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In homage to the return of UBC’s this September students, this month’s featured photograph is of a student fundraising group in 1931. The group of Chinese Canadian students were raising funds through a concert for a new stadium at UBC:

The place to go for university history is the University of British Columbia Archives, which is a branch of the library (and neighbours to us here at Rare Books and Special Collections/The Chung Collection, so you can visit them and us at the same time!). On their website, they provide both an alphabetic listing and a chronological listing of UBC buildings. According to the entry for the Old Stadium (since demolished) the Stadium was built in 1931 including funds raised by the Alma Mater Society. This benefits from this concert of Chinese students were presumably included in that fundraising campaign. The photograph was taken by Yucho Chow Studio, who photographed many Chinese-Canadian groups and families.

This month for our featured photograph, we longed to show a vintage shot of the fair at the Pacific National Exhibition, a Vancouver summer favorite. Alas, the Chung Collection does not have one. We do however have this great shot of a fair in Red Deer, AB:

The photograph dates from the mid 1920’s – 30’s, and originates from the Clandonald material in the collection. The Clandonald material tells the story of Scottish and Irish immigrants who settled near Red Deer as part of the CPR’s land colonization programs. You can browse through all the Clandonald material, most of which has been digitized and can be viewed online.