By Patti Dawkins
For decades the Sunday Hillhurst Sunnyside Flea Market has been a gathering place for members of our community. Brian Smith has attended every week since it began. He is recognizable by his groomed moustache and mutton chops, ponytail, plaid shirt, denim jacket and jeans. You may catch a twinkle in his eyes.
Brian was a long-time resident of Hillhurst and Sunnyside and has lots of lived experience in the community. He was born in the Grace Women’s Hospital eight decades ago. His first home was in Sunnyside on 9th Avenue by Edinburgh Park. He remembers catching polliwogs as a child in the swamp close by and being terrified of the “witches”, retired priests dressed in black robes, who lived at the top of the hill in the Bishop’s Palace. https://www.heritagecalgary.ca/heritage-calgary-blog/bishopspalace
During his childhood Brian’s family moved around the neighbourhood. For a while they lived on 10a Street behind McGavin’s Bakery where his father worked delivering bread by horse and wagon until he reached an age when Mr. McGavin thought it was too hard on him and gave him a job inside the bakery. His uncle worked as a Ferrier at the bakery stable one block south of Kensington Road at 11th Street. One of Brian’s first jobs was to mow the newly installed lawn at the bakery.
McGavin's Bread company building, Calgary, Alberta.", 1967-05, (CU1124594) by Duffoto. Courtesy of Libraries and Cultural Resources Digital Collections, University of Calgary.
The Smith family also lived on 11th Street at 3rd Avenue and in a house at #20 14th Street NW that his father built by hand. That house was moved to Parkdale in 1954 to accommodate the widening of the 14th Street bridge and his parents moved with it. Brian inherited the house when his parents passed away and that’s where he lives now.
Brian attended Hillhurst Cottage School (now the Alberta Wilderness Society Offices) on 12th Street for grades one to four. After that he attended Bow View School before it became Queen Elizabeth School. He remembers the school slowly expanding as they added a new grade every year until it went right up to grade 12.
He was a quiet child who liked to draw. In 1960 he enrolled in the Alberta College of Art (now AUARTS) and moved away from home. He rented an “alley house” on 6th Street in Sunnyside, for $40 a month. It was originally a livery stable, now it would be called a laneway house and rent for $1400 per month. It was in this little house that Brian hooked up with artists and musicians. They formed the Brute Force Jug Band and performed regularly at the Pig’s Eye in the Stadium Shopping Centre, a popular hangout for beatniks, hippies, and adherents of the counterculture.
There was something in the air during the sixties and it wasn’t just pot smoke. “The times they were a changin’…” sang Bob Dylan. An interest in Eastern religions led Brian to many of his lifelong friends at the Borderline, a Transcendental Meditation Centre situated in Parkdale by the Bow River. For a fee you received a personal mantra and learn how to meditate at the Borderline. The Maharishi once came to visit.
In 1968 Brian rented a little house on a large piece of property in the far Northeast corner of Sunnyside on McHugh Bluff at 3rd Street and 7th Avenue. If you look closely at the photo below you can see Brian’s house on the left-hand side of the photo perched on the bluff with the old streetcar line acting as a driveway. The original house had been lifted 15 feet off the ground onto a concrete basement to protect it from flooding hence the house was well above the flooded area.
Glenbow Archives (NA-1044-3) "Bow River flooding, Calgary, Alberta.", 1932-06, (CU175281) by Unknown. Courtesy of Libraries and Cultural Resources Digital Collections, University of Calgary.
The property had a good-sized unused chicken coop, which was quickly occupied by musicians as a band rehearsal space. It became a gathering place for artists, students, and musicians. Backline Orchestra, Rooster and others practiced and jammed together there.
During the sixties Brian was involved with the “Diggers”, a group formed in Haight Ashbury San Francisco, the centre of the counter-culture movement. They were radical, social activists and anarchist street performers who promoted the idea that everything should be free - food, clothing, medical care, and love. They lived communally, spearheaded the back to the land movement, provided free street entertainment, made a daily soup that was distributed for free on the street to anyone who wanted it and introduced the idea of free medical and law street clinics. Their ideas drifted up to Canada. This group was the genesis for many alternative movements.
Hitchhiking was a legal and a common mode of travel for many young folks. Brian provided free accommodation for travellers in. He remembers driving to Banff and back with a friend, picking up hitchhikers along the way. They would drop people off in Banff and then drive back to Calgary picking up more hitchhikers who were taken back to “crash” at Brian’s place for the night. Brian happily lived in that house until 1976 when the landlord attempted to put a second story on the property, and it failed.
After a short stint at a house on Memorial Drive, Brian moved into a small backyard house behind what was known locally as the Singer house. Alan Singer, son of Jack Singer, lived in the main house on the SW corner of Memorial Drive and 5a Street NW. Another small house sat at the rear of the property. It was fire damaged by the previous occupants rumoured to be prostitutes. Brian made a deal with Alan to repair the damage for one year’s free rent and continued to live there until the property was sold and developed into condos. He then moved to the family home in Parkdale that his father built. Brian may have left the community of Hillhurst Sunnyside, but he returned to his childhood home.
Brian claims that going to the Alberta College of Art, as it was called then, saved his life. It was a tolerant, supportive, and stimulating environment where hard work, lateral thinking, and an appreciation of difference thrived. The art school was a small department of SAIT at the time. The students were actively engaged in the work they were doing. Tuition was under $100 including supplies, within reach for low-income students with artistic abilities.
While Brian was going to art school, he spent his summers working as a relief Fire Lookout Observer. He was the first “long hair” to get hired. Other art students soon signed up following Brian’s lead. It was the perfect job for artists, and art students. During their working hours they were scouring the mountains with their binoculars looking for wisps of smoke. Down time allowed them the solitude and uninterrupted environment to produce artwork.
When Brian was in his fourth year of art school he applied for and accepted a job at West Canadian Graphics as copy camera operator. Eventually he found his lifetime career when he became a Display Man for Eaton’s and then the Bay, setting up all instore floor and window displays.
Brian loved a store on 10th Street called the Opportunity Shop in a space that was formerly a Jenkins Groceteria. It was full of old treasures that could be picked up for a reasonable price. Brian bought an old dentist chair there and a National Resophonic Guitar that was in bad shape and in dire need of repairs. He had the guitar for many years before he found a Martin D28 with the perfect neck to replace the damaged one on the old National. His musician friend Gary Bird was so impressed with the repair job he kept it! Brian’s love of old things in need of repairs has continued throughout his life, hence his presence on Sunday mornings at the HSCA Flea Market and a house full of old treasures.