ca 1887 today’s Main Street looking north to the narrow strait that connected Skwácháy̓s [False Creek East] to the Salish Sea through False Creek along with the two peninsulas that bounded the inner inlet and tidal lands
The strait between the two peninsulas, roughly south of today’s Thornton Park, was still unobstructed and allowed small vessels and larger vertebrates to travel freely.
This is one of the last archival images of the remaining temperature rainforest, with red cedar and hemlock, in the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood west of Main Street.
The centre of this image also affords a rare early view of the marine areas and salt marshes east of the northern peninsula to where Chinatown eventually expanded and today is the low area that includes the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden.