Cordova Bay Station web pages require a JavaScript enabled browser such as Microsoft Internet Explorer version 5 or greater or Netscape version 4 or greater. Alternately, JavaScript may have been turned off in your browser. Open your browser preferences and enable JavaScript. You do not have to restart your computer or browser after enabling JavaScript. Simply click the Reload button. When enabled, JavaScript has no effect on your privacy settings and no cookies will be written to your computer - William C. Slim.


Home
 
2003-
  
WINTER 2003/2004

Canadian Pacific Railway Employee Communications
Room 500 401-9th Ave S.W. Calgary AB T2P 4Z4

 MAIL, RAIL, AND RETAIL
Mail Rail and Retail
From left, Jonathan Hanna CPR corporate historian, Marcella Szel vice-president of strategy & law and corporate secretary, Mrs. Andre Ouillet, Andre Ouillet president Canada Post, Paul Clark vice-president of CPR communications & public affairs, Bianca Gendreau curator Canadian Postal Museum.
 
  Gunlach Korona view camera
Gunlach Korona 5"x7" view camera, circa 1925:  Until the 1990's the company had one of Canada's most skilled in-house photography departments.
 
An exhibition called "Mail, Rail, and Retail:  Connecting Canadians", is at the Canadian Postal Museum of the Canadian Museum of Civilization.
 
CPR, Canada Post, and Hudson's Bay Company were among Canada's first major enterprises, and are among the handful of businesses in Canada that continue to exist in their original forms. Whether through letters new immigrants sent home about fertile land for farming, the availability of transportation by rail to new settlements, or the goods settlers needed to live in harsh conditions, the three enterprises played roles that were essential to populating and developing Canada.
 
  News Agent cap
Uniform hats:  In the mid-1960's, a large CPR passenger station would have had as many as 14 different positions identified by their hats.
 
"With mail, rail, and retail services, Canada had communications, transportation and trade. These were the fundamentals needed for economic development and industrial growth when our country was in its infancy, and they remain the fundamentals even today", said Rob Ritchie, our president and CEO. "Visitors to the Mail, Rail, and Retail exhibition will see how important these services were for survival and success in Canada's formative years, and more significantly, will recognize their continued importance and the role they will play in Canada's future prosperity".
 
"This exhibit provides Canadians with a new perspective on their past, present, and future", George Heller, chief executive officer of Hudson's Bay Company, said. "It puts a unique focus on three different but inter-connected enterprises and the incredible influence they had on Canada's development and growth and on Canadians' quality of life".
 
  Punch clock
Punch clock, circa 1945:  Manufactured in Montreal by the W.A. Wood Company, this "Globe Timeregister" recorded the comings and goings of thousands of employees.
 
The Honourable Andre Ouillet, president and CEO of Canada Post, noted that "the Hudson's Bay Company defined Canada's trading territory and its development as an east-west country while the railway linked the pieces into a whole, opening the country for settlement. At the same time, the Post Office served as Canada's political, business, and personal lifeline. Each company has grown with the country and each continues to connect Canadians to this day".
 
The Mail, Rail, Retail exhibition can be viewed in the Canadian Museum of Civilization at 100 Laurier Street in Gatineau, Quebec, on the banks of the Ottawa River, directly opposite Parliament Hill.
 
It runs until 29 Nov 2004.

This Momentum article is copyright 2004 by Canadian Pacific Railway and is reprinted here with their permission. All photographs, logos, and trademarks are the property of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company.

 
© 2005 William C. Slim       http://www.okthepk.ca