Seraphim “Joe” Fortes is believed to have been born in Barbados

Barbados

Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles. It is in length and as much as in width, amounting to . It is situated in the western area of the North Atlantic and 100 kilometres east of the Windward Islands and the Caribbean Sea; therein, it is about east of the islands of Saint...

 in 1865. After leaving his homeland in his mid-teens, he worked in Britain for several years. In 1884 he sailed around Cape Horn from Liverpool

Liverpool

Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...

 on the "Robert Kerr", arriving in Burrard Inlet

Burrard Inlet

Burrard Inlet is a relatively shallow-sided coastal fjord in southwestern British Columbia, Canada. Formed during the last Ice Age, it separates the City of Vancouver and the rest of the low-lying Burrard Peninsula from the slopes of the North Shore Mountains, home to the communities of West...

 in September 1885. His name occurs repeatedly in the ship's log as Seraphim Fortes.

After the disastrous fire, which completely destroyed the recently incorporated City of Vancouver on June 13, 1886, Joe Fortes worked as a shoeshine boy and porter at the Sunnyside Hotel and as a bartender at the Bodega Saloon on Cordova and Carrall (Maple Tree Square in Gastown

Gastown

Gastown is a national historic site in Vancouver, British Columbia, at the northeast end of Downtown adjacent to the Downtown Eastside. Its historical boundaries were the waterfront , Columbia Street, Hastings Street, and Cambie Street, which were the borders of the 1870 townsite survey, the proper...

).

Making his home at English Bay, he lived in a tent on the beach during the milder months of the year. After the turn of the century, he moved into a cottage at the foot of Gilford Street on the shore-side of Beach Avenue. His little house was later moved to the other side of the street, just east of Alexandra Park.

Joe Fortes devoted all of his free time to teaching children to swim and to patrolling the beach. The self-appointed unpaid guard continued to support himself by working odd jobs until, in 1901, the City appointed him its first official lifeguard.

His contemporaries referred to him respectfully and lovingly as "Old Black Joe" or "English Bay Joe". The stocky, dark-skinned man was a friend and teacher to the children, a guard for the bathers and a hero to people in distress. He has been officially credited with saving 29 lives, yet it is believed that the real number is considerably higher.

In 1910 the City honoured Joe Fortes for his many years of service to the public by presenting him with a gold watch, a cheque and an illuminated address.

When Joe Fortes died on February 4, 1922, Vancouver held a record-breaking funeral procession for Fortes. Mourners crowded into Holy Rosary Cathedral

Holy Rosary Cathedral (Vancouver)

Holy Rosary Cathedral is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Vancouver, British Columbia. It is operated by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vancouver; its Archbishop is J. Michael Miller, CSB and its Rector is the Very Rev. Glenn Dion...

; Vancouver said farewell to a brave, kind and modest friend. He was buried in Mountain View Cemetery

Mountain View Cemetery (Vancouver)

Mountain View Cemetery is the oldest cemetery in the City of Vancouver, British Columbia. Opened in 1887, it is located west of Fraser Street between 31st and 43rd Avenues...

. A flat stone marks his grave, simply inscribed: "JOE".

In June 1927 the citizens of Vancouver dedicated a monument to Joe Fortes. The fountain in Alexandra Park by sculptor Charles Marega

Charles Marega

Charles Carlos Marega was a Canadian sculptor in the early 20th century.He was born in Lucinico, in the commune of Gorizia, then part of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. He received training in plaster work in Mariano, Italy and then studied in Vienna and Zurich. In Zurich, he met Berta, who he...

 bears the inscription: LITTLE CHILDREN LOVED HIM.

He is still remembered today. A branch of the Vancouver Public Library

Vancouver Public Library

The Vancouver Public Library is the third largest public library system in Canada, with more than 2.5 million items in its collections, 22 branches, approximately 375,000 cardholders, and nearly nine million item borrowings annually...

is named after him, as well as a well-known downtown restaurant, which opened in 1985, one hundred years after he arrived in Canada.

External links

• Joe Fortes Seafood and Chop House restaurant
• Joe Fortes Branch, Vancouver Public Library