This 12-pounder muzzle-loaded naval cannon has fired most days since October 1989 at nine PM across the Vancouver Harbour. It's original purpose is now lost on many people as the changing technology for naval navigation has modernized. However, the Vancouver Parks Board continues the tradition that this gun is fired daily.
The cannon was built in 1816 by H & King and is numbered DCLVII (657). Etched onto it is the Royal cipher of King George III. In 1856 DCLVII (657) and 15 other cannons were given to the Provinces of Canada - those colonies that made up British North America at the time. These included Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, and Vancouver Island. The Colony of British Columbia would be established two years later in 1858. At this time this Hudson Bay's Company administered territory.
The gun showed up at Nanaimo on Vancouver Island at this point. The purpose was to assure the local coal miners that the local native people would not attack. There is no known uprising between these groups.
The gun was then relocated to Esquimalt to help deal with the British and American tension over the various border disputes in question, primarily who had control over the San Juan Islands. This dispute lead to joint occupation of San Juan Island, the establishment of Fort Bellingham, and a rather non-violent Pig War that lasted until 1878 when Haro Strait was established as the maritime boundary between the Gulf and San Juan island groups.
In the meantime lumber shipment started happening from Burrard Inlet to Victoria, San Francisco, and Hawai'i. Later in 1887 the first trans-continental train arrived in Vancouver from Montreal, securing Vancouver as the terminal port on Canada's Pacific Coast.
There are various stories as to why this gun was placed here and fires daily at nine o'clock each evening. One is to set the chronometers of ships in a time when sailing required their use as well as sextants. Others say it was to announce to the fishermen that daily closure in Burrard Inlet fishery was ending. Regardless this gun has served it's purpose to announce a specific time.
It has been silenced a few times through the 20th century, including when in the 1960s it was stolen by the University of British Columbia engineering students. To help thwart any further pranks and theft in 1986 - the City of Vancouver's centennial of incorporation - a metal and stone cage was built around the Nine O'clock Gun.
Today it is a part of the daily soundscape of Vancouver being fired nightly at nine. On calmer nights it has been reported being heard as far inland as Mission some 60 kilometers | 40 miles east. However, as the urban din has been slowly increasing it has been heard less and less beyond a few miles.