MHS Centennial Business: Canadian Pacific Railway Company

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Presidents of the CPR

To discuss the history of the CPR and its involvement in our great province, you have to go back to the very decade of Manitoba’s entry into confederation. In 1874, the community of Winnipeg discovered that plans were being drawn for the construction of a transcontinental rail line to run through Selkirk to the north. Immediately, a citizens’ committee was established and a petition was delivered to Ottawa. In true Canadian fashion, debate over the issue lasted for seven years when in 1881, the Canadian Pacific Railway Company was formed and agreed to construct the line through our present provincial capital. This important decision would help pave the way for Winnipeg to become the “hub of commercial activity in the northwest.” For the next 16 months following, immigrants migrated to the city in search of employment and hope causing the population to explode from a few hundred to 14,000. Due to this massive influx, the CPR announced 2,000 new jobs at their shops.

This period was an intensification of the expansion of the mid-1870s on a scale which was unprecedented in Canadian history. For a short time, the sky was the limit. Winnipeg was again “the new Chicago” and speculation drove the prices of lots on Portage Avenue or Main Street above the going rate for similar frontage on Michigan Avenue or State Street in the “Windy City.” Emerson and West Lynne, its long-since devoured twin across the Red, were touted in local and eastern papers as improved versions of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Crystal City, Rapid City, Nelsonville – a long list of metropolises-to-be clamoured for the attention of settlers and received that of speculators. Winnipeg was prompted by the speculation fever to move heaven and earth in order to secure the crossing of the Red River by the new Canadian Pacific Railway.

During this time, construction of the railway was supervised from offices in Winnipeg. Facilities were located near the Point Douglas area of the city. During the early part of the 20^th century, this marshalling yard was one of the largest in the world. It was the centre point of the Dominion, moving material and goods in both directions between eastern and western Canada.

Over the years, this railway company has changed and evolved in many aspects including service lines, modes of transportation and even things as simple as its name. CP Rail System, or CPRS, was changed again to Canadian Pacific Railway Company in 1996. The nature of Manitoba-based railway services have also evolved throughout the 20^th century and beyond, including operations across the nation.

One such evolution was in 1994 when emphasis was focussed on consolidating customer service for all its Canadian operations into a new centre in Winnipeg. At that time, the Canadian Pacific Railway Company was expecting to employ more than 200 people – many of whom would have been transferred from urban centres all across the country. Winnipeg was also the chosen site for the CPR’s headquarters for the “grain team,” its company’s marketing unit for transporting western Canada’s most fundamental commodity.

The Canadian Pacific Railway’s activities and involvement in Manitoba still continue today. its main heavy repair facility is located in Weston yards. Additionally, services such as a diesel shop which is responsible for a large part of CPR’s fleet and the Transcona which welds standard rails into quarter-mile long continuous rails for installation in main line track across the country have been built and maintained.

The railway employs 1000s of Manitobans and spends approximately 2 billion dollars in our province on payroll, provincial taxes, purchases and capital spending. This is in addition to indirect spending generating by business done with Manitoba-based suppliers. It maintains and operates approximately a 2000 km network of line to serve its Manitoba customers and connects them to terminals and major coastal ports throughout the North American continent.

An article in CP Rail News dated 28 August 1974 had this to say about the Canadian Pacific Railway’s involvement in the building of our province: “The diversification of Canadian Pacific operations is well known – but would you believe 50 years in the entertainment business? Winnipeg Beach was where it all started at the turn of the century when CP Rail opened an amusement park, complete with roller coaster, Ferris wheel, merry-go-round and dance hall, among other things – and a rail line to get people there. The company also built a hotel on the site – the Empress – where, in its heyday, picnickers could buy a gallon of beer for 25 cents and the Sunday concert was the social event of the week. There was a 400-foot pier and an 800-foot boardwalk where families strolled up and down in the sun, and friends and lovers did likewise, more or less on moonlight excursions.”

Presidents of the Canadian Pacific Railway:

Term	President
1881-1888	George Stephen (1829-1921)
1888-1899	William Cornelius Van Horne (1843-1915)
1899-1918	Thomas George Shaughnessy (1853-1923)
1918-1942	Edward Wentworth Beatty (1877-1943)
1942-1947	D’alton Corry Coleman (1879-1956)
1947-1948	William M. Neal (1886-?)
1948-1955	William Allan Mather (1885-1961)
1955-1964	Norris Roy “Buck” Crump (1904-1989)
1964-1966	Robert A. Emerson
1966	Norris Roy “Buck” Crump (1904-1989)
1966-1972	Ian David Sinclair (1913-2006)
1972-1981	Fred Burbidge
1981-1990	William Stinson
1990-2006	Robert J. Ritchie
2006-present	Fred Green

An MHS Centennial Business Award was presented to Janet Weiss, General Manager (Grain) of Canadian Pacific Railway Company, by MHS President Steven Place, on 3 April 2004.

See also:

The Background of the Battle of Fort Whyte by James A. Jackson
MHS Transactions, Series 3, 1945-46 Season

Early Manitoba Railroads by Howard W. Winkler
MHS Transactions, Series 3, Number 10, 1953-54 Season

Rails Across the Red - Selkirk or Winnipeg by Ruben C. Bellan
MHS Transactions, Series 3, 1961-62 Season

Railways and the Manitoba School Question by James A. Jackson
MHS Transactions, Series 3, Number 30, 1973-74 Season

John M. Egan, A Railway Officer in Winnipeg, 1882-1886: An Account of Canadian Pacific’s First Years in the Manitoba Capital by Omer Lavallee
MHS Transactions, Series 3, Number 33, 1976-77 Season

The 1883 Locomotive Engineers' Strike in the Canadian North West by David Spector
Manitoba Pageant, Volume 22, Number 1, Winter 1977

The Country Railway Station in Manitoba by Charles W. Bohi and H. Roger Grant
Manitoba Pageant, Volume 23, Number 3, Spring 1978

Review: Glenbow Museum, The Great CPR Exposition: The Impact of the Railway on Western Canada, 1883-1930 by Donald B. Smith
Manitoba History, Number 9, Spring 1985

The Rise and Fall of the Manitoba Railway Garden by Edwinna von Baeyer
Manitoba History, Number 31, Spring 1996

A Fallen Splendour: The Challener Murals of Winnipeg’s Royal Alexandra Hotel by Susan Moffatt Rozniatowski
Manitoba History, Number 42, Autumn/Winter 2001-2002

General Rosser's Legacy by Ken Storie
Manitoba History, Number 56, October 2007

Some CPR workers:

Thomas S. Acheson

James Albert Manning Aikins (1851-1929)

J. Robert Almey (1895-1988)

Adam David Anderson (1890-?)

James Anderson (1847-?)

John Arbuthnot (1861-1931)

Clarence Henry Baird (1882-?)

Walter Reginald Baker (1852-?)

James Alexander Barry (1886-?)

Spencer Argyle Bedford (1851-1933)

Alexander Begg (1840-1897)

Charles Napier Bell (1854-1936)

Frank D. Blakely (1865-1918)

Robert Johnston Blanchard (1853-1928)

Nathaniel Boyd (1853-?)

John Wilson Briggs (1872-?)

Thomas J. Brown (1869-c1925)

Eric Brown-Wilkinson (1888-?)

George Huestis Campbell (1855-1928)

Thomas Cassin (1847-1927)

George Clements (1874-?)

John Wesley Cockburn (1856-1924)

James Colcleugh (1841-1918)

Elias George Conklin (1845-1901)

Robert Crawford (1862-?)

William H. D’Arcy (1861-?)

Humphry Ringler Drummond-Hay (1886-?)

John M. Egan (1848-?)

William Henry Ellis Evanson (1866-?)

Sandford Fleming (1827-1915)

Louis O. Genest (1857-?)

Edward T. Greenway (1877-?)

Frederick Thomas Griffin (1853-1935)

Grant Hall

George Henry Ham (1847-1926)

Aquilla Barber Handscomb (1835-1908)

James Jerome Hill (1838-1916)

Gordon T. Howden (1875-?)

Theodore Alexander Hunt (1871-?)

William Harold Hunt (1884-?)

Edwin Alfred James (1865-?)

Edward W. Jarvis (?-1894)

Benjamin S. Jenkins (1859-?)

Thomas Johnson

Robert Jordan (1856-?)

Richard Kellett (1866-?)

John Kennedy (1867-?)

Edgar Boteler Kenrick (1863-1905)

Omer Lavallee (1925-1992)

Henry Lawson (1861-?)

Thomas Lee (1882-?)

Francis Reginald Longworth (1891-?)

Peter Lowe (1887-?)

Robert Newton Lowery (1882-?)

Manson Ainslie Lyons (1879-?)

John Angus Macdonald (1862-?)

William MacGranachan (1882-?)

Malcolm H. MacLeod (1857-?)

Charles Henry Mansur (1871-?)

George Maxwell (1823-1911)

Henry McGill (1854-?)

Charles Edward Stuart McPherson (1862-?)

John Allan McPherson (1855-?)

John H. McTavish (1837-1888)

Walter Moberly (1832-1915)

Ernest Moorhead (1877-?)

Frederick Leslie Newman (1859-?)

Thomas Nixon (1823-1904)

George Turner Orton (1837-1901)

H. Clare Pentland (1914-1978)

John Thomas Blandell Persse (1861-1927)

Francis White Peters (1860-?)

Ralph Benjamin Pratt (1872-?)

Charles Redpath (1872-?)

William Robinson (1849-1936)

Donald Aynsley Ross (1877-1956)

Israel Merritt Ross (1842-1911)

Thomas Lafayette Rosser (1836-1910)

Charles Millidge Ruttan (1883-?)

Henry Norlande Ruttan (1848-1925)

Frederick Edward Molyneux St. John (1838-1904)

John Edward Schwitzer (1870-1911)

Thomas Clarkson Scoble (1840-1900)

John James Scully (1872-?)

Maurice Macdonald Seymour (1857-?)

John Wright Sifton (1833-1912)

George A. Simpson (1843-1905)

Donald A. Smith (1820-1914)

Albert Robert “Ginger” Snook (1835-1926)

Samuel Benfield Steele (1849-1919)

George Stephen (1876-?)

Donald Alexander Stewart (1852-1897)

Alpheus Beede Stickney (1840-1916)

R. Rennie Swan (1876-?)

Donald McLeod Telford (1845-?)

Ronald Wesley Tuckwell (1890-?)

William C. Van Horne (1843-1915)

John V. Vopni (1872-1964)

Charles Whitehead (1836-1919)

Joseph Whitehead (1814-1894)

William Whyte (1843-1914)

This gallery was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.

Page revised: 15 May 2011