The trail of the swinging lanterns

John Bull’s eldest daughter, Canada—recently eulogized as his fairest by the Honorable William H. Taft—is no laggard in recognizing opportunity as it ebbs and flows in the great, scientific game of trade. Like our wide-awake neighbor to the south, she inherits from commercial and speculative England the bartering instinct, and is willing enough to emulate, in a modified way, cousin Columbia’s obeisances to the goddess of commerce. The goddess, aforesaid, has been an active dame and most aggressive throughout North America during the past half century. To further her aims, enthusiastic disciples have achieved such marvellous feats, especially in railroad construction and transportation methods, during the period mentioned that comparisons, invidious or otherwise, are well-nigh compulsory.

The prairie schooner has made a squeaky exit from the drama of locomotion into museums and the tortuous, blazed trails of the gold seekers of ’49, minus kinks and humps, are now the routes of many lines with trackage contributing to an aggregate of 256,547 miles of railway which 2105 roads have under operation to-day in United States alone. In 1860 the Union possessed only 30,626 miles of steel.

Fifty years ago the fruits of opportunity in the middle and golden west appeared to the denizens east of the “Missouri” to ripen and require plucking all at once, and the termination of the Civil War signalled the inauguration of extravagant railroad ventures. Ambition fired the mind of the restless native and that big, swelling, polyglot immigration pouring into the “Land of Liberty,” needed space and breezy fumigation. Afterwards, they had to be fed and equipped, which, pursuant to the laws of demand and supply, materially increased consumption. Responding to the goads of progress, the railroads extended, paralleled and criss-crossed the “other fellow” in the dignified scramble for a slice of the melon of prosperity. The slogan was and has ever been, “More Passengers,” “Increased Tonnage”: import, export, interline and local business all comprised grist for the mills. About the time mercantile houses were becoming inoculated with the “commercial traveller” idea, a small squad of travelling railroad representatives, in open formation, were training observing optics on prospective traffic. In this, the eastern group of railroads were slightly in advance of their newer, western connections.

As far back as 1868 New York and New England State railways—the nuclei of gigantic present day systems—grew interested in international trade and thrust their tentacles across that imaginary line of demarkation bisecting the great lakes, into Ontario and Quebec. Mr. E. L. Slaughter entered Canada forty-eight years ago as representative of the “Erie” and is said to have been the first foreign line travelling agent to invade British domains on such a mission. Some Canadian merchants no doubt, remember this Southern gentleman who occupied an office at the corner of Scott and Wellington Streets, Toronto. John Strachan, genial and popular, followed him and for many years graced the position, with Mr. M. McGregor, inscrutable and keen, as right bower. S. J. Sharp was also an active agent of that system in Ontario. Those were the days of the “Merchant’s Dispatch,” 1870, the days when John Barr in the early eighties trod the boards boosting the “Blue Line,” and his understudies, A. F. Webster, Bob Moodie, Charles Holmes and F. F. Backus, sallied forth from the corner of Church and Colborne Streets, originally laboring in the same cause. Afterwards, T. J. Craft, and subsequently S. Hyndman, made predatory incursions from Detroit for the “Blue Line.” Mr. Craft was once agent at Galt, Ont., and an organ, the product of his skill, is, I believe, in good order to-day in a church in that Scottish burg. The distinctive term “dispatch” I mention, was applied to the earliest systematized methods, operative within a railway organization, for tracing perishable or timed freight and transporting it via most direct routes in cars of a uniform dimension, color, etc. Ere long, “Great Eastern” and “National Dispatch” sprang into existence. Hot on their heels came the “Hoosac Tunnel Route” and “West Shore” bidding for favorable consideration through the medium of indefatigable Joseph Hickson.

Not until 1901 did W. A. Wilson, a graduate of that school, and formerly with the “Fitchburg,” assume control of the “N.Y.C.” merged freight interests. Louis Drago and Frank C. Foy supervised passenger affairs for the consolidated lines.

At that period there was more talk in Canada of reciprocity with United States than there may be again. Uncle Sam’s politicians were wont to shun the subject, but the interchange of traffic grew apace. Emboldened by their competitors’ success, the “Lackawanna Road” sent an emissary into Ontario and they “have stuck,” George Bazzard campaigning for years for that interest until age caused him to make place for A. Leadley, now at the helm. 1884 saw the advent of the “Lehigh Valley” and Duncan Cooper. Robert Lewis, then in his prime, was busy making hay, years before their permanent office was decided on. He was a practical student of the “Morse” code at Suspension Bridge in 1855 when the first near-modern structure spanned Niagara River. Thirty years ago he presented his card in “York” state as representative of the “Great Western.” Only recently came the “Pennsylvania” with Don McKenzie as sponsor and succeeded by L. J. Fox and Messrs. Stackpole Plummer, and Little.

A large percentage of the public have enjoyed or know of the splendid passenger equipment and service some of these railways, in conjunction with Canadian trunk lines, offer to-day between Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton and Atlantic Seaboard. No doubt the reader who has attained the age of 45 years could develop a comparative mental picture of his first train ride, its discomforts, shortcomings and quaint paraphernalia. The demands of the age and growth of travel account for “the milk in the cocoanut.” Before the war, the average number of trains crossing the line via Rouse’s Point, N.Y., was 134 per month, and in that time they transported 9,627 passengers southward. At Newport, Vt., 160 trains entering United States yield a monthly patronage of 6,897 people. Probably you are curious to learn how it is at Niagara Falls, N.Y. This accessible and world-famous spot, redolent with much that is historic and tragic, is the magnet which attracts or ushers into the State of New York 20,000 souls a month and 700 trains of all railroads are pressed into service to cater to the modern craze to be “on the go.” These authentic figures do not include pedestrian traffic.

Compare the tonnage of forty years ago, and the leisurely dispatch it was given, with the daily carloads containing a multifarious assortment of perishable commodities and staples which now make regular, scheduled runs of 24, 36, and 48 hours between United States points of origin, the docks at Portland, Boston and New York and distributing centres in Canada. Twelve to fifteen hundred tons of import merchandise for Ontario destinations per month, apportioned to each of the half dozen competitive eastern “U.S.” lines, is a conservative estimate of what is handled. They bring in hardware, silver novelties, locks and clocks from Connecticut; tools, machinery and electrical supplies from Massachusetts and New York; cement and coal from Pennsylvania; early table delicacies from Maryland, and off ocean vessels, English fabrics, weaves from Scotch and Irish looms, German toys, Parisian frocks and bonnets, as well as tons of express matter and the theatrical accessories which accompany the thespians, prestidigitators and slap-stick artists. One of these eastern lines, with a strong weakness for fruit shipments, transports to the international bridges during the season, 125 carloads a month of incoming Cuban pineapples, Costa Rica bananas and Mediterranean lemons. The local and through eastbound tonnage secured by interested railways receives equal dispatch, exceeds that average and includes large quantities of apples, cheese, eggs, flour, implements, lumber, meats and poultry which probably approximate a combined monthly output of 1,200 carloads. It may be news to some of the uninitiated to hear that 1,500 carloads of Ontario grown turnips are shipped annually in the autumn for consumption in the United States. It is not surprising, therefore, that the big “American” carriers hasten to augment their revenues by coaxing and nursing this growing trade.

In 1875 the complacent east languidly condescended to heed insistent whispers concerning Canada’s vast Northwest. The tide of travel was diverging and began to carry with it in that direction prospectors, homesteaders and adventurous merchants bent on spying out locations in the prairie El Dorado. Dependent, of course, they levied on the mills of the east for food, clothing and implements. About this time Sir Hugh Childers, London, England, occupied the President’s chair directing the destinies of the Grand Trunk Railway, and the contemporary Canadian Pacific Railway official was (Sir) William Van Horne. Lucius Tuttle, President of Boston & Maine System, D. McNicoll, Vice-President, and C. E. E. Ussher, Passenger Traffic Manager, Canadian Pacific Railway, later on in the first flight and noteworthy examples of what determination and capacity accomplish, were going through a “course of sprouts” with Ontario lines which afterwards lost identity. Robert Kerr, former Passenger Traffic Manager “C.P.R.,” was “G.F. & P.A.” of the Northern Railway, and in his office situated at the foot of Spadina Avenue, Toronto, Tom Marshall and Henry Jago shoved the quill. Mr. Jago recently relinquished the duties of “G.E.P.A.” West Shore Road at New York. Henry Bourlier, so long associated with J. D. Hunter as western representatives of the Allan Line, was in 1874 ticket agent of G.T.R., in the old depot, and Tommy Jones was City Ticket Agent, Great Western Railway. Shippers hereabout will remember John Porteous, G.F.A., G.T.R., Montreal, Arthur White, G.F.A., Midland Railway, Port Hope, Ont., Jim “the penman” Thompson of the C.P.R. and Malcolm Murdock. Then it was that the star of Geo. B. Reeve and W. E. Davis began to twinkle; likewise, John W. Loud. All in modest positions at that time, they were fitting themselves for the exalted places they afterwards honorably filled in shaping the policy of the “Grand Trunk” and “Trunk Pacific” systems.

The majority of these and other officials had frequent business intercourse with the various United States railway agents who visited Canada.

In the year 1877 Mr. A. H. Burnham made his initial bow in Ontario representing Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway. This move was significant, indicating the expectations of western roads based on the interest Manitoba’s commercial future had awakened. In July, 1878, the late James M. Taylor, prior to that time General Freight Agent and Superintendent, St. Lawrence & Ottawa Railway, had the distinction of establishing at Toronto the first permanent western line office in Canada. He was appointed General Canadian Agent of the “St. Paul Road.” Unlike any competitor, that railway maintained an agency in Ontario without interruption for three decades. Andrew J. Taylor joined his father in February, 1879, succeeding him several years ago when the former transferred to Pittsburg. These gentlemen have ever been regarded as pioneers and charter members of the foreign railway colony, highly respected by a legion of friends. James M. Taylor, a man of sterling personal characteristics and business acumen, who appreciated and sustained a clever hand in a quiet rubber at euchre, chose for headquarters a suite of rooms within a door of the northeast corner of Front and Scott Streets, then the hub of mercantile activity in Toronto. A neighbor was Mr. Richard Arnold, for a long time City Passenger Agent in charge of the “G.T.R.” office located on the aforesaid corner. Mr. Arnold’s daughters became respectively, the wives of William Wainwright and James Stephenson, two notable figures of the old regime. The former died when Fourth Vice-President of the “G.T.R.” and his erstwhile confrere, I believe, lived in retirement in England until death. Mr. Arnold numbered in his staff the late well-known “Phil.” Slatter; a junior assistant was Mr. C. E. McPherson, now A.P.T.M., C.P.R., at Winnipeg, who 35 years ago left “G.T.R.” ranks to travel in New England for the “Rock Island Road” and J. B. Tinning. C. W. Graves imbibed from the same seasoned chief preliminary hints on how to handle the dear public and look out for the elusive traveller who was not above licking into illegibility the date on expired tickets.

Messrs. V. M. Came, W. Barnes and Sam. Beatty soon followed Mr. Burnham of the St. Paul Road to further the interests of the Chicago & Northwestern Railway, but were transferred before many moons had silvered the landscape. The two Jacks, “Morley” and “Winnett” swung into line in 1879 and did good work in both departments for the “C. & N.W.R.,” opening an office in Toronto in the old Baldwin Building, I understand, in 1880.

John Morley long ago forsook the excitement of the road. He died at Winnipeg during the summer of 1908, and interment occurred at Toronto, where his family is well known. The mantle of these gentlemen fell naturally on the shoulders of a sturdy Spartan, Burton H. Bennett, cryptic, yet merry, who jumped into the game with a will and has won an enviable reputation in the dual position.

The “Burlington Road” was right up on the firing line, looked after by a gentleman bearing the uncurtailed and historic cognomen, John Quincy Adams Bean, from “way down east.” After him, in order, appeared Messrs. Badgeley, Simpson and John A. Yorick. The late Joe Simpson was always happy if his road secured patronage in regular twos and threes. Not every one knows that he was for a few hours an unwilling guest of the “Fenian” leader O’Neil in 1866, and had been with M.K. & T. and T.St.L. & K.C.

Brilliant, well-informed, J. Francis Lee represented the “Rock Island-Albert Lea” combination, D. J. Peace sought freight for them and Eben MacLeod was located at Montreal somewhat later for “C.R.I. & P.” Such watchful competitors as “Great Western Railway,” featured by Messrs. Ridgedale, Noyes, Storr and Baker, and “Union Pacific Ry.” with Ira P. Griswold in the van, M. C. Dickson and J. O. Goodsell holding power later, before Geo. Vaux and J. J. Rose took up their work. Charles A. Florence, an “Illinois Central” Agent, made Berlin—now Kitchener—his headquarters.

The “All Rail” mediums then available for transporting man and beast destined California, the Dakotas and Manitoba from Old Ontario, were “Grand Trunk,” “Great Western,” “Credit Valley,” and “Canada Southern,” covering the distance as far as St. Thomas and Detroit, thence via “Michigan Central” and Wabash Railroads to Chicago. Tom Cochrane, R. W. Youngs, Bob Middleton, J. W. Kearns and G. C. Wilson follow the footsteps of predecessors and patrol that neighborhood now. As travel increased from a dozen or two people to an occasional weekly carload, and more, the number of migratory railroaders multiplied. Oldtimers will recollect some of those big hearted, brainy hustlers including Sam Seymour of the “Pennsylvania,” Dave Cavan, formerly of Stratford, John Laven, off the “Iron Mountain,” representing “M.C.R.,” Charles Ousterhouse, T.P.A. N.Y.C. Lines, Geo. B. Wyllie for “L.S. & M.S.” and later in full charge of “Ill. Cent. Ry.” affairs in Canada, and the late much lamented J. Nelles Bastedo, who shipped from Barlow Cumberland’s service several years ago to travel for “Santa Fe System.” Joe Rattenbury, who twenty-five to thirty years back used to stow away at his place in Clinton in one night as many as 18 of these railroading nomads and cosmopolitans, often repeats a story the wiseacres will recollect about his brother “Ike” and laconic “Bass.”

The many sided men above enumerated made it their duty to assist with Customs formalities at the frontier and also assuage the fears of intending passengers trembling at the prospect of meeting in Chicago that much heralded and maligned bugaboo the bunco steerer.

It is worthy of remark that while to-day the railroad companies caution and forbid passengers riding on the platforms, thirty-five years ago the travelling public swarmed on that perilous projection, on the steps and quite often took possession of the car roofs with a nonchalance that would make the cold chills play peek-a-boo up and down your spine. How many of the lads and lassies in this year of grace would have the temerity to sally forth, for instance to the London Fair, decorating the top of a flat car rigged up with benches for the occasion? Your fathers and mothers did it.

The patronage of the farmer and his brawny sons, who had visions of gang plows and waving wheat, was an important desideratum in that era. Party leaders were “some pumpkins” and they puffed and spat over many a fragrant cheroot while sipping their “ponies” and “bootlegs” in company of expectant agents.

Charlie McP—— tells a tale of an exodus of the boys over the trail of the lonesome pine to some silent place near Coboconk where the villagers were to meet them to consult. To introduce the serious talk of tickets, rates and routes, some foreign line spokesman suggested a mild libation all hands round. Agreed! Not to be outdone, his neighbor ordered again something out of the lamp for the lords and laity: partaken ad libitum, in extenso. Now me! It’s your turn, and so the hours wore on, your Uncle Dudley Hayrick taking on his grist at minimum cost, business postponed and county council adjourning to reconsider the tax rate.

CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME

As the train slowed down at a busy country station a man excitedly put his head through the open coach window. “A woman in here has fainted,” he cried, “has anyone got any whiskey? Quick!” A philanthropist reached within the recesses of his unmentionables and handed a bottle to the enquirer with an 18 karat thirst. The latter frantically uncorked the flask, put it to his lips and took a noble pull, “Ah”, he sighed, “that’s better, it always did upset me to see a woman faint.”

Presently the good blood of Ontario, and some bad stuff, was rolling westward at the rate of two and three regularly arranged for trains of nine to thirteen loaded cars each week. The personal effects and stock of the settler went along too, the owner ensconced occasionally in a tourist sleeper jolting along at the end of the string, and eager railway companies took turns in hauling the prize. Excitement ran high. The wires were kept hot about special or inadequate equipment, conflicting rates and alleged unconstitutional moves of opposing forces.

It was no uncommon occurrence to convene a meeting in hotel parlor or little red schoolhouse and there agents present would, in turn, give the agriculturist samples of terseness or spell-binding eloquence. Imagine the persuasiveness that was pitted against the farmer’s cautiousness or distrust. Recall, ye of good memory, if you can, the epigrams, arguments and bon mots which rolled off the ready tongues of a dozen or more jovial pilgrims from o’er the border; for instance, M. McNally, representing “St. P.M. & M.R.” a fowl fiend who could eat poultry five times a day, Charlie O’Connor with the “Northwestern,” Con. Sheehy, that urbane, silk tiled gentleman sent over by the “Wabash,” A. C. Stonegrave with eagle eye for “Central Vermont” end of it, rough and ready Harry Badgeley of “Great Western,” Bill Askin or handsome Billy McLean of the Beatty Line. They talked corn until their tones grew husky and they were as fine a coterie of unconventional free lances as ever probed the intricacies of a railroad timetable. To this day the boys tell of the adaptability of Harry Badgeley of the “C.G.W.R.,” how he studied pigology, hob-nobbing for three days with a colony of ruralists whom he landed high and dry by this artful manoeuvre in spite of keen competition. That was the halcyon era, the palmy days of Ed. Sullivan, Ed. Riley, Ed. Clancy and Ned Hanlan.

Frank E. Harrison, who is now agent of C.P.R., at Whitby, Ont., will remember all this as he was about this time Canadian Agent first for the C.B. & Q.R., and afterwards the C.St.P. & K.C.R.

On “special” party dates passengers were concentrated at junctional points and afterwards personally conducted to Detroit, Chicago or St. Paul. Mr. B. Travers, city ticket agent at Paris, still, has informed me that parties of 75 and 100 people were occasionally gathered there, and such a pretentious exodus was known to earn a serenade by the local brass band at the time of departure. The sturdy knights of ploughshares and other instruments of peace had to be and were better mixers than the stall-fed variety of traveller of this day, and the consciousness that theirs was a common object made easy the upsetting of social barriers to the music of violin, mouth-organ and jew’s harp. The journey always ensured incident and good-fellowship, and perhaps, some disappointing experiences. The records, considerately offered me for perusal, do not include the name of the escorting agent who, while wrapped in the arms of Morpheus in a Chicago hotel, suffered the loss of his train’s entire proceeds by the deft removal of a panel in the door on which his coat was hanging. It was when escorting a party westward that Will Wyley, with “M.C.R.,” suffocated, and M. Boesmburgh had a very close call in the burning of the hotel “Newhall” at Milwaukee.

Three different gauges, or widths between rails, were accepted as standard in different parts of Canada and United States at that time, and to permit interchange of equipment, three rails were sometimes laid. Just before the adoption of the standard, broad gauge, 4 feet, 8½ inches, became general in America, a good-sized party bound for the west were delayed at Toronto half a day awaiting the readjustment of that portion of the “Great Western” to Hamilton, Ont. In the forenoon one rail over the entire distance, 39 odd miles, was moved in and spiked down in its new position. This must have been quite a feat 35 years ago in the absence of those simplifying methods practiced to-day. John Weatherston, father of Nicholas and Robert of the same name, supervised the work.

Moving westward over designated routes from Chicago, the canary-colored coaches were pulled by locomotives with yellow bellied boilers, wheels painted scarlet and ponderous smokestacks—hummers in the old days—but antiques in 1918. They bore such names as Antelope, Reindeer, Thistle, &c., as well as of prominent people.

BOIL THEM WHEN THEY’RE TOUGH

Picking her way daintily through the grime of the locomotive works, a young woman visitor viewed the huge operations with visible awe. Turning to a young man from the office who was shewing her through and pointing, she asked, “What is that big thing over there?”

“That’s a locomotive boiler”, said the guide.

She puckered her brows.

“And what do they boil locomotives for?” she enquired.

“To make the locomotive tender”, said the young man from the office, with amazing effrontery.

Young’s Magazine

What a shock it would be to My Lady’s complacency if, on her journey now, she should find it necessary to raise a sunshade in the coach to protect her raiment from the rain and snow sifting through the chinks and rifts in the car. This age is not without some blessings, as Ben Fletcher might have exclaimed. We are reminded here of a characteristic of Mr. Fletcher, who was advance agent for “D.G.H. & M.” He had been working up business for an excursion to Nebraska, which did not “pan out,” one solitary passenger offering his patronage. The selling agent wired him for instructions and received reply couched thusly: “By the great horned toad Reginald, chain him to the seat!”

The “St. P.M. & M.,” at birth “St. Paul & Pacific,” later converted by astute minds into the “Great Northern Railway,” was the railroad which gave that big quartette, Messrs. Angus, Smith, Hill and Stephens, a gilt-edged monopoly of Manitoba emigration and, incidentally, the patronage of dame fortune. Men and chattels had only shank’s mare as an alternative to this line northward from St. Paul as far as Fisher’s Landing, a Red River port. Here, transfer was made to the Kittson Line of steamboats plying to Fort Garry now Winnipeg, and owned by Norman Kittson, a colleague of J. J. Hill in some early business ventures. In winter the trip was made by stage travelling part way over thick ice. Mr. Kittson was one of several successors to Anson Northrup, the pioneer navigator of the Upper Mississippi River who launched his first craft there in 1835.

The Great Northern Railway, during the time of the Manitoba boom, and since, was championed in Canada by “live wires” such as Jack Huckins, resourceful Ham McMicken, who is acting for the road in Europe at present, Messrs. Kinsley, Graves, Wurtele, Watkins, Hetherington, Tudor and Brooks.

James M. Taylor, in charge of affairs for “C.M. & St. P.R.,” during those strenuous days, pulled off the biggest coup of the period I attempt to sketch, in securing for his line a party which originated at Millbrook, Ont., and is said to have consisted of or influenced 500 people together with 55 carloads of effects. Mr. A. Leach, who was ticket agent there then, capably fills that position to-day.

The idea which the “President’s Agreement” made concrete in February, 1900, was ridiculed twenty years before and the system of commissions to agents for ticket sales being in vogue, competition waxed lively. For obvious reasons the standards of remuneration did not always remain stationary; fancy prices and fat drafts swelled many a bank balance.

Although few dismissals and re-engagements by telegraph were bulletined, the foreign railway man’s berth never was considered as sure as taxes. For brief periods in those stirring times, the commission paid to agents for each ticket reading from a point in Eastern Canada to the Pacific Seaboard netted $11.00 to $15.00. Inside information about methods and means, dormant in the book shelves of many an agent’s memory, would have made interesting anecdotes had one gained the favor of men like Tom Ford, T.P.A., G.T.R., W. J. Grant, for a time with “Mobile & Ohio” in Canada, Geo. W. Hibbard, former A.G.P.A., C.P.R., Montreal, unfortunate Alex Drysdale, who lost his sight and was pensioned by the Chicago & Alton Railroad, and the erudite M. B. “Garfield” Tooker, the Beau Brummel of many a husting. Heard you ever of Mr. Tooker’s perceptive olefactory membrane? How he accurately distinguished, though blindfolded, the odor of a dozen different perfumes in J. Livingstone’s store in Listowel. Then behold, the unkindest cut of all: some mischievous scamp thrust an uncorked bottle of skunk oil beneath his nose.

Another scout, robust and in commercial life at Hamilton to-day, who links the past and present, is D. O. Pease years ago with the Great Western Railway. Dan Pease is the proud possessor of the long delayed Fenian Raid medal, and when William Edgar appointed him D.P.A., G.T.R., Montreal, he evinced during twelve years in that capacity, an enthusiastic interest in military matters and movement of troops. Conversant with shipping and the French language, shrewd and sauve, he successively represented the C.M. & St. P.R. for several years in Quebec in the early days, and relates an incident about a ticket agent in Prince Edward Island who booked a party of twenty round trips to California and out of the bountiful commissions purchased for his wife a fine horse, harness and basket buggy.

Canadian Ticket Agents’ Association

Representative group of officers and members present at Annual Meeting, Buffalo, October, 1909.

Pictured beside C. & N.W.R. Terminal, Chicago

There are quite a number of agents, active in transportation matters at the present time, who took part in and recall the friendly but whirlwind competition “American” lines indulged in to obtain the lion’s share of business moving beyond the border. Forty years rest lightly indeed, on them all and a baker’s dozen chosen at random might well include Edward de la Hooke, London, dean of the faculty, erect, vigorous and immaculate, who began railroading in Hamilton in 1864, W. G. Webster, a colt yet and an inveterate wag, who resides in Chicago, J. A. McKenzie, Woodstock, Will Jackson, Clinton W. Somerville, Seaforth, James Dore, Mitchell, R. Lauder, Goderich, C. L. King, Kincardine, John Towner, Stratford, P. Robertson and R. E. Waugh, Hamilton, Dick Shea, Palmerston, W. E. Rispin, Chatham, Dan. Hayes, London, Geo. McCallum, Galt, a storehouse of ancient history; C. E. Horning, Toronto, Tom Evans, London, John Paul, Dave Dover and Alex. Calder, Winnipeg, W. H. King, St. Thomas, J. Quinlan, Montreal, W. H. Clancy, now living in Toronto, (a wit with an “Emerald” flavor), A. E. Lalande, Montreal, J. B. Lambkin, Halifax, D. Carruthers, Quebec, John Lyons, Moncton, and J. M. Riddell, Portland. The names U. E. Thompson, Belleville, John Foy, Toronto, A. H. Taylor, Ottawa, C. E. Morgan, Hamilton, J. Tierney, Arnprior, W. Bunton, Peterborough, W. H. Harper, Chatham, Alex. Notman, Toronto, Joseph Heffernan, Guelph, Louis Drago, Niagara Falls and John Gray live in the memory although they have ceased their labors.

Among such as these was and is business and co-operation sought by that original and persistent advertiser, W. R. Callaway, once station master at Walkerton, now G.P.A., Soo Line; S. H. Palmer, C.P.A., M.C.R.; Harry W. Steinhoff, Geo. H. Anthony, Varnie Russell, R. G. McCraw of W.C.R. (the Soo’s new arm), D. W. Hatch, connected with A.T. & S.F.R.; C. Hartigan, Rutland Railway, and that big four who so well attended to Northern Pacific Railway affairs, Messrs. Walter E. Belcher, W. G. Mason, George Dew, Thomas Henry, and their collaborators, Geo. W. Hardisty, Geo. McCaskey and Geo. Barnes. Guided by Armand Lalonde, the “B. & M.” scored often. They could tell you of long drives in good and indifferent weather into the surrounding country seeking prospective passengers and good locations for the half and quarter sheet style of advertising so much used then; of hard and fast arrangements upset in a thrice accompanied by restitution of deposits given to clinch the deal and of mysterious cheques which seemed to spring from nowhere in particular when the management forbade their acceptance. They smile when recounting methods used to test if agents were sticking to tariff. I remember the case of one stool pigeon who, after obtaining the favor of a ticket at a rate partially unconfirmed, selling it with intent to a rival organization to be utilized in trapping the enemy. He made a required affidavit as to purchase price and the subterfuge, with its charge of irregularity hingeing thereon, had not been operative an hour before the resourceful agent who sold him the ticket, effectively turned the tables causing the spotter’s arrest on the grounds “false pretences,” and that worthy received his liberty under suspended sentence together with a reprimand.

While these diversified events were finding a niche in history, M. V. McGinnis and Major E. M. Peel, a lover of horseflesh, were on the war path for the Canadian Pacific Railway, and their contemporary, W. T. Dockrill, present T.P.A., C.P.R., was a “big issue” in another direction. A busy man with a portable railroad in his “carpet-bag” ticket case, he created quite a furore years ago in the vicinity of Brockville. From November, 1883 to June 1885 he traveled on the “C.P.R.” trains between that city, Ottawa and Smiths Falls exchanging prepaid orders and ticketing westbound business. In July, 1885, the C.P.R. was completed to a point beyond Jackfish and from track-end there, the heroes of the Battle of Batoche marched across the arm of Lake Superior before the bridge linking up the western extension was erected. During the time the different contracts were completing, the builders released at intervals, 10,000 laborers and navvies in lots of fifty, one hundred and two hundred, who traveled via Carleton Junction to Brockville on orders issued by the agents appointed after each station had been established behind the scene of operations. These exchange orders were seldom fully routed and Mr. Dockrill thus controlled heavy business which he, in competition with G.T.R., directed round the horn via ferry and Morristown, N.Y., thence Utica & Black River Railway, an abbreviated but prolific “feeder” to “Canada Southern” through St. Thomas and “L.S. & M.S.” by the way of Buffalo.

In 1881 rumors of consolidation of existing railway systems in Ontario were bruited about by those “in the know” and the steady, westward extension of the “C.P.R.” sowed uneasiness where the interests via “Chicago-St. Paul Route” were cherished. August 11th and 12th, 1882, witnessed the amalgamation of “Great Western” and “Grand Trunk.” William Edgar then was “G.P.A.” at Hamilton and Mr. Geo. T. Bell, present Passenger Traffic Manager, Grand Trunk Railway System, made stenographic hooks and crooks for him.

November 2nd, 1885, marked an epoch in the annals of the prairie provinces. Although previously used for transportation of troops, it was the date when Canadian Pacific Railway equipment first rolled into Winnipeg under a schedule. The event was fraught with much import to Manitoba and forged an item of significance in the history of the Dominion. The national character of Van Horne’s project and the prestige of the sponsors of this great pioneer, western Canadian line attracted to it the major portion of freight traffic which had been moving via other channels, and by demanding the privilege of preferential passenger rates, based on newness, geographical position and inaccessibility, the patronage of the “Homeseeker” was diverted, practically en masse, from United States lines which had enjoyed the pickings unmolested for eight years. This reversal of conditions left not even all the “Dakota” business to the latter, and with a single exception, the Chicago-St. Paul and allied systems, one by one, abolished Canadian agencies and withdrew their representatives from active participation in the chase.

Then it was that General Passenger Agents Carpenter, Charlton, St. John, Stennett and Barnes, in the seats of the mighty at Chicago and St. Paul, felt a temporary modification of interest in Canadian passenger affairs. Geo. Barnes afterwards resigned from the Northern Pacific Ry, entering commercial life as a piano manufacturer, and, I believe, made a fortune.

These changes, however, did not impair the business relations then budding between “U.S.” merchants and Canadian importers, and the railroads of the neighboring republic realized that it behooved them to look jealously after their individual share of lumber, broom corn and cotton goods from the Southwest, seeds, citrus and deciduous fruits from California, tinned salmon and shingles from the North Pacific Coast and consignments of matting, silks, bamboo, rice, etc., disembarked along Puget Sound.

The man in the street might puzzle over the price of his breakfast orange if he reflected that some days 20 carloads of this marmalade fruit now and then gluts the local markets at Montreal and Toronto.

A certain percentage of such incoming cars, after unloading, are returned laden with hides to Milwaukee’s greatest tannery, clay, cordage, fish, lumber and sand; pedigreed sheep for Idaho and Oregon ranchmen, hair for San Francisco plasterers, gums, glass, nuts, salt, and tinplate from Atlantic Coast wharves; also with ton upon ton of coveted Canadian woodpulp which reappears as the basis for newspaper headlines.

Historians of railroad progress chronicled continued extension until the ramifications of the “G.T.R.” and subsidiary properties, gradually gridironed the Province of Ontario with a network of branches, despite obstacles, not always anticipated. A most deplorable happening, and severe financial setback, was the accident which occurred on February 27th, 1889. In the evening of that date “G.T.R.” eastbound express, No. 55, en route Hamilton in charge of conductor Dan Revells, crashed through a bridge at St. George, snuffing out the lives and injuring more than two score passengers. Mr. J. A. Richardson, widely known as Canadian Passenger Agent, Wabash Railroad, and a veteran business getter, had, under pressure on the part of friends, left his train at London. The seat he vacated there was taken by William Wemp, Immigration Agent of “C.M. & St. P.R.” Poor Wemp was numbered among the killed. This proved to be the worst Canadian railroad disaster since March 12th, 1857, when sixty people died in the Des Jardins Canal wreck.

From 1891 to 1898 seven lean years spread stagnation and hard times abroad in the land, discouraging operations of “U.S.” corporations in Canada, but 1900 beheld a restored confidence pulsating the arteries of trade. British Columbia felt the stimulus, the optimistic Northwest clamored for improved transportation facilities, while J. J. Hill surveyed from afar the possibilities in duplicating portions, at least, of “C.P.R.” Later, his policy got the wedge’s thin end into “Kootenai” and Vancouver, which quickly resulted in heavier tonnage prospects from Ontario and Quebec for his trains. Canadian Northern Railway activity in Manitoba followed by the deal that province’s government entered into with President Mellen of Northern Pacific Railway, threw open a previously restricted area giving United States lines to the south larger opportunities and scope, which compelled their attention once more.

The complexion of things had undergone a change in twenty-five years and the traffic the returning “American” railroads now seek and appreciate comprises not only settler’s outfit and pressing needs, but everything from a car of seaweed to a circus train and the variety runs the gamut of raw and manufactured products. Your westerner unconsciously imbibes large ideas with the unpolluted ozone of the boundless prairies. He courts sleep in a metal bed from Ontario, bathes in a porcelain-lined tub and eats well. If he has them, he freely parts with his ducats for carloads of biscuits, butter, bacon and eggs; cheese, flour, canned vegetables, condensed milk, syrups, marmalades and sweets which come from the east. Recently a train of cars containing John Barleycorn’s headache provoker flaunted boldly across the horizon heading due west to the opulent personage who imports his pianos and autos in big lots regularly. Mark you, more than 200 carloads of “Niagara” grown grapes, peaches and mixed fruit roll out to the blooming prairie every season over bridge and ferry and into the tunnel’s insatiable maw at Sarnia.

The substantial growth of Winnipeg, Portage la Prairie, Brandon, Regina, Calgary, Edmonton and Pacific Coast cities, and the mushroom proclivities of many a lesser burg, has given a marked impetus to the spirit of competition in manufacturing and railway circles. In the face of an exaggerated propaganda about bounding difficulties, and the like, and a strong but diminishing pro-Canadian sentiment, the men behind the gun annually dispatch and receive by way of Rouse’s Point, Suspension Bridge, Port Huron, The Sault, etc., merchandise worth thousands of dollars which our cousins eagerly solicit, working for the haul in conjunction with Canadian railway lines. Eight hundred carloads a year would be, according to some men’s estimate, a modest shewing, but, after all, conditions considered, it is a tidy, “found” business in and out of Canada for an individual “U.S.” line to secure or relinquish. I have known a single railroad’s catch in Ontario to exceed, on several occasions, three hundred carloads a month, 95 per cent. of this tonnage going to Manitoba and British Columbia destinations, the fresh fruit receiving exceptional attention and other commodities making scheduled runs to Winnipeg well within five days, and to Vancouver in twelve days’ time. It is estimated that via the various avenues between the two nations, from Coast to Coast, two carloads of freight a minute pass into the republic to the south as a result of the crusade of its railroad corporations.

In more than one tight pinch “U.S.” railways have come to the fore, furnishing an expeditious alternative when shipper and consignee have been stewing over congested yards, crippled motive power, notorious scarcity of cars, strike and snow disadvantages which trouble every line sooner or later and which are not unknown to the men piloting the Canadian railway interests to success.

Twenty-two foreign railroads, nine operating in the east and central States, and thirteen western companies, each maintain one to six passenger and commercial offices in this country. Affairs pertaining thereto are supervised by Canadian Agents, Division, General and Travelling Agents, Contracting Representatives, Solicitors, City Canvassers and Counter Clerks. The combined staff numbers 100 men. With few exceptions, they are natives of the soil; familiar with local conditions, and are liberal dispensers of a good deal of salary, rentals, incidental expense monies and sunshine. AIn rounding up traffic the tactics which obtain include direct solicitation with shipper, consignee and traveller; the assiduous cultivation of the man who pays the freight or buys the tickets, and canvass of stationary railway agents, whose judgment often dictates via what junctions and lines unrouted shipments, and passengers without pre-arranged itinerary, should be routed. Prompt dispatch and trains “on time” are cardinal requisites in luring trade and holding a continuance of favor. The personality and perseverance of the foreign road agent has an important bearing on results. Changeable climatic conditions divert certain commodities and influence the warm zone hunter from one channel to another. Warehouse and track facilities play a part in the scheme of convenience, and that indefinite quantity, sentiment, colors calculations, though shifty as smoke. Unsettled claims occasionally rile the temper and switch a lot of business to the lynx-eyed competitor who watches while he works. Friendly, but contending factions, lock horns for the haul of a single carload. San Francisco and Vancouver agents, acting in concert with their confreres at Winnipeg, Halifax or Hamilton, keep the wires sizzling. Perhaps, some of the “big wigs” put a finger in the pie, and to score a point, resort to every permissable ruse save, let us hope, that dishonorable weapon, the bogus telegram.