied by Senator Alan Bluechel (left), Mrs Jeanne Erlichmann Bluechel and Mrs Irene Spellman.

Michell Brown and Doug Smith hold up the Price Waterhouse Trophy, which they won in junior skiing competition at Blackcomb Mountain on Sunday.

Mountain Square buildings in various stages of construction. Some hotels are missing, giving a clear view through to Sundial Crescent.

First place winners in the Mouton Cadet Spring Festival held April 9, 10, 11 on Whistler Mountain. (l to r) Dave Murray, Nancy Smith, Jim Parsons, Toby Shale. Back row Xavier deEizaguirre of Mountain Rothschild and Werner Schonberger, president of Featherstone & Co.

An innovative storage system for the Mouton Cadet atop the mountain.

Celebrating Whistler’s World Cup Downhill RacesCelebrating Whistler’s World Cup Downhill Races

March 31, 2018 Whistler Museum 2 Comments

Historically, in the month of March, Whistler would be hosting a World Cup Downhill event. Up to 500 weasel workers would be working 12-hour days preparing the racecourse, installing safety nets and removing and moving snow throughout the course. These volunteers were as important to the success of the event as the downhill racers themselves.

Thousands of ski-race fans would descend on Whistler, filling up hotels and making reservations a necessity to eat at many of the world-class restaurants in Whistler Village. Pubs and bars would be full to capacity and the village would be enshrouded in a party-like atmosphere for close to two weeks.

Whistler attempted to host its first World Cup race on March 7, 1979. Due to weather, the race was cancelled. Three years later, in 1982, Whistler successfully hosted the World Cup Downhill event. This race took place on a course on the north side of Whistler and its finish was in the newly completed Whistler Village.

Peter Müller of Switzerland finished in first place and two Crazy Canucks, Steve Podborski and Dave Irwin, finished second and third, respectively. The 1982 race was capped off with a huge celebration because Podborski tied Müller for the overall Downhill World Cup title.

Thousands upon thousands of spectators jam Whistler Village Square for the World Cup presentations. Whistler Question Collection, 1982.

This would be the only race held on this course. Racers complained the north side course was too flat and Müller even joked that he should bring his cross-country skis to the next one. The downhill course was moved back to the south-side course and every other World Cup Downhill race held in Whistler was held on this course. The racecourse was later renamed after Crazy Canuck Dave Murray, who succumbed to cancer in 1990.

Whistler hosted the World Cup Downhill event again in 1984 and two years later in 1986. In 1989, Rob Boyd became the first Canadian to win a World Cup race on home soil. If you ask many Whistlerites here at the time, they can tell you where they were when Boyd crossed the finish line.

Local boy Rob Boyd atop the podium, 25 February 1989. Photo: Greg Griffith/WMAS.

Prior to the Olympic Games hosted in 2010, the last successful Downhill Men’s event was held in 1995.

From 1996 to 1998, the FIS moved the North American stops to earlier in the race season, leading to three consecutive cancellations of the Whistler stop on the World Cup circuit due to snow and weather conditions.

Will Whistler host another World Cup Downhill race? Or will it be an event that only appears in Whistler’s past?