the work. “How long do you think it would take to build the cursed thing?” he asked. I guessed about twelve or fourteen months. That settled it. He was not there to build fool tunnels to please a lot of engineers. So, perfectly satisfied that the matter was settled and done with, he whirled around to his desk and went on with something else, simply remarking, “Mind you go up there yourself and a take that d–d tunnel out. Don’t send anybody else.”
I asked for the profile, and when I reached the door, paused for a minute and said, “While I’m up there hadn’t I better move some of the mountains back as I think they are too close to the river.” The “old man” looked up for a second, said nothing, but I could see the generous proportions of his corporation shaking like a jelly. He was convulsed with laughter.
The prairie section of the CPR was not, as is so often thought, built across only flat plains. Its route also included low rolling hills that presented many obstacles to laying a well-graded railway line. These challenges, though, were nothing compared to those that had to be met laying track through the mountains of British Columbia and across the Canadian Shield. Van Horne’s mettle and managerial genius were tested as never before in 1884 and 1885, the years in which the railway was pushed further in both these areas, to the west and the east.
Construction in mountainous British Columbia was especially challenging, for it was here that the most difficult terrain and weather along the entire CPR route were encountered. The seven-hundred-mile prairie section that lay between the Assiniboine River at Brandon, Manitoba, and the Elbow River at Calgary had required only one major structure — the South Saskatchewan Bridge at Medicine Hat. By contrast, the mountain line required many bridges, tunnels, and snow sheds, usually on the flanks of steep granite mountains pierced by deep canyons. Before construction in the mountains could be completed, miles of track had to be cut through solid rock and countless rivers had to be crossed, some by iron bridges more than a thousand feet in length and one by a wooden bridge two hundred and eighty-six feet above the water below — the highest bridge in North America. Moreover, fourteen streams had to be diverted from their natural beds by tunnelling them through solid rock.
Describing Van Horne’s intervention in a Rocky Mountain canyon, an unidentified spectator, H.R. Lewis, wrote:
There were men felling trees & men drafting great logs, men building trestles & braces & wooden bulwarks, men laboring to the utmost of their physical powers & men directing their labors, & one man there was, sturdy, plainly dressed & calm of bearing, who directed the directors. He seemed to be everywhere, giving his personal attention to each detail of the work. He found the spots claiming immediate attention & measured accurately with his eyes the speed of the rising waters.
He superintended the unloading of rock brought by puffing engines & assisted with his own hands in placing the heavy blocks of stone. He told the carpenters how to secure the huge wooden braces, the smiths where to fasten their iron clamps & with it all never lost for one moment his cool, authoritative demeanor.
The horrendous construction problems posed by the mountain section frequently led even qualified engineers to disagree among themselves on how certain portions of the line should be built. On these occasions, Van Horne had to act as the final arbitrator on these “grave engineering questions.” The fate of many workers rested on his decisions. Much of this difficult and dangerous toil was done by fifteen thousand Chinese labourers who were brought to British Columbia between 1880 and 1885 to work on the railway. Hundreds of them met their death as they built the line between Vancouver and Calgary, often from exposure in the harsh weather conditions or from being crushed by falling rock or killed by dynamite blasts.
To the east, the difficulties and costs associated with laying track across the six hundred and fifty-seven miles of remote, rugged terrain that lay between Callander and Port Arthur (now Thunder Bay), Ontario, presented a different type of challenge. Van Horne had no illusions about the magnitude of the problems involved in building in this region, particularly along the rocky stretch that hugs the shoreline of Lake Superior, which he himself defined as “two hundred miles of engineering impossibilities.” However, exuding his usual confidence, he added, “But we’ll bridge it.”
The grading and track-laying crews began their work in 1883, starting out from both ends of Lake Superior. On this stretch of the route the crews had to deal with the extremely variable topography, the steep cliffs that descend to the lake, and the general lack of earth with which to construct embankments. Perhaps the greatest challenges were the many swampy muskegs — the crews had to re-lay one stretch of track seven times. There were sinkholes, too — seemingly solid patches of ground that suddenly gave way under the weight of a train, with costly, time-consuming results. And there were landslides — on one occasion a slide swept away a section of track and, with it, thousands of dollars’ worth of steel rails. When the telegram conveying the bad news reached the unflappable Van Horne at this desk in Montreal, he merely lifted his eyebrows and uttered a quiet exclamation.
Construction was also hampered by the total lack of access to the northern shore of Lake Superior except over ice in the winter and by water during the rest of the year. Yet, somehow, steady supplies of the building materials had to get through. To this end, Van Horne ordered the purchase of boats to transport supplies and men to the north shore’s work sites. He also ordered the construction of three twenty-three-hundred-ton steel passenger and cargo steamers. They were launched on Scotland’s Clyde River and sailed across the Atlantic in October 1883. Eventually the boats were based in Owen Sound, where they became a vital link in the first-class immigrant services that the CPR was able to offer from Montreal to the Rockies in the summer.
It was during construction on the north shore that Van Horne imported the first “track-laying” machine to be used in Canada. It was his answer to the difficulties posed by track-laying, especially in challenging areas. A delivery gantry rather than an actual machine, it carried rails forward in troughs along one side of the lead car and ties on the other side.
Referring to Van Horne’s multiple achievements on this stretch of the transcontinental, the authoritative Railway and Shipping World observed in 1900, “It is well to say in passing, that if Van Horne had accomplished nothing else, his victory over the engineering difficulties afforded by the line along Lake Superior’s north shore would give him fame enough for one man.”
Van Horne had to cope not only with the physical challenges that hampered the progress of construction, but also with labour shortages, strikes, and “the demon rum.” In the West, which was under federal jurisdiction, the sale of alcohol was banned. It was not prohibited, however, in Ontario, where enterprising liquor peddlers found an eager market. Heading their list of customers were the toiling navvies, who frequently turned to alcohol for relief from the exhausting work they performed and the extremely primitive conditions under which they lived. Van Horne attempted to dampen rum’s appeal by arranging for the construction crews to be well fed, but this solution was not enough to stave off a chronic liquor problem. All too often drunkenness led to lawlessness and violence, such as the rioting and gunplay that erupted on the north shore in October 1884. It was so serious that authorities summoned a magistrate and some policemen from Toronto to restore order.
Construction of Canadian Pacific’s main transcontinental line showing end of track at year’s end.
Map by Vic Dohar.
Day-to-day problems such as these absorbed much of Van Horne’s attention; but even as he was dealing with these concerns, he was spinning far-reaching plans for the CPR’s future. He was convinced that the railway should strive to become an integrated international transportation company, with ships, grain elevators, hotels, and telegraph lines. And so the visionary Van Horne began to acquire ancillary services even as the main line was still being built. He arranged, for example,
