A new series of publications?
Trevor Marshall's query in the previous post (sugar beets) has prompted me to informally poll readers of this blog, the website, and the series of hardcover books on CNR operations during the 1950s in Ontario.
As readers of the books realize, the time is growing short for producing volumes such as Steam at Allandale and its successors. In preparing a 192-page book detailing the intricacies of railway operation more than half a century ago, I depend on living memories of the men who worked on the CNR in the specific territory. Each time I put together a book, it becomes more difficult to recreate those wonderful details of operation which are not otherwise recorded anywhere but in human memory banks. In that regard, I am engaging on a hellbent quest to cover as many CNR division points as possible before the sources are gone. When it comes to portraying railway operations I refuse to speculate--so the possibility of accurately describing such details will disappear forever in the near future (read this Topic for more).
My intention with the present series is to cover the rest of the CNR territory in Ontario. Beyond the Northern Ontario book which will emerge later this year, that only leaves the Toronto and Hamilton areas and the Belleville Division (including the Lindsay area and most of the Toronto-Montreal mainline, possibly broken into two books). The Ottawa area (and anything east of Brockville) was technically part of the Montreal District. Whether or not I get that far is unknown, but it is safe to say that any attempt in the present format will likely not prove fruitful for lack of living sources.
With respect to the previous post, Trevor posed a reasonable request: do I have any more information on operations which I would care to share? My answer at the present time is that no, I don't, beyond what has been published in the books (time and budgetary constraints dictate that I research elements to the degree which is necessary for the publication at hand). However, I would like to do in-depth studies of various industries and traffic patterns over the 1945-59 era in Ontario as they related to CNR, and possibly other resident railway, operations. For that matter, general topics such as railway express services, trucking companies, postwar vehicles, the St. Lawrence Seaway, dieselization and the like may be fair game. As an author and publisher, I enjoy serving an appreciative audience with a successful series of books while supporting my family at the same time. My question to those loyal and prospective readers is this: aside from the current series on CNR operations in Ontario during the 1950s, what would you like to see explored in publication form? Please click on "Comments" at the bottom of this post to offer your input.
As readers of the books realize, the time is growing short for producing volumes such as Steam at Allandale and its successors. In preparing a 192-page book detailing the intricacies of railway operation more than half a century ago, I depend on living memories of the men who worked on the CNR in the specific territory. Each time I put together a book, it becomes more difficult to recreate those wonderful details of operation which are not otherwise recorded anywhere but in human memory banks. In that regard, I am engaging on a hellbent quest to cover as many CNR division points as possible before the sources are gone. When it comes to portraying railway operations I refuse to speculate--so the possibility of accurately describing such details will disappear forever in the near future (read this Topic for more).
My intention with the present series is to cover the rest of the CNR territory in Ontario. Beyond the Northern Ontario book which will emerge later this year, that only leaves the Toronto and Hamilton areas and the Belleville Division (including the Lindsay area and most of the Toronto-Montreal mainline, possibly broken into two books). The Ottawa area (and anything east of Brockville) was technically part of the Montreal District. Whether or not I get that far is unknown, but it is safe to say that any attempt in the present format will likely not prove fruitful for lack of living sources.
With respect to the previous post, Trevor posed a reasonable request: do I have any more information on operations which I would care to share? My answer at the present time is that no, I don't, beyond what has been published in the books (time and budgetary constraints dictate that I research elements to the degree which is necessary for the publication at hand). However, I would like to do in-depth studies of various industries and traffic patterns over the 1945-59 era in Ontario as they related to CNR, and possibly other resident railway, operations. For that matter, general topics such as railway express services, trucking companies, postwar vehicles, the St. Lawrence Seaway, dieselization and the like may be fair game. As an author and publisher, I enjoy serving an appreciative audience with a successful series of books while supporting my family at the same time. My question to those loyal and prospective readers is this: aside from the current series on CNR operations in Ontario during the 1950s, what would you like to see explored in publication form? Please click on "Comments" at the bottom of this post to offer your input.
posted by Ian Wilson at 10:15 AM
24 Comments:
You know wat I want.
Rich
Yeah, yeah I know Rich. Anything else though?
Ian:
I would like to see some more in-depth information about the human side of getting the trains over the line. Dispatchers, operators, station agents etc. what they did on a day-to-day basis.
Thanks for the suggestion, Bruce. Luckily, I've already spoken to enough men in detail to put that one together. There was a similarity to these jobs across the Southern and Northern Ontario Districts.
Knowing that you are a fan of model railway operations, I can see where you'll be going with that information...
There may be a place for specific industry and the related car utilisation...although I may be opening a can-of-worms here! For example, the automotive industry in Windsor and Oshawa, the cement industry in St. Marys, the aforementioned sugar beet industry, the lumber industry, Inco in Sudbury...even the Stratford Shops generated a lot of activity. I also appreciate that much of this has been covered in Ian's series of books....but you asked!
Doug Cushman
Doug, you're more or less onto what I have in mind. Doing each of the existing series of books is like putting a piece of puzzle into place. Having gotten so far and seen how the pieces relate to each other, the next logical step would be to tie the whole thing together into some sort of operating "encyclopedia".
If you model the Windsor area, for instance, you would be interested in what was presented on automobile traffic in the London book. However, if you model a portion of the east-west (Northern Ontario District) mainline, you would also be greatly interested in that automotive traffic. In either location you will want to know, for instance, about the closure of the old Ford assembly plant at Walkerville in favour of a new one at Oakville in June 1954.
Conversely, if you model a town in Southern Ontario which has a team track and lumber yard, you would find the Northern Ontario book to be illuminating with respect to lumber traffic.
We could go on and on. The Niagara Frontier, specifically the paper industries, is inextricably tied with Northern Ontario. You would need to understand the traffic patterns and car utilizations up there to apply them to the area around the Welland Canal.
As you are alluding, our interest as (primarily) modelers of railway equipment and operations dictates an all-encompassing treatment of various industries as they related to car service and traffic patterns. Not to mention other developments of the postwar era.
Great contributions folks... keep them coming!
What you writing of almost calls for an overview--a "big picture", if you will, of Southern/Northern Ontario CN operations circa 1954 to tie in with your books. Interdivisional trains, i.e. 492, ran freight from one district to another. There were of course, many more trains than 492, and all had their reason to be.
I second the comment about operations from a dIspatcher's/dEspatcher's point of view, etc. I have had the sometimes dubious luck of having worked at CN in the running trades for eighteen years, and am constantly learning about railroading as practiced at CN in Southern Ontario today, and reconciling it with the past.
Most readers of your books are not able to learn railraoding in this fashion, nor would care to take a job braking to learn. Even tying it in to what happened 52 years ago is a sometimes daunting task for this guy.
I'd venture that such a book would be a good seller, and whet interest in your other books.
Steve Lucas.
By the way, Ian--those Hamilton and Lindsay (the centre of my universe! ;) ) books sometime would be nice to see.
Steve.
Thank you for the comments, Steve. The plan is to maintain the present series of books (Hamilton, Toronto, Lindsay, Belleville--in some order) until they are finished. At some point in time (in all likelihood before the current series is done), I could begin a parallel series, if only the background work.
Four more volumes in this series uninterrupted takes us until at least 2012, and I'm likely not going to keep going on that path without a break in routine. It really all depends upon when the oldtimers are too hard to find. When that day comes, there won't be any urgency to proceed on one path over the other.
Peterborough area would be good. Ottawa, or the Kingston sub too.
Peterborough--part of Lindsay. Ottawa--already mentioned. Kingston Sub.--no such thing on the CNR in the 1950s (but you mean Toronto-Montreal mainline, and it's already been mentioned).
Actually Ian given the dates for the various terminal closures Lindsay maybe one you might consider for earlier publication. Of all the terminals/divisions you have mentioned or are working on it was the first closed and thus the gentlemen who worked there tended to be older as they had been there a long time and no new blood moved in. Many retired there when the shops were closed and are now gone. Worth considering anyways.
Tank car traffic would delight me. You know my interest is on the west coast, but the reality is that a very large part of the traffic came from or through Ontario, or was sent there from out here. I would bet there are still some old timers around who could take you through the oil business and car servicing etc in similar ways to what you've accomplished so well with general railway operations. I wonder if CGTX employees have fond memories and photo collecitons?
Not that oil was the only tank car traffic. The world of chemicals and their transport in, into and from Canada would also make a worthy study.
Rob Kirkham
Dan, you make a good point, and that is the reason why I chose the Northern Ontario book next. Fortunately, I have been able to locate a lot of men who worked from the late 1940s or early 1950s onward on that District.
Regarding Lindsay, anyone who retired when that terminal closed is long out of the picture now. Realize that anyone we're dealing with at this stage of the game worked only spareboard in the 1950s. At the end of the decade, he was scarcely more than 30. So a Lindsay man at that age went somewhere else. If he packed it in (and he's still alive), he didn't retire--he left the railway for other work. In which case, all the better--his memories of railway work are untainted by the diesel era!
Rob, you're right, tank car traffic needs to (and will be) covered.
At the moment, we're relying on anecdotal evidence offered on U.S.-based freight cars lists. Folks who study equipment for its sake rarely give operations any more than a nod. And it is futile to try to apply any specifics from U.S. operations to Canadian when it comes to tank cars, reefers or stock cars. We had different geographical, economical and transportation network considerations.
I was reminded of this while perusing a recent Richard Hendrickson article about stock cars, when he mentioned some basics about operation. He asserted that stock cars generally roamed all over the place (onto connecting roads) and that backhaul was rare (i.e. they normally returned empty).
Guess he wasn't referring to Canada, and specifically the CNR, which routinely used stock cars to haul coal, ties, tomatoes and pulpwood--and those are just off the top of my head.
Yep, we need Canada-specific (Ontario-specific) information on operations.
Lest anyone jump in here and mention a Yahoo Canadian freight cars & operations list (which was spawned from a stimulating discussion on the Canadian Branchlines list).
There is some useful information exchanged on e-mail lists. But I'm proposing comprehensive (and era and geographical specifc) treatment in formal publications. Any discussion of e-mail lists is out of the scope.
As I sat and thought about this .... there is also a railway topic that does not receive much coverage: the non-revenue movements, specifically MOW , and not just the "big hook" but the section men and equipment as well; the guys that kept it all running. Where did the equipment sit, and what determined what locomotive and what crew would man it, etc?
Regards,
Doug
Not to discuss e-mail lists but I understand the CDN-frt-cars-n-ops had been in the planning stages for several months and was not the result of discussions on the old list.
More on topic, are you planning discussions on the gravel movements and Glenchristie lime kilns near my home town?
"Anonymous" (your name would be nice), have you seen the London book?
Doug, good suggestion on the m-o-w operations. A lot of those assignments were more or less regular--e.g. bank widening, ballast loading and spotting, etc.--for many weeks on end.
Will give this one some more thought; thanks.
Steam at Allandale touches and Steam in Northern Ontario will touch on the subject but there's a story in the change in travel patterns to "cottage country" in the 1945 to 1959 era. In the 1910s there was intense competition between the Canadian Northern, Canadian Pacific and Grand Trunk railways to capture the tourist travel to the "Highlands of Ontario". All railways offered express trains to Muskoka, overnight sleeper car accommodation at the wharves, hunters' specials in the fall, etc. The introduction of King's Highways in the 1920s (see www.thekingshighway.ca for further information) created a network of improved roads to cottage country; however, as orginally constructed these passed through the towns. The post WWII cottagers using, for example, Highway 11 had to contend with bottlenecks through Allandale/Barrie, Orillia, Washago and Gravenhurst. In the 1950s the "Department of Highways of the Province of Ontario" constructed "bypasses" to eliminate these bottlenecks and as the highways improved, the cottagers' reliance on the railway diminished, resulting in curtailment or elimination of railway service.
As mentioned in Steam at Allandale, the Highway 11 Washago bypass, which opened in June 1955, prompted realignment of the Newmarket Subdivision -- the so-called Washago Diversion. Although too late for Ian's Washago, the summer of 1955 would make for interesting modelling - work trains, work gangs (B&B, track, signal, and telegraph), ballast trains, temporary grade crossings, flag protection, material delivery, etc.
I just lost my comment so I'll try again...:-(
I agree with Rob that an essay on Canadian tank cars is long overdue and would be great to see.
I would also be interested in the operations and movements of CN/CP reefers both in Ontario and south of the border; which RRs they were transferred to, what they carried, where they took it, and what they brought back. Were 8-hatch reefers captured in US service during peak seasons if they were available and what were they carrying?
As an aside, I found an interesting article that included ball bearings as a temperature-controlled commodity carried by reefers in Canada! Not what you think of for reefer transport.
Hello Ian,
In response to your question: ...what
would readers like to explore in publication form? Well, since your current series is prototype based, and although a huge resource for modelers,
would you think it feasible to produce a series featuring the models created as a result of this series? The idea would
involve soft cover journals(to be inserted in 3ring binders), each would
feature construction articles of various
CNR equipment, whether, locomotives, cars, structures, etc. Just a thought.
Jeff's comment above is interesting - the "Cottage Country" traffic aspect would indeed be nice to see.
I also like the idea of following one industry around the province - e.g. the paper industry (Nothern Ontario to Niagara) you mentioned.
I would add my last "second" to the MOW aspect of runnning the railway. You have delved into the large shops at Stratford, etc, but I too am interested in learning about the station agent, the local track gang, and so on.
Andrew
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