British Columbia Miscellaneous License Plates

Shown at left is a blotter for the Ker and Stephenson Limited insurance company which operated from an office (shown below right) at 909 Government Street in Victoria. We believe that the "G-4127" is a reference to a phone number(?).

This plate was issued to mark the 1977 Conference of the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Administrators (CCMTA) in Victoria. Actual BC license plates were being manufactured by Acme Signalization of Montreal at this time, and this particular plate appears to be on the Saskatchewan base.	This plate was issued to mark the 1989 Conference of the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) in Vancouver.	This plate was issued to mark the 1991 Conference of the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA).
This oddball showed up on eBay in 2010 with the seller claiming that "WPC" stood for the 1988 "World Partnership Conference" and the "ALTA" along the side denoting an Alberta delegate. Thanks to Paul Keenleyside, we now know that this was issued to delegates to the Western Premiers Conference (WPC) held in Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island in 1988. Since the Premiers of Saskatchewan and Manitoba also attended the meeting (and possibly even Territorial leaders), we are assuming that there are other versions of this plate with "SASK" and whatever was used for Manitoba along the left side of the plate.	This is thought to be a prototype that was prepared for the (Sovereign) Squamish Nation and would have represented one of the first "Tribal Plates" (as they are commonly referred to in the US) in Canada - as far as this writer is aware.	These plates, while not formal provincial issues, were thought to be used on official vehicles associated with the Greater Vancouver Open (GVO) in the late 1990s (possibly 1997 or 1998).
Could we call this a "Cascadia" license plate? It has a little bit of British Columbia ("Beautiful"), Washington ("Evergreen State") and Oregon (tree logo) all in one plate!	This plate was prepared by Astrographic after the 2003 announcement that Vancouver would be hosting the 2010 Winter Games and displays the original logo for VANOC.	The coveted seasonal "Ice" plate, cannot be renewed and is only good in the north of the province where temperatures remain below zero for most of the winter. Visibility by law enforcement has been an historic issue with these plates.

An artist on Qudra Island known for turning driftwood into sculptures (Driftwood Creations) made the news in 2020 for completing a full size replica of a Volkswagon Beetle, complete with a 1970s inspired BC plicense plate No. AEW-001 (being the initials of Allan Edward Witcombe, the father of the sculptor)!

When I first saw this plate I enquired with the owner as to what it was, I was told that it was made to commemorate the first Lufthansa flight into Vancouver in 1983; hence the 1983 styled decal, the "LH" for Lufthansa, and the "446" for the flight number. These plates are rather plentiful from time to time on the German version of eBay.

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