convincing and his personal prestige and lucid exposition of routes,
rates and accommodation ensured regular renewal of patronage from
individual travelers and professional ticketing agents from Halifax
to the Detroit River. When he was in his prime--genial, popular and
as strong as a gladiator--he participated in many exciting episodes
of personal character and incidents arising out of the unsettled
conditions governing travel, ticket scalping, rate cutting and
commissions on sales. He described to me how, on one occasion the
“Wabash”, “C.B. & Q.R.”, “C. & N.W.R.” and “C.R.I. & P.” made an
agreement lasting for a limited period, whereby they pooled their
entire passenger business ticketed through Chicago, Omaha and
westward, each receiving an equal monthly division irrespective of the
percentage handled individually. While this understanding was extant
his employers, the “C.M. & St. P.R.”, opened their line from Chicago
to Council Bluffs, Nebraska, and requested admission to the charmed
circle. The quartette black-balled the new candidate and he, through
the medium of increased commissions broke the cabal and the status quo
shot as high as a captive balloon with feverish excitement. In 1885 one
Quebec agent received for commissions on passenger business from the
incoming ships destined the west, a cheque for one month’s bookings
amounting to $750.00.
Like the late Robert Lewis, long connected with the Lehigh Valley
Railroad, who years ago fished in the wilds of Northern Muskoka and
beyond, Andrew Taylor was a devoted follower of the sport of Isaac
Walton. His regular journeys and explorations in the regions of
fish and game were to him anticipated fixtures and the source of
much pleasure and benefit. He visited many haunts in his time, was
considered an authority on ways and means to fill a creel and color a
“meerchaum”. Like Theodore Roosevelt, he “dee-lighted” to handle a gun
and was better than the average as a wing shot.
Passionately fond of outdoor life, with him originated the plan for
a permanent headquarters in the woods, and aided by his associates
Messrs. B. H. Bennett, J. J. Rose, P. G. Van Vleet and Jack Goodsell,
the well equipped lodge of the incorporated Red Chalk Fishing and
Game Club, six miles south of Bigwin Island in Lake of Bays, was
established in Northern Muskoka, with Andrew Taylor charter president,
honorary life member and pater familias of a sociable brood of thirty
sportsmen.
Having been an ex-president of the Victoria Lawn Bowling & Skating
Club and the Western Bowling Association, London, his office was the
rendezvous of curlers and bowling committees as well as fellow members
of the Toronto Lacrosse & Athletic Club.
Few of his friends had more intimate opportunities to realize his
characteristics than myself and one must labor beside a person to
obtain the true perspective. The antithesis of what men describe as
a “fourflusher”, he could not stoop to conquer by unfair means, but
was punctilious in observing the code, in the propriety of personal
behaviour, in the composition of a sentence. Although endowed with
Scottish caution, in many ways he was not secretive but almost boyishly
candid and uniformly courteous, patient and generous to a fault. The
confidante of his father, the adviser to a score of relatives, idolized
by his family, A. J. Taylor’s confreres valued his friendship and
regarded their intimacy with him as a golden opportunity.
* * * * *
[Illustration: Half the membership of the Red Chalk Fishing and Game
Club, Muskoka.
Central Quartette--
P. G. VAN VLEET Publisher, Toronto.
The late A. J. TAYLOR C.F. & P.A., C.M. & St. P.R.
B. H. BENNETT G.A., C. & N.W.R.
J. J. ROSE G.A., Union Pacific Railway.
Reading from left to right from top centre of circle--
CAPTAIN E. FREMLIN Paymaster, 34th Batt., C.E.F.
DOUGALS A. MACARTHUR Toronto-Port Hope Sanitary Co.
WILLIAM JACKSON Pres., Jackson Mfg. Co., Clinton, Ont.
F. H. TERRY T.A., G.N.R., Toronto.
F. A. NANCEKIVELL Traffic Manager, Ford Motor Co.
GEO. BARNES G.A., N.P.R., Detroit, Mich.
L. MACDONALD D.F.A., G.T.R., Toronto.
H. E. WATKINS G.E.C.A., G.N.R., Toronto.
C. E. HORNING D.P.A., G.T.R., Toronto.
J. O. GOODSELL A.G.P.A., U.P.R., Kansas City, Mo.
R. J. KEARNS New York Life Company, Toronto.
W. D. WILSON Wilson, Lytle, Badgerow Co., Tor.
]
BY-WATER MAGAZINE
Business Getter’s Competition Prize Winning Essay
Eighty per cent. of new business secured--after eliminating the
advantageous influence of good advertising well placed--results not
from unusual happenings or quasi-romantic incidents. It originates in
pressing industrial expansion and broad education, it flows through
modern channels, and along those thorny, old-fashioned highways of
endeavor such as persistent, methodical solicitation of passenger
and freight traffic, a conscientious interest in its handling and
disposition after acceptance, and above all depends upon the good will
and very essential aid of each one of that many sided army employed by
the transportation corporations whose arteries provide the means for
commercial life’s activities.
Assuming that you desire to introduce or further exploit a worthy
service and route, publicity should be the first vital consideration.
In this propaganda who can better assist you to reach the world and his
wife than the rank and file, than those men and youths of high and low
degree whom you meet when you occasionally call and who, during your
absence, are always in immediate contact with buyers and the stream of
enquiring public, alert and receptive, like a big league star playing
close to the third sack.
It has been, let us suppose, a regrettable necessity that prevented
officials from organizing the present desultory practice into a system
of at least three meetings a year when separated railway employees
and their superiors could meet and discuss subjects pertaining to
the relations existing between the company and its patrons. At such
anticipated and informal conventions every one present is urged to
express opinions. Traffic matters are viewed from different angles,
the solitary agent who thinks himself and agency discriminated
against, learns the larger reason for local inconvenience, outside
representatives obtain a “close up” inspection of the chiefs in action
and the plan, as a fixture, would become a sound, progressive measure
as well as a distinctive advantage to the _esprit de corps_ of any
transportation company’s staff.
Man is a gregarious, sociable “critter”, fond of exchanging “idears”,
an impressionable, flesh and blood individual quite like yourself, who
easily responds to straightforward, properly timed overtures of the
railway and steamship traveling fraternity, ever willing to concede
you an “even break”, or better, if merited. Collectively they are
the Central News Bureau in your line, diplomatically safeguarding
your reasonable expectations. More prospects come to light, more
new business is secured and resolved into renewals through the
agency of ticket sellers and traffic men by the gradual ingratiating
of personality than via any of the other mediums. An indiscreet,
pugnacious official who, for instance, soberly declares that only his
company’s wall map embodies all the virtues invites ridicule and gets
it.
Collaborate and hobnob with the nabob in the inner railway or warehouse
sanctum sanctorum, and the next man down, if you will: they deserve
that deference and “were poor once themselves”, but do not always
flock with the headquarters staff and entirely overlook the other boys,
nor the understudy to the traffic manager of those firms controlling
ten cars per week or ten cases a month. They see and hear unthought
of items of interest and possess long memories. Cultivate your
recollection of faces and names, for to-morrow or next season a clerk
may gravitate to “Depot or City Ticket Agent” and opportunity, with
passengers leaving to his guidance and judgment “What route should we
take” and it is to his address that advertising points the finger.
A few companies endeavor to arrange the time and transportation which
enables certain city ticket agents to journey over the main line of
their property for educative reasons, but the experienced assistants
are too infrequently included, are seldom sent on an excursion into
outside territory, and never attend a ticket agents’ association
meeting, and yet, the nature of their duties implies ability to
promptly and accurately answer innumerable questions regarding junction
connections, baggage transfer, location of foreign line depots, dining
and sleeping facilities as well as geographical peculiarities. Books
there are that print some of this information, but often the enquirer
departs disappointed without exact details, but to the men who have
been over the ground with eyes open, it is decidedly satisfying to be
able to intelligently submit the facts and note how your statements
carry conviction and impress the recipient. Of all people needing the
experience of travel, the ticketing agent who directs others on their
journeys should be first to possess that advantage.
Dispensing to these gentlemen few promises and religiously observing
those is a strong undercurrent in shaping your course. Unfailing
attention to reservation requests, prompt news of the whereabouts of
specific shipments, and early notification of upward tariff revisals,
&c., &c., are assets that help forge a friendship out of which springs
new business, which a “fourflusher” or thoughtless one is prone to
overlook after his final handshake. “O consistency, thou art a jewel.”
In circles where the weed is so popular, the “eternal cigar” is
good-naturedly accepted only as a lubricant to the wheels of
conversation, but in the name of all that is gloomy and peculiar do
not insult the intelligence of some captain of industry, or “regular
fellow”, by flashing on him the moment you enter The Presence, what
seems like a transparent bribe in the form of a cheroot a few degrees
better than the “Bartender’s Revenge”. Many of them indulge a weakness
for more delicate fragrance at Half a Dollar for three or two. Because
such a contretemps was studiously avoided by the writer several years
ago, a prominent Hamilton, Canada, merchant--then patronizing a
competitor--gave “our route” a dozen cars of eastbound California fruit
and explained why.
Few transportation people are so sinuous and adept as to be “all things
to all men” without “trimming” and loss of self-respect, where one
representative is quite _au fait_ with the powers that be, another will
make indifferent headway, but you may note in your log book that these
observations outline some practices which will retain old acquaintances
and secure a fair measure of new business.
[Illustration: BELLEVILLE’S CONTRIBUTION TO TRANSPORTATION
An exceptional record in this field of endeavor
1. W. B. BAMFORD, District Freight Agent, Canadian Pacific
Railway, Toronto, Ont.
2. H. E. BEASLEY, General Superintendent, Esquimalt & Nainamo
Railway, Victoria, B.C.
3. JOHN BELL, (the late), General Counsel, Grand Trunk Railway,
Montreal.
4. W. H. BIGGAR, Vice-President and General Counsel, G.T.R.,
Montreal.
5. W. E. BURKE, Assistant Manager, Canada Steamship Lines,
Toronto, Ont.
6. A. B. CHOWN, Traveling Passenger Agent, Grand Trunk Railway,
Pittsburg.
7. J. M. COPELAND, T.F. & P.A., Chicago & Northwestern Railway,
Toronto. R. J. COTTRELL, Locomotive Foreman, Grand Trunk
Railway, St. Thomas, Ont.
8. W. P. DEMPSEY, T.F. & P.A., Chicago & Northwestern Railway,
Detroit. E. DONALD, Land and Tax Commissioner, Grand Trunk
Railway, Montreal.
9. W. J. DUCKWORTH, Superintendent of Construction, G.N.W.
Telegraph Co., Toronto. J. H. ELLIS, Secretary, Louisville &
Nashville Railway, Louisville, Ky.
10. W. E. FOSTER, K.C., Solicitor for Ontario, Grand Trunk
Railway, Montreal.
11. JOHN A. GRIER, (the late), G.F.A., M.C.R., also General
Manager, Hoosac Tunnel Line, Chicago.
12. R. HAY, C.P. & T.A., Canadian Northern Railway, Vancouver,
B.C.
12. J. HAY, Locomotive Foreman, Grand Trunk Railway, Sarnia, Ont.
12. D. J. HAY, Former Air Brake Inspector, Grand Trunk Railway,
Stratford, Ont.
13. E. W. HOLTON, General Passenger Agent, Northern Navigation
Co., Sarnia, Ont. R. IVERS, (the late), Locomotive Foreman,
Grand Trunk Railway, London, Ont. H. R. KELLY, Superintendent,
Canadian Northern Railway, Capreol, Ont.
14. W. H. KENNEDY, Master Mechanic, Grand Trunk Railway,
Toronto--Fighting for us in France. T. W. R. MCRAE, Claims
Agent, Grand Trunk Railway, Montreal, Que.
15. R. B. MOODIE, (the late), General Agent, Intercolonial
Railway, Toronto.
16. F. H. PHIPPEN, K.C., General Counsel, Canadian Northern
Railway, Toronto.
17. GEO. H. POPE, (the late), Right of Way Commissioner, Grand
Trunk Pacific Railway.
18. W. W. POPE, Secretary Hydro Commission--former Assistant
to General Counsel, G.T.R. J. P. PRATT, Assistant to General
Counsel, Grand Trunk Railway, Montreal.
19. W. D. ROBB, Vice-President, Grand Trunk Railway System,
Montreal, Que.
20. W. ROBERTSON, Former M.S., G.T.R., Maker of Robertson Cinder
Conveyor, Chicago. T. WATERSON, Chief Clerk to General Counsel,
Grand Trunk Railway.
The tribute on the following page is inspired by the charm and beauty
of the bay where Belleville’s absent sons sailed, skated, fished and
swam.]
LINES TO QUEEN QUINTE
Green are the hills when far away,
And Youth in leash craves Manhood’s sway:
Placid the waters that wash the sands,
The sky is blue o’er distant lands.
Yet phantom castles--springtime dreams,
Dissolve like foam on woodland streams,
As Fancy--chastened by breath of Time,
Reasons in prose and not in rhyme:
Yearning ceases--behold at home
The glories pictured by they who roam.
Rimmed with vesture of verdant green,
Basks Quinte Bay--perennial queen:
Matron--a seer--she spans full years
Of promise, hardship, wreckage, tears.
From pre-historic days of yore
Her scroll is writ with mystic lore.
O’er her breast stole birchen craft
Burdened with Redskin, bows and shaft;
Swiftly stalking widgeon and deer
Or Paleface tiller settled near.
Champlain and Franklin sensed her spell,
As did good priest with book and bell.
Soldier, trapper and creaking stage
Have seen Dame Quinte lashed in rage,
But seldom doth she portend ill,
Her mood is tranquil, coaxing, still.
Who hath not felt her soft caress,
Limpid, seductive as maiden’s tress,
Who hath skimmed her foaming crest
With spreading sheet at her behest,
And doth not sing throughout his days
Of this real gem amongst the bays.
Ensconced in a setting of green and gold,
She is ever young to young and old:
Could her waters speak as they flow along,
“Forget me not” would be their song.
THE CANADIAN NORTHERN RAILWAY SYSTEM
[Illustration: SIR WILLIAM MACKENZIE,
President, Canadian Northern Railway System.]
With her feeders and tributaries tapping the distant, beautiful
valleys of historic Arcadia and a trunk line that ensures a through
fast freight service from ancient Quebec--an ideal gateway for men
who go down to the sea in ships--the second steel highway in Canada’s
transcontinental trio stretches hundreds of miles far and away through
rolling uplands, untouched forests and waving wheat fields to Burrard
Inlet and flourishing Vancouver, a busy maritime mart and door to the
placid Pacific.
Built or purchased and gradually assembled by Sir William Mackenzie and
Sir Donald Mann, the capitalization of the Canadian Northern Railway
System, which will be taken over by the Government of the Dominion of
Canada, has been reckoned at approximately $43,000 per mile for 10,000
miles of railway actually under operation, and during the arbitration
proceedings at Osgoode Hall, Toronto, Mr. Pierce Butler, St. Paul,
Minn., counsel speaking in behalf of his clients, stated that the
railway was now on a basis of $50,000,000 gross earnings a year.
Previous to the declaration of war the “C.N.R.” was financed mainly
by British capitalists whose intentions, apart from expected profit,
were to directly increase the yield and transportation facilities for
wheat against the possibilities of war, having in mind how far below
consumption was their own production of the fundamental food.
In 1896 the Manitoba Legislature passed a charter, with land grants,
providing for the construction of the Lake Manitoba Railway & Canal
Company, which was not taken advantage of until 1899, when Messrs.
Mackenzie and Mann purchased and commenced construction from Gladstone,
Manitoba, to Winnipegosis, Manitoba, 123 miles, and operation was
inaugurated January 3rd, 1897.
Construction was started the same year on the Manitoba & Southeastern
Railway from Winnipeg to the Great Lakes, and in November, 1898, 45
miles of it were operated, St. Boniface to Marchand.
The Northern Pacific Railway lines in Manitoba were acquired in 1901,
and in the same year the thin edge of the wedge was inserted in Ontario
when Parry Sound rejoiced over its first railway connection with the
outside--a 3.3 mile spur to a Canada Atlantic Railway junction.
[Illustration: SIR DONALD MANN,
Vice-President, Canadian Northern Railway System.]
In 1911 the track-end had reached the foot-hills of the Rockies and
engineers declare the C.N.R.’s low elevation at the Yellow Head Pass,
and where its line later decends to the sea by the valleys of the
Thompson and Fraser Rivers through the Cascade Range, locates the track
only a few feet above tidewater of the Pacific Ocean.
At one point on the “C.N.R.” mountain division the track is only 4½
miles from the base of Mount Robson--altitude 13,068 feet--the highest
peak in the Rocky Mountains.
With the completion of the “C.N.R.” central Montreal terminal, near
Dominion Square, which is approached by a 3.3 mile double tracked
tunnel beneath Mount Royal, the Directorate will have an exceptional
advantage in being able to move solid trains from west to east without
backing down from dead-end tracks or breaking up their train formation.
The “C.N.R.” serves urban centres having more than 1,000 population
containing 90% of the population of the towns and cities of Alberta and
97% of Saskatchewan, the centre of the wheat belt.
If the system should be extended to connect Toronto with Hamilton it
would then have access to cities and towns aggregating 60% of the town
dwellers of the entire provinces, which also produce 70% of their total
manufactured products.
In 1916 the “C.N.R.” carried 132,000,000 bushels of grain: if reduced
to flour and the manufactured flour which it transported be added
thereto, the foodstuffs from territory along the “C.N.R.” would be
sufficient to supply the British Isles’ 45,000,000 population with
four pounds of bread each per week for six months. The “C.N.R.” should
therefore, be regarded, especially since the advent of war, as an
essential to the life of the Empire.
Statistics go to show that in the Provinces of Ontario, Quebec and Nova
Scotia, where the principal Canadian pulp and paper mills are situated,
those of the greatest capacity--or 53% of the total capacity--are
situated exclusively on “C.N.R.” lines.
[Illustration: D. B. HANNA,
Third Vice-President, Canadian Northern Railway System.]
For the year that ended with July, 1916, the exports of paper amounted
to $21,680,000 of which 88% went to the United States, and the total
exports of pulpwood, pulp and paper for that year were valued at
$40,865,266. United States consumers gladly took 87% of this immense
output, but the United Kingdom received only 6%.
During 1917, 85,000,000 feet of British Columbia lumber, in 3,850 cars,
were handled by “C.N.R.” to the Prairie Provinces and Eastern Canada.
Balsam and Douglas fir, red cedar, spruce, hemlock, &c., predominated.
Silver spruce for aeroplanes came also, and as a result of the efforts
of the Imperial Munitions Board the output of the latter has been
recently doubled, the monthly production at present being approximately
1,200,000 feet.
Mr. W. H. Moore, Secretary of “C.N.R.”, in “Railway Nationalization and
the Average Citizen”, makes some clear and terse comparisons of deep
interest to the public spirited tax-payer anent the government’s aid
given in cash, land and guaranteed bonds to “C.N.R.”, and subsidiary
properties, and also to other Canadian railways, especially the
Canadian Pacific Railway. He sets down that the “C.N.R.” received from
federal, provincial and municipal coffers.--
Land Acres $ 6,555,708
Cash subsidies 38,874,148
Guarantees by governments 211,641,140
Federal loans 25,858,166
In rebuttal, the Government Bureau of Railway Statistics tabulates--
To “C.P.R.”, land Acres $ 28,023,185
Cash aid to “C.P.R.” 108,920,375
Loans from Dominion Government (paid back) 40,000,000
The Dominion Government’s Board of Arbitrators--Sir William Meredith,
Chief Justice Harris and Wallace Nesbitt, K.C.,--which submitted a
report as to the value of 600,000 shares of Canadian Northern Railway
common stock, consumed 50 days from March to the middle of May in
hearing the testimony of legal counsel and valuation experts, the
proceedings totalling over 1,500,000 words of evidence and costing
about $100,000.
[Illustration: F. H. PHIPPEN,
General Counsel, Canadian Northern Railway System.]
The Board’s award of $10,800,000 for the railway stock valuated,
exceeded by $800,000 the limit for same made by Act of Parliament,
which was $10,000,000.
Each group of participating principals paid its own costs, but the
Government bore the cost of taking the evidence.
The Dominion Government is perfecting a plan whereby the “C.N.R.” will
be operated as a corporation under a board of directors to be appointed
by the Government. Time will tell if this method reaches fruition.
The total liabilities being taken over by the Government in connection
with the “C.N.R.” are $438,264,377.67 and the assets sum up to
$528,437,885.74.
Speaking for himself and also voicing the views of Sir Donald Mann
and Third Vice-President D. B. Hanna, Sir William Mackenzie contended
that the “C.N.R.” was destined to be an essential factor in the
expansion of this country and that in the opinion of the transportation
experts who had examined the situation, their properties would be
particularly useful in the reconstruction days on which this land
must soon enter. He said his associates had devoted the best of their
years in developing the system to the present state of efficiency and
confidently relied on the future to justify their work and estimates of
values.
❦ ❦ ❦
As anticipated, since this resume was set in type, the
Government of the Dominion of Canada has assumed control of the
Canadian Northern Railway and operation of the system will at
once be undertaken by a board of eight representative gentlemen
with a practical and experienced railroader, Mr. D. B. Hanna,
as President, who will have associated with him
Graham A. Bell, Major, Deputy Minister of Railways
A. J. Mitchell, Ottawa
E. R. Wood, Toronto, Capitalist
Robert Hobson, Hamilton, Ironmaster
Frank P. Jones, Montreal, Manager Canada Cement Company
A. T. Riley, Winnipeg, Financier
C. M. Hamilton, Weyburn, Sask., Agriculturist
A TENDERFOOT IN TEMISKAMING
And the silent places beyond awaiting the iron horse
[Illustration: River Drivers on the Montreal River, Temiskaming,
Northern Ontario.]
Marketing the jubilant flag pole and Christmas tree is a comparatively
unhackneyed commercial twist not overdone and if discontented dwellers
in old Ontario, seigneurial Quebec or the world at large, like that
prospect or court a change from brick and asphalt to the silent places,
opportunity beckons to them from amidst the serried ranks of raw
material swarming over the hilly, rock-ribbed areas of Temagami, the
dales of Temiskaming and Porcupine’s budding principality of golden
promise.
As the newcomer’s eyes view the sea of tapering masts--shorn of drapery
in winter--and the springtimes’ green undergrowth crowning summits and
slopes, which in that corner of the Canadian hinterland undoubtedly
conceal unconjectured lodes of mineral wealth, his brain tabulates new
and fascinating impressions respecting this vast heritage and pregnant
land of the future.