New Westminster RECORD THURSDAY October 27, 2016 33
THE 80s IN NEW WEST
THE RECORD HITS 35
WHAT KEPT LOCALS BUSY IN THE CITY
If you wanted to catch ’80s flicks like Raging Bull, Top Gun, Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Breakfast Club or Platoon, there were a few options around town, including the Columbia Theatre and Paramount Theatre (before it became a lapdancing establishment) on Columbia Street and New West Cinemas in Westminster Mall. Folks looking to do a bit of gambling (and able to handle the smoke) may have enjoyed a night of bingo. New West has been home to a few bingo halls through the years, including Sunday night games in the New Westminster City Market at 1051 Columbia St. – a site that’s now home to Columbia Square shopping centre. Woodward’s. Need we say more? It was the go-to place for pretty much everything you needed including clothing, shoes, groceries and toys.You could enjoy a quick bite to go at the malt stand or sit down for a coffee or a meal in the res-
taurant. Come Christmas, there was no place quite like a visit with Santa at Woodward’s. In the early 1990s, Woodward’s relocated into the new Woodward’s Centre (now Royal City Centre) at Sixth and Sixth and eventually closed shop. If you needed to get the newest release by the likes of Michael Jackson, Madonna, the Police or Billy Joel, you headed to Kelly’s Stereo Mart at the corner of Columbia and Sixth streets (where Starbucks is now located) or Big K Music in Westminster Mall. While White Spot has been located in Royal City Centre for many years, in the 1980s it still stood on the corner of 12th Street and Sixth Avenue, across the street from Lucky Strike Bowling.You could dine inside at the counter or a table, or get served in your car by the White Spot carhops. If you wanted a homecooked meal, you likely ventured to the Waffle House – when it was located on Sixth Avenue.The 600
block of Sixth Avenue, now home to the Royal Bank and some dollar stores, was the site of others businesses in the 1980s, including Cartwright Jewelers, Kelly’s Men’s and Boys’Wear and Parkhill Bakery. If you have an appetite for fish, you would have headed down to the waterfront in April for the seasonal eulachon run in the Fraser River. Fishermen sold the eulachon for about $1 a pound. Nightlife proliferated in New West in the 1980s, offering up everything from nightclubs where you could dance the night away to oldschool beer parlours.The College Place Hotel (Mugs and Jugs and Chicago Tonight), the Royal Towers Hotel (Rosie O’Grady’s pub and Mardi Gras nightclub), Casablanca’s on Church Street, E.J. Jacksons in Sap-
Downtown: The Paramount Theatre (left), built in 1902, was still operating as a movie theatre in the 1980s. Top, the 600 block of Sixth Avenue in 1984. RECORD /Archived Files
perton, Fronts of Front Street, the Windjammer, the Windsor, the Terminal Pub, Moonrakers, and the King Edward Hotel – and a few we’ve likely missed. Late night munchies? There’s a good chance you hit up Bino’s Restaurant (fries with gravy or a jumbo bran muffin, anyone?) in Westminster Mall or Venus Pizza, the predecessor to River’s Reach neighbourhood pub. Jane Fonda and Richard Simmons inspired many folks to don spandex and
leggings and do aerobics. Locally, Fitness New West at the Centennial Community Centre and theYMCA of New Westminster on Sixth Street were the places to get fit. Sports fans enjoyed action at Queen’s Park Arena, where the senior Salmonbellies enjoyed great success in the 1980s (see page 41). Come winter, they could enjoy watching future NHLers Bill Ranford and Cliff Ronning take to the ice for the New Westminster Bruins. Levis were still on trend, but Sergio Valente and Jordache were among the hot denim brands of the 1980s. If you needed a new pair
of jeans, you may have ventured in to Bootlegger in Westminster Mall or Kelly’s Men’s and Boy’s Wear on Sixth Avenue. Big, big hair was a big thing in the 1980s, and locals visited places like Michael’s Salon, Raymond’s Salon in Woodward’s, Classic Hair Salon and He and She to get punky cuts, perms and other styles of the day. New Westminster is home to grocery stores like SaveOn-Foods, Safeway and Buy Low Foods, but in the 1980s families would have headed to the Woodward’s Food Floor, Safeway or SuperValu in Westminster Centre for their grocery needs.
They still talk about King Neptune’s buffet A legendary part of New Westminster’s restaurant history served its last supper in 1982. The King Neptune opened on the waterfront at the foot of Eighth Street
By THERESA MCMANUS in the late 1950s, quickly garnering a reputation as the go-to upscale restaurant in town. Diners came from across the Lower Mainland to feast on seafood. “It was a seafood feast to remember. Lovely stuff,” recalls longtime New West resident Tony Antonias. “They had crab, shrimp, prawns. It was just incredible. It was something to behold.” After filling their plates at the buffet tables stacked with seafood, side dishes
and fruits, diners headed to the dining area that featured views of the Fraser River. “King Neptune – where salmon jump from the Fraser into the pan,” reads a postcard distributed during the restaurant’s heyday. While seafood lovers often dined at the restaurant, for many folks a night out at the King Neptune was reserved for special occasions. “To go to the King Neptune was a night that you would hold very, very special,” Antonias says. “It brought a lot of people to New West. It was the talk of New Westminster. It was a special place.” Many residents were saddened when the famous seafood establishment was forced out of its waterfront location in 1982, when the B.C. Development Corpo-
ration didn’t renew the restaurant’s waterfront lease. First Capital City was an agency established by the B.C. Development Corporation and the City of New Westminster to work on the redevelopment of the city’s waterfront. The restaurant’s closure led to plenty of legal wrangling in court, as the owners attempted to sue for breach of trust and negligent misrepresentation.The restaurant building was put in storage and the owners considered a new location in Surrey and Richmond, but it never came to be. More than 35 years after the restaurant shuttered its doors and left New West, the King Neptune’s legacy lives on in the memories of residents and in mementoes like menus and postcards that pop up periodi-
Seafood dining: Denis Almas stands in front of the King Neptune Restaurant in 1981. The restaurant had been there for about 20 years. RECORD /Archived Files
cally for sale on eBay. “Some of us have also never forgotten King Neptune,” local historian Jim Wolf told the Record in
2013. “It had a wonderful neon sign ... and when you came down the Eighth Street hill and there was King Neptune holding his
trident looking straight up the hill and beckoning people to come on in and eat the salmon.”