White River's New Station - 1958

My father saved an article from the CPR Spanner of April 1958 about the new station which had recently been built there. Twenty years later, I would meet one of the workers mentioned in the article.

Until circa 1924, I believe that White River had been the headquarters of the division - that is, where the division superintendent, his administrative staff and the main dispatching office had been. I also believe that physical space limits for more expanded shops and yards, and the periodic flooding of the White River itself, precipitated this change. When I 'came on brake' in Schreiber very briefly in 1977, Schreiber was well-established in its role as the Division Headquarters and it seemed it had always been that way.

from: White River - 100 Years, Pictorial History, 1985, Mary Houston.

My main intention with this post is to pass on and preserve the 1958 article. However, I am including a few other images so readers can understand some of the changes to the station facilities over the years. Mary Houston's wonderful 1985 book - prepared with the help of the people of White River and their photographs - shows the earliest station facilities.

from: White River - 100 Years, Pictorial History, 1985, Mary Houston.

A photograph taken in July 1911 by a CPR civil engineer shows the addition of a second story and of an extended platform and passenger shelter. The Spanner article below adds details about the station's modifications through the years and I have not included all of the station photos in Mary Houston's book. You can imagine Division offices upstairs and dispatchers running a few hundred miles of railway by timetable and through train orders sent by telegraph.

Unused postcard, circa 1955, my collection.

About fifteen years after King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (later, the 'Queen Mother') did a walkabout on White River's platform, a diesel stands ready as a westbound passenger train arrives at the building.

from: Canadian Pacific Railway, Spanner, April 1958, collection of LC Gagnon

The sled on the platform appears in Mary Houston's book.

from: Canadian Pacific Railway, Spanner, April 1958, collection of LC Gagnon

There were only a few eastbound stock cars at the headend of some freights by 1977 and the animals travelled without 'rest' enroute. 

After the running trades, I did a brief internship with Bob Mura on his overnight shifts. He was a great guy and I can imagine him saying with vigour that something was the 'best thing that happened since someone invented the wheel'. A relative of his whom I met on the internet told me that yardmaster Linklater was Bob's father-in law and that the yardmaster's nickname was 'hot cakes'.

On the pegboard behind Bob are 'trains' and cuts of cars. The IBM punch tape representing a given consist, was wrapped around the thumb and pinkie finger to form those 'figure of eight' loops. To 'couple' a local lift, you could run the train tape through an off-line machine, followed by the lift, and have the machine produce a copy in the form of a new one-piece tape. The train tapes were fed through an on-line machine to update the car control folks at the other end of the wire in Montreal.

from: Canadian Pacific Railway, Spanner, April 1958, collection of LC Gagnon

from: Canadian Pacific Railway, Spanner, April 1958, collection of LC Gagnon

I tried, but could not resolve the details of the items within the display cases on the far wall. I think I could see a commemoration of the Royal Tour of 1939, however.

from: Canadian Pacific Railway, Spanner, April 1958, collection of LC Gagnon

Ahem! Mary Houston went to great lengths in her book to prove that this famous thermometer was broken and that the temperature in official records for that day was not quite that cold. 

The 'coldest spot' legend comes from the old days when weather data was sent by telegraph wire and when big city newspapers printed what was available. The modern 'discovery' of the militarily strategic arctic after World War Two cleared up any confusion about the fact that there were colder locations in Canada.

from: Canadian Pacific Railway, Spanner, April 1958, collection of LC Gagnon

In the interest of preserving this piece of history, I 'tuned' the image up as much as I could.

Officials, Running Trades, Operators and Dispatchers

When I went to work in Schreiber in early 1977, I saw it almost at the end of its special status as a 'railway town'.

Years later, I found a book which helps preserve and explain 'the big picture' of life in small towns such as Schreiber and White River - which were railway towns first and foremost, for the better part of a century.

The following pages come from Minetown, Milltown, Railtown - Life in Canadian communities of single industry; Rex A Lucas; 1971; University of Toronto Press.

When doing sociological studies, it is a serious business to maintain confidentiality. In this book, there are no clues suggesting which railways or communities were studied. Of course, personal interview data was also kept in strict confidence.

The author's approach as a sociologist in this book:

.. 'begins with an individual, his hopes, fears, problems, solutions and the habitual associations of his daily round of life. After informal chats or formal interviews with many individuals, the sociologist begins to see persistent patterns, some shared by all, others shared by certain respondents. During the course of the interviews it becomes clear that some respondents think that their problems are personal, unshared, and not understood by others, but other perceptive respondents are aware that many share the same difficulties because they see them as arising from a common source in their place of work, their community, or their nation. The sociologist has the advantage of listening to more people in more communities than any one respondent; this enables him to locate patterns about which many individuals are unaware. The accumulated advantages are even greater if, as in this study, the sociologist is able to undertake all of the interviewing, rather than relegating the work to others.'

'The first patterns for this book were found after interviewing many people in Railtown, Ontario.'

[ ... ]

'These patterns were confirmed in interviews and in questionnaire replies from a much wider range of communities of single industry throughout Canada. It is these common patterns, intrinsic as they are in communities of single industry and with a population of under 30,000, that I have chosen to report here.'

from: The Standard, October 4, 1947, "Big Hill Railroading" collection of LC Gagnon

Power for Pilgrimage Trains, CPR Spanner, Nov 1949, collection of LC Gagnon

New Face on the Time Card (Train 901), CPR Spanner, Jun-Jul 1961, collection of LC Gagnon

'From the cab ot 901, engineer views eastbound passenger train 
during a twilight meet in the rugged woodlands of Northern Ontario.'

New Face on the Time Card (Train 901), CPR Spanner, Jun-Jul 1961, collection of LC Gagnon

'Alex Peers sits at the controls in Moose Jaw despatching office. 
Board shows position of trains on section of main line west of Moose Jaw where installation of Centralized Traffic Control permits train to proceed on signal indications only.'

from: The Standard, October 4, 1947, "Big Hill Railroading" collection of LC Gagnon

Just east of Field BC, an operator hoops up train orders -
one set for each locomotive crew and one for the tailend crew.


Other Categories of Railway Workers

Other Categories of Railway Workers

from: CNR Keeping Track, photo circa 1963

What do the railroaders above have in common with those at Schreiber?

Almost everything.

When I went to work in Schreiber in early 1977, I saw it almost at the end of its special status as a 'railway town'. 

It still had a car shop and some locomotive maintenance capacity. The divisional offices and superintendent were located there. Significant local resource-based industries were served by daily train assignments and this, in turn, required yard switching assignments.

The local offices organized crew assignments - drawing from the east and west pools, and the spareboards. Yard office staff called crews by telephone or in person. Car control functions; payroll; and even colour sense and vision tests were performed locally. Physicals required as a condition of hiring were done in Schreiber. Engineers upset about the way traffic was handled could climb the stairs after their run and have a talk with the train dispatcher responsible.

Schreiber had the 'highest per-capita income in the province of Ontario' - as we were told in the classroom. This was mainly because the running trades employees - long known as 'the aristocrats of labour' - were based in Schreiber.

My brief encounters with clerks, yard office staff, office managers and middle managers - both at Schreiber and White River - are the most fondly remembered. Some of my fellow running trades employees were intolerant of peers of other ethnic origins working with them in the running trades. Some were particularly scornful of any ideas coming from other railway companies.

'If I wanted to clean switches, I would have hired on as a sectionman!' was a quote which went with a 'not my job' refusal to work story - proudly recounted by a running trades employee which I remember being told. 

As Rolly Martin started out as a sectionman (on another! road) and as an ashpitman - not starting as a member of the 'elite' running trades which I had arrived in town to become - he tended to have a little more perspective about the nature of railway work than some of the other characters I had to deal with. 

Division Superintendent Small (a former locomotive engineer) told us we might get laid off, but that we should take temporary work on a maintenance of way gang if that happened - to get 'the big picture' of the railway. 

Years later, I found a book which helps preserve and explain 'the big picture' of life in small towns such as Schreiber and White River - which were railway towns first and foremost, for the better part of a century. 

When doing sociological studies, it is a serious business to maintain confidentiality. In this book, there are no clues suggesting which railways or communities were studied. Of course, personal interview data was also kept in strict confidence.

The following pages come from Minetown, Milltown, Railtown - Life in Canadian communities of single industry; Rex A Lucas; 1971; University of Toronto Press.

The author's approach as a sociologist in this book:

.. 'begins with an individual, his hopes, fears, problems, solutions and the habitual associations of his daily round of life. After informal chats or formal interviews with many individuals, the sociologist begins to see persistent patterns, some shared by all, others shared by certain respondents. During the course of the interviews it becomes clear that some respondents think that their problems are personal, unshared, and not understood by others, but other perceptive respondents are aware that many share the same difficulties because they see them as arising from a common source in their place of work, their community, or their nation. The sociologist has the advantage of listening to more people in more communities than any one respondent; this enables him to locate patterns about which many individuals are unaware. The accumulated advantages are even greater if, as in this study, the sociologist is able to undertake all of the interviewing, rather than relegating the work to others.'

'The first patterns for this book were found after interviewing many people in Railtown, Ontario.'

[ ... ]

'These patterns were confirmed in interviews and in questionnaire replies from a much wider range of communities of single industry throughout Canada. It is these common patterns, intrinsic as they are in communities of single industry and with a population of under 30,000, that I have chosen to report here.' 

The local railway hierarchy begins with:

1. Officials
2. Running Trades
3. Operators and Dispatchers

Dispatchers Paul Pelto and Barlow Howard pose at the new Schreiber Division CTC board in early 1968.
The boards would go live and this 511 mile territory would be operated through them before the end of the year.
from: CPR Spanner, April 1968

Above: 'the changing role of the fireman' ..

A story in the Quebec Chronicle Telegraph from May 10, 1968 gives a few details. It was written almost a decade after steam locomotives were removed from regular service on the CNR and CPR and almost two decades after serious 'dieselization' began.