Pleasantside is a residential neighborhood on the shore of the arm of Burrard Inlet known as Port Moody, about 12 miles (19 km) east of Vancouver and 1.5 miles (2.4 km) northwest of the city of Port Moody, British Columbia. Port Moody, the smallest of the Tri-Cities, is bordered by Coquitlam to the east and south and by Burnaby to the west. The city takes its name from Richard C. Moody, commander of the Royal Engineers, chief commissioner of lands and works for British Columbia, and the colony’s first lieutenant-governor, a post he held from 1858 to 1863.

Before Europeans arrived, Coast Salish First Nations lived along the coast, drawn by its mild climate and abundant food. The Fraser Valley gold rush of 1858 brought thousands of prospectors to the region, and the Royal Engineers cleared a trail from the colonial capital, New Westminster, giving ships anchored in Burrard Inlet an overland link inland. In 1879 the fledgling town of Port Moody was named the Canadian Pacific Railway‘s western terminus, and the first transcontinental passenger train from Montreal arrived on July 4, 1886. Real-estate prices soared, then collapsed the following year when the CPR extended a 12-mile (19 km) branch line west along the inlet to Vancouver, which became the new terminus.

In 1905 James S. Emerson built a sawmill to cut cedar with 1 hundred and 25 employees. Port Moody was incorporated as a city in 1913, with sawmill owner Perry A. Roe serving as its first mayor, and became primarily a mill town. Its sawmills turning timber into boards and shingles for the burgeoning developments around Burrard Inlet. By 1915, several oil refineries had opened, led by the large Imperial Oil Company development just outside the Port Moody boundary. After World War II, new industrial development brought steady employment, and the town expanded geographically, becoming increasingly suburban. Read more here and here. Explore more of Pleasantside and Port Moody here: