Elizabeth and I arose at the Ramada Inn and following our Internet duties, she drove to the International House of Pancakes where I had a Belgian Waffle and sausage and Elizabeth had an omelette. For this and the two following days, we used the Canadian Trackside Guide to assist us in finding preserved railway equipment and displays, since neither of us have ever been east of Hope and while we knew of stations, there was much else to see and photograph.
Elizabth drove us both to the station in Agassiz in the District of Kent. After thirteen days of dry weather, this morning was the only rain we encountered on the whole trip. But once we were out of the Fraser Valley, the weather improved.
Canadian Pacific Agassiz station built in 1893. The Agassiz-Harrison Historical Society was first established in 1979 when a group of people interested in forming a historical society were meeting in Harrison Hot Springs - they named the group the Harrison Lake Historical Society. Shortly after the group moved meetings to Agassiz, where most of the members lived. By 1982 the society incorporated as a non-profit organization and the name was changed to the Agassiz-Harrison Historical Society. In the 1980's the society was given a small space in the District of Kent office where they undertook administration, displayed artifacts and ran a mini museum.
In 1985, to prevent the demolition of the old Agassiz station, the Society purchased the building from CPR for $1.00, with the understanding that it was to be moved off the original site. And so the station was moved to the Experimental Farm where it stayed until 2003. This was the time when the District of Kent saw the value in having the Station anchor Pioneer Park, and paid for it to be returned.
It is a flag stop on VIA Rail's Canadian.
A Canadian Pacific speeder.
Canadian Pacific caboose 437319 built by the railway in 1949.
Mid-train helper Canadian National ES44AC 2983, built by General Electric in 2016 on a freight that passed through while we were there. Now we will explore this station.
A History of the Agassiz CPR Station.
On Track to Canada and the Canadian Pacific beaver emblem.
The waiting room bench.
A velocipede built circa 1914.
A station agent's desk.
Canadian Pacific Spans the World map and railway posters.
The company safe and large luggage.
I then drove us to Hope via British Columbia Highway 7.
Canadian National Hope station built in 1916. In 1942, it was often the first stop in the forced removal of over 22,000 Japanese Canadians from the west coast of British Columbia. Nearly 8,000 of these citizens stepped foot on the platform as the Hope CNR station was the connector to the rest of the province and sites of internment that those of Japanese ancestry were unjustly sent to. 2,644 of these citizens were loaded in the back of trucks at the station house to make the 19 km journey to Tashme.
Then in move the 1950's during a royal tour across Canada by train, Queen Elizabeth II stopped at the Hope Station House to greet residents. In 1982, the District of Hope passed Bylaw 633 protecting the Station House as a heritage site. It was moved to its former location in 1984. The building had been vacant for several years when the government gave the parcel of land to the Chawathil First Nation in 2021, who wanted the station moved or demolished. At a cost of $120,000 to $140,000, the 2,567 square foot building was hauled on a trailer in January 2024 to a permanent site at 919 Water Avenue. A $1.8 million restoration will create a museum/visitor centre opening in 2025.
We continued our journey as I drove British Columbia Highway 3 to Princeton.
Canadian Pacific wooden caboose 436714, ex. Princeton and District Chamber of Commerce Tourist Infocenter 1996, nee Canadian Pacific 436714 built by the railway in 1920.
The next stop was in Hedley, where mining was a large industry for most of the 20th century. Gold was found on Nickel Plate mountain in 1898. The ore was rich but it had to be extracted from the host rock by crushing and chemical treatment. By 1903, men were digging the first of 74.5 miles of tunnels into the mountain and building a tramway and a 40 stamp mill. Men climbed the mountain each day to go to work until a second town for 200 people was built on the mountain top. Nickel Plate operated as an underground mine until 1955. The average price of gold over those years had been about $40 per ounce. Houses, rail tracks and the mill machinery were removed. The mine was reopened in 1986 and worked for ten years as an open pit mine.
The Mascot Mine, a rival mine with a dramatic history, dug into the mountainside high above the valley, driving 41.6 miles of tunnels between 1935 and 1949. These mine buildings still cling to the cliff and have been repaired by the Upper Similkameen Indian Band so that visitors may safely explore them.
The Hedley Museum and the Mascot Mine Museum display artifacts and photographs from this era. People have lived in the Similkameen Valley for 7000 years. First Nations people mined and traded ochre and chert. The townsite was built in the middle of Indian land. At its peak in the early 1900's, Hedley and the town on the mountain, had about 1,000 residents, five hotels and all the amenities needed in a frontier mining town. Over the years floods, rock falls and fires have consumed part of the town, but much remains to be explored.
Approximately 86 tons of gold were produced from Hedley's mines between 1904 and 1996.
Hedley one ton ore car 1898 to 1998.
Two one ton ore cars.
Nickel Plate Mine one ton ore car 4205.
Homestead Nickel Plate Mine information card.
The mining car display from the other end.
A frame of a one ton ore car.
The next stop of the day was in Osoyoos.
Canadian Pacific Railway Osoyoos station built in 1944 by the Kettle Valley Railway, a CPR subsidiary and now home of the Lake Osoyoos Sailing Club. This railway section ran 9.3 miles from the Haynes Packing House just south of Oliver to the Osoyoos Co-operative Fruit and Vegetable Growers Packing House where Watermark Beach Resort is located today.
The last spike of the Osoyoos section was driven on December 28, 1944 by pioneer George Fraser. The rail extension responded to population and agricultural growth requiring more efficient access to bring local produce to market. The line transported various goods to Penticton where they were barged to Kelowna and onto the Canadian Pacific Railway. The main cargo consisted of ground crops such as cantaloupes, watermelons, cucumbers, tomatoes and the versatile, mild-flavoured zucca melons, in addition to apples, peaches, pears, plums and cherries. At its peak, as many as 42 refrigerated cars left Osoyoos each day. Steam locomotives were used until the switch to diesel in 1954. Eventually shipping by truck edged out rail as a quicker and more cost-effective means to move products, and the line was last used for freight in 1976. Sailing club members raised the funds to save the station, and in 1983 it was moved north from its original location in the middle of what is now Gyro Park, to its current site.
We enjoyed our visit to Osoyoos station but we had other places to go.
Midway was our next destination along Highway 3. In the 1800's, fur traders, prospectors, and white settlers began moving though this sun-drenched valley. Until then, it had been a traditional hunting ground and place for gathering the medicinal rock rose roots. The United States claimed this area and all of British Columbia north to 54 degrees until the treaty of 1846 set the 49th parallel as the border. But traffic and trade followed the river valleys north and south. When gold was discovered at Rock Creek in 1859, and American miners came swarming into the region, Governor Douglas saw that an east-west route through the interior was vital for maintaining British control. He dispatched an energetic young engineer named Edgar Dewdney who hacked out a four-foot-wide road from Hope to Rock Creek in 1860; then with the discovery of gold at Wild Horse Creek in the Kootenays, Dewdney again tackled the task and pushed the Dewdney Trail on through the Midway Valley in the spring of 1865.
By 1884, Midway had its first resident, a Mr. Henry Nicholson, and by 1889 Louis Eholt owned a thriving ranch on what is now the town site of Midway, known then as the Eholts. A Montreal-based company bought the site for a smelter in 1892, but that plan fell though, and a year later the town site was plotted. The new town's original name, Boundary City, was changed in 1894 to Midway by Capt. R.C. Adams of Montreal (one of the owners of the townsite) as the original name was too similar to the nearby smelter town of Boundary Falls. He is said to have taken the name from the Midway Plaisance at the Chicago’s World Fair of 1893.
There are a number of reasons though that made Midway a suitable name: a) Midway was located approximately midway between Penticton and Marcus, Washington, then its nearest railway point; b) Midway stands somewhere near mid-point on the old Dewdney Trail, from its beginning at Hope to its terminus at Wild Horse Creek, near Fort Steele; c) Midway stands approximately midway between the Rockies and the Pacific; d) in 1895, the first provincial policeman was posted here and in 1897 Canada Customs arrived; e) in 1900, Midway became the western terminus of the Columbia and Western Railway, (a subsidiary of the CPR). A copy of the Midway Advance Newspaper of June 17, 1901 carries advertising for five hotels, a meat market, dry goods store, pharmacy, bakery, wagon and carriage builder, stationery shop, sawmill, and a stagecoach company in the burgeoning little town.
The following decade saw feuding railroad companies, litigation, a series of railroad plans, short-lived railroad ventures, and violence all centered in Midway. In November 1905, a pitched battle with shots fired was waged between CPR workers and a crew of the Vancouver, Victoria, and Eastern Railway (known as the Washington and Great Northern Railway in the US) which was determined to run a line north from Spokane into Midway. Expropriation was granted to the VVE and in 1905 Midway had its second railroad.
On July 5, 1910, the sod was turned on yet another railroad venture – the Kettle Valley Line – to link Midway to the west coast, with Andrew McCulloch as chief engineer. The first eastbound passenger trail left Midway on May 31, 1915; the last passenger train on the Kettle Valley Line passed through Midway on January 17, 1964.
Canadian Pacific Midway station in 1900 which is Mile 0 of the Kettle Valley Railway. This station has not wandered far in its life. As a matter of fact, it has managed to wander a total of 100 feet or so since it was first built 100 feet nearer the railway bed behind it. The railbed remains where it was first put, though it's now a Rail Trail and no longer a railway.
The first railway to arrive in the area was the Columbia & Western, a subsidiary of the CPR. It was an extension of the CPR's line at Castlegar, intended to eventually link to the main line which ran to the coast. This link, known as the Kettle Valley Railway, was finished, finally, in 1915, linking the interior with the coast. The KVR ran from this point 600 km. west to meet the main line at Hope, BC. Built through rugged, mountainous terrain, it was hailed as an engineering landmark when completed.
The line remained in operation until, due to a changing economic climate, the KVR was abandoned and the tracks removed, beginning in 1991. Fortunately for us history buffs, a few far sighted individuals have managed to rescue this station for posterity.
The station was moved here from its original location on the far side of the maple tree, next to the Kettle Valley Railway line, in 1985.
The plaque on the station.
Canadian Pacific Railway bunk house.
A three-wheeled velocipede.
A Canadian Pacific speeder.
10 wheeled 33 gauge made of speeder parts to commemorate the loss of Canadian Pacific 2-8-0 3512 in Slocan Lake on December 31, 1946.
Canadian Pacific caboose 436715, built by the railway in 1920.
The Station House history board.
Canadian Pacific Railway timetable board.
The Kettle Valley Railway National Historic Site plaque.
Elizabeth then drove us to Grand Forks.
Canadian Pacific Grand Forks station built circa 1900. It not only is it one of the few wood framed stations which have survived in the province, but it is also the oldest survivor which has not been relocated. Today the old tracks of the Columbia and Western Railway which run past the station are long gone but the track bed is now the Columbia and Western Rails to Trails trail, which is part of the Trans Canada Trail, the world's longest hiking and biking trail. The station has been designated a heritage railway station by Parks Canada.
At the time it was built, the community of Grand Forks was expanding into a robust distribution and refining centre for Boundary District ore and agricultural produce. The station symbolizes the strategic position of Grand Forks within the Boundary District, the intense rivalry between competing rail lines to obtain the district’s mining business, and the importance of rail transportation to the development of a mining industry in British Columbia's southern interior at the turn of the century. The station is a modest but attractive frame building with decorative "Swiss Chalet" elements, a style common among Columbia and Western stations of the Boundary District in the early 1900's. Grand Forks station is one of the few remaining examples.
The heritage character of the Grand Forks station resides in those features which relate to its original design - on the exterior its simple form, roof shape and finish materials and on the interior remnants of original layout and finish. The heritage value also lies in the visual relationship between the station and its setting.
A Canadian Pacific speeder undercover at the station.
We next made our way to Castlegar.
Canadian Pacific box car 56561, nee Canadian Pacific 49523, built by Eastern Car Company in 1959.
Canadian Pacific caboose 434526, ex. Canadian Pacific work service caboose 420909 2002, nee Canadian Pacifc 43426, built by the railway in 1975.
Canadian Pacific Castlegar station built in 1907, which not only established Castlegar as a cross-roads of transportation in the Kootenays but became the unofficial town center for over 50 years (1902-1958).
In 1887 the CPR completed the rail link between Nelson and Robson – across the Columbia from Castlegar. Paddle wheelers, including the SS Minto, carried goods and passengers between Revelstoke at the head of the Arrow Lakes and Robson. Lead-zinc ore (galena) was barged across the river to West Robson and then shipped by standard gauge Columbia and Western Railway to the smelter in Trail. A little later the CPR bought the existing area railways as a part of the Crow’s Nest Line and linked them with a bridge near Pass Creek. At about the same time a line was built from West Robson to Midway. To accommodate the traffic the bridge and the station were both built and completed in 1902. While the bridge has a swing span to accommodate downstream paddle wheelers, it was used only once.
Built in the wye of the tracks, the station had a second storey with living quarters for the station agent and his family. The first station burned to the ground in the late winter of 1906 as Station Agent Harry Gage and his family escaped with only their night clothes and one mattress in which Mrs. Gage had hidden the family savings. It was immediately replaced by the present station. After almost 100 years it is still one of the best preserved in the province.
In 1987, the Castlegar Heritage Society, a volunteer organization which had already developed Zuckerberg Island Heritage Park, and which had spent years negotiating for the now-empty station, persuaded the City of Castlegar to buy it for one dollar in a last minute deal. Then, using a matching grant from the British Columbia Heritage Trust, the Castlegar Council moved the station from its place in wye westward to city property, forty feet from track center. The Society then leased the station for one dollar a year, and with the cooperation of the CPR, municipal officials, local service clubs, industry and citizens has been restoring it as a transportation museum.
Canadian Pacific speeder 807-65 built by Fairmont, year unknown.
Canadian Pacific speeder 807-64 builder date and year unknown.
The Caboose's Early Uses.
Speeders display board.
A sectionmen's shed once located in Fife, British Columbia, built in 1932.
Sectionmen's shed history board.
Canadian Pacific baggage cart.
Castlegar's First Jailhouse Provincial Police Detachment 1934 to 1959. Elizabeth drove us to A&W Restaurant where we had an excellent meal then I drove us to Nelson, where we stayed at the Best Western Baker Inn for the night.
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