On May Day, May 1, I will be part of a public event at which the building at 411 Dunsmuir St. in Vancouver will be given a plaque by the Vancouver Heritage Foundation acknowledging the site as one of the Vancouver “Places that Matter.”

The free event occurs at 3:30 pm at Café Marie in the building.

411 Dunsmuir was constructed by the Vancouver Trades and Labour Council in 1912 and served as the largest Labour Temple west of Chicago until 1920. I was asked to take part by the BC Labour Heritage Centre, one of the co-sponsors of the event, because my 2025 book of poems, Out of the Ordinary, contains a poem, “The Ballad of 411 Dunsmuir St., Vancouver, BC.” The poem touches on an attack on the building during Canada’s first civic general strike, Aug. 2, 1918. I will be reading the poem at the plaque dedication.

Other sponsors of the event are the 411 Seniors Society and the Vancouver Labour Council.