Gordie's Song Yet Rides Again

It seemed like a romantic notion to take the train across Canada and indeed it was..well at least from Toronto to Vancouver, much less than the entire coast to coast trip, but a mighty journey, nonetheless.

There have been so many wonderful and yet sad experiences in these 5 days in early March of 2013. Yes, a plane trip may be taken in 5 hours and a train 5 days but the tales of the train ride will last for a life time. A flight by plane, however, is too short and insular to allow any chance to create such lasting memories.

Gordie Lightfoot set to music the romantic and tragic story of the making of the railway line across Canada in his classic tribute, The Railway Trilogy. It is ironic that so many of his words ring true still today.

Ok, the clip that follows is not Gordie, but Gordie is at least 3,000 years old now and has lost his voice. These kids each have more talent than Gordie could possibly ever imagine in his wildest dreams. However, hats off to Gordie for writing such beautiful and descriptive lyrics.

By the way, please do not skip the song. It is critical to the theme - honest !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BF1g4NcINvQ

Just in case you want to sing along, here are the words.


There was a time in this fair land when the railway did not run,

When the wild majestic mountains stood alone against the sun,

Long before the white man and long before the wheel

When the green dark forest was too silent to be real

But time has no beginnings and hist'ry has no bounds
As to this verdant country they came from all around
They sailed upon her waterways and they walked the forests tall
And they built the mines the mills and the factories for the good of us all

And when the young man's fancy was turnin' to the spring
The railroad men grew restless for to hear the hammers ring
Their minds were overflowing with the visions of their day
And many a fortune lost and won and many a debt to pay

For they looked in the future and what did they see
They saw an iron road runnin' from sea to the sea
Bringin' the goods to a young growin' land
All up through the seaports and into their hands

Look away said they across this mighty land
From the eastern shore to the western strand
Bring in the workers and bring up the rails
We gotta lay down the tracks and tear up the trails
Open 'er heart let the life blood flow
Gotta get on our way 'cause we're movin' too slow

Behind the blue Rockies the sun is declinin'
The stars, they come stealin' at the close of the day
Across the wide prairie our loved ones lie sleeping
Beyond the dark oceans in a place far away

We are the navvies who work upon the railway
Swingin' our hammers in the bright blazin' sun
Livin' on stew and drinkin' bad whiskey
Bendin' our old backs 'til the long days are done

So over the mountains and over the plains
Into the muskeg and into the rain
Up the St. Lawrence all the way to Gaspe
Swingin' our hammers and drawin' our pay
Drivin' 'em in and tyin' 'em down

Away to the bunkhouse and into the town
A dollar a day and a place for my head
A drink to the livin' and a toast to the dead

Oh the song of the future has been sung
All the battles have been won
O'er the mountain tops we stand
All the world at our command
We have opened up the soil
With our teardrops and our toil
For there was a time in this fair land when the railroad did not run
When the wild majestic mountains stood alone against the sun
Long before the white man and long before the wheel
When the green dark forest was too silent to be real
When the green dark forest was too silent to be real
And many are the dead men too silent to be real

I, of course, planned this trip on the iron road many months before…Ok, actually about 30 minutes before running out to Union Station in downtown Toronto to catch the 11 pm Tuesday night departure, which may explain why I had but one pair of mismatched argyll socks with me…well,  at least they were sort of the same colours, a cool green and yellow diamond pattern....entirely nerdy.

What a great idea, to travel across Canada by scenic rail…4 nights and lots of black coffee.....and even a tad of vino rosso from time to time....well daily actually....and more than a tad....well it made up for the diet Coke regimen that I was on for the prior month...wat's wit dat diet coke ting anyway ? I had always wanted to do this, the train ride, that it..why not now...he who hesitates...is married ?

As I now know, there is a severely marked difference between the comforts afforded to the sleeper class people and the plebian class, the latter of which I became fiercely proud to be one, as the trip proceeded.

A shower, however, would have been a real plus for both this traveler and all who may have dared to mistakenly wander near. There is also a marked class distinction between the sleeper types and the plebs, which is less than attractive.

As I was waiting in the lounge area in Union Station, I met Yannic, an international business student from Germany – he was studying in at a school in Montreal and was taking his study week time to see Canada by rail. 

Yannic - James Bond Junior

Although not (yet) a hockey fan, he had spent the day doing  an amazing walking tour of the highlights of downtown Toronto…Fort York, Kensington Market, Yorkville, the Distillery, the Islands, Air Canada Centre – all  in one day yet. I suspect that the hockey reference is incongruous, but that is part of its beauty.

I thought of introducing him to my buddy Murray’s daughter in Vancouver, who just broke up with her boyfriend, but reconsidered..perhaps too familiar. We became good friends for the remaining five days of our trip.

When we were chatting, the railroad groupie guy approached, asking for our tickets. I was on auto pilot and immediately went into my Nazi accented “do you haben sich your glaussen heich papppers”, and went into oooops mode. Yikes, I need to stop doing that.

Yannic was joined by two other German students, Daniel and Joe,none of whom knew one another before this trip and a host of young people from Ontario and other parts of the world, setting out mostly to Alberta for new lives in the oil sands "bringing the goods to a young growing land, all up through the seaports and into their hands", so to speak. Indeed “as to this verdant country, they came from all around”.


 Joe was also a student from Germany. He was born in Canada or had Canadian parents..whichever it was, he had Canadian citizenship and was in Canada to see the country and then was returning back home. Unlike the social and perhaps overly verbose Daniel, Joe was very quiet as he felt his English was not up to snuff.


 Daniel was a student from Germany who had finished high school and was going to BC to work on a student co-op. He was a very social and fun guy and more importantly, after a few beers, revealed his true asset - he knew each and every word to Freddie Mercury's Bohemian Rhapsody. This unique display of musical talent came in quite handy at 11 pm after a few, well a few more than few, drinks.

The Studiously Reserved Joe

 


Daniel - Gallileo, Gallileo....

 

I cannot say that spending the first night, well actually all four nights, trying to sleep, mostly upside down, in a semi-reclining chair was a lot of fun.......”away to the bunkhouse and a place for my head..”

I spent most of the first night positioned in such a manner, my bare toes poised over the top of the chair, resting on the window. I actually washed them when I realized that this would likely be my sleeping posture for the evening. All in all, memo to file, svp......a real bed is a necessity. 

I had no idea a sleeper meant a sleeper, oddly enough. Well, I guess I sorta kinda did, but my cursory….very cursory, review of the website suggested that one needed to share a room with a fellow traveler…which actually would not have been so bad after all…but even that seems to have been read in error.

 I had flashbacks of requesting what I had thought was a private sleeper cabin in France from Tignes to Paris a zillion years ago, when some guy entered in the middle of the night and revealed his stinking feet...maybe it is a train thing with the smelly feet..well that ended that romantic evening.

The good news is that travel by train is really a wonderful way to see Capreol, well, likely the only way, as there can be no real roads that actually find their way into this splendid metropolis of 439 inhabitants, a number which likely includes all the relatives living in the “south” as they call Toronto and all rodents in the local dump.   

But so it was that its “green dark forest was too silent to be real”, just as the train whizzed by the cold white forest firs…too silent to be real. 


We stopped here the first morning around 7 am. We had 15 minutes to disembark and take in the amazing sights so I thought grabbing a Globe and Mail would be a splendid idea.

The lady running the shop at the station had no papers, not the nazi kind, newspapers. The gentleman next to her offered to drive me to the convenience store in town to pick one up – what a lovely thing to do. 

In Toronto, this just would never happen. It reminded me of the time in Halifax years ago when Matt was at a hockey tournament. When I noticed my car was having a bad morning, I asked the hotel manager if I could have the number of CAA, he instead offered me his car to drive to the rink and that he would get someone to boost my car when I was at the rink. I asked if he wanted my car keys or ID as security. “Nope”, he said, “I am pretty sure you will bring it back”.

This is really how life should be. The fellow who drove me to town, Craig, was also the Via Rail engineer from Capreol to Winnipeg. He said “well, you can tell your friends that I drove you to the convenience store and then to the Peg, as Winnipeg is affectionally known.

A view of Northern Ontario from the railway window:

Look away said they across this mighty land

And then there is Etna. What a dear. 

Etna...a smile and a mission and a vision of the day...

Etna is a 80 year old something from the Republic of Ireland who was touring Canada by rail to visit Prince Rupert on the BC coast, north of Vancouver. She had been all around the world and more and judging by her disdain for the sleeper class, did so in a most economical manner.

Etna’s father lived in Prince Rupert in his 20’s in the years before the Great War, as it then was known before WWII in the years before the Great War, as it then was known.

This is similar to the MGA British 1959-1962 sports car which was never actually called an MGA, of course, until the MGB was made and then as referred to as the MGA even though it does not have these letters anywhere on its chassis, however…I digress…

Etna had her father’s letters, handwritten of course, from Prince Rupert back to Ireland detailing the life and times of a young engineer in BC in the 1900's…well not quite wilderness, but close enough. 

It was then being established as a port primarily for coal export to the far east and the USA. No doubt her father’s stories told of a remarkable life. The population today is listed as 12,000. I suspect 100 years ago it must have been a bustling port of roughly 200. This ignores the intriguing question of why a remote town in British Columbia was named after a German prince….perhaps another story for another time.

Etna also had all her father's fading sepia photos from his time in Prince Rupert. Her mission was to match the evidently marked settings with new ones showing her in the same spots, some 100 years later. She would like her grandchildren to do the same with her photos, soon to be taken.

Etna gave me a book to review, showing illustrated artwork of scenes of Canada from the train coast to coast, co-ordinated with the words of the very same Gordie Lightfoot railway trilogy song, as above, a truly lovely production. (Canadian Railroad Trilogy by Gordon Lightfoot, art by Ian Wallace, is published by Groundwood Books ($24.95). (http://www.ian-wallace.com/exhibitions.html)) 

 We shared a laugh about the publication of Gordie's death 10 years ago, when Gordie called the editor to report that the news of his tragic passing was a tad overstated. 

We also tipped a glass in honour of her father and her mission, which was indeed "a drink to the loving and a toast to the dead".

Gordie and I were neighbours on Beaumont Road in Rosedale a thousand years ago. Well close to neighbours..i rented the third floor of a house close to his for a few months pending my move to Elm Avenue…..At the other end of the street was the grand pooba of the Toronto Archdiocese of the Catholic Church, Cardinal what’s his rosary….

Gordie’s garbage was cascading vodka and gin bottles. I was afraid to check out the Cardinal’s. Well we know now that just viewing photos should not be sinful…at least according to Professor Tom Flanagan…ok enough…Tom was in the news lately for his stated views that simply viewing child porn should not be a crime..hmmmm...a less than popular view - i am not sure what his eminence, the cardinal would say about this....

So the idea of train travel is really as cool as all get out, but Via Rail really needs to buff this sucker up a tad. The service basically is atrocious, in a friendly downhome way, I might add, but the whole thing needs a a truck load  of javax bleach and polish. 


It would help a lot to blow the thing right up and start again. I am not age biased, but everyone who works on the train makes Methusala look like a pre-schooler. A little youth in the staffing ranks would hurt no one.   

Some of the staffers are quite decent people but others are simply mean and condescending, like the jerk who ran the dining room car, who kept the plebian class out of the dining room in the first and second sittings. He told one customer that she could enjoy a meal in the dining car only if she was diabetic.

I know internet service in northern superior country may be pushing it, but when we are near any other sign of civilization ( you can tell when the locals have Tim Horton’s cups) this surely should follow. Really, how hard would it be to put a satellite on the train to allow the inhabitants something to do, apart from walking to the washroom, lining up for the bar car to open at noon and to walk to the observation car….hmmmm….It leaves a lot to be desired. As I write this in an airport in Lauderdale, I just got off a flight with internet service..from 15,000 feet up yet !

I got a laugh when my brother asked me if there was a gym on the train…ok let’s do this again…we have a place to sit, an observation car, a bar, a dining car and a washroom…that’s it, baby !

And then we are blessed with the Via Rail narration of the trip across Canada. After four days in the observation car, while breezing down from Jaspar to Vancouver, suddenly a voice appears out of nowhere over the audio system, which to date has only announced the time for lunch, stating in a kinda sorta "you have heard me yackking so much like this before voice"...and on our left we have Lake Waccamucha (or some such place)....that was the sole reference to any geographic or historical reference on the entire trip...crazy..those Via Rail people are so focused on service...noooot. It is hard to imagine traveling across a country ( yes, I know...ok I started in Toronto) and not one word about about any history or points of interest....hmmmm.

Well Capreol is in the distant past and Hearst, north of Lake Superior, is ahead. Stay tuned.

After Capreol came Hornepayne, Nakina and Sioux Lookout, all blessed with the same northern Ontario charm and left everyone wondering “what do these people do here?” 


There is really no visible sign of life, apart from the mandatory ice rink and snow mobiles, which I suspect answers this question – they play hockey, curl, figure skate, hunt and ice fish. There is no skiing anywhere close to these towns. The good news is that they may not get CBC Radio.

The observation car is quite beautiful even where there is not much to look at, apart from pine trees covered in frozen snow. At night the starry starry night from this car would have inspired Vincent….it is indeed truly moving, so to speak..and yes as Gordie so aptly put it “the stars came stealin’ at the end of the day”.

It is now 5:30 am Thursday morning. I thought it was 6:30 am which is a bell crasher on the train as the breakfast service starts at this time. Regrettably, after tossing and turning all night and finally making it, I thought to the breakfast car, alas…we switched to central time over night and I was one hour early…rats.


 

A wheat field on a cold winter day....does this say..stop here and enjoy to you ?

And then we have my travel mates. There seem to be basically two categories, the first being young kids from Ontario coming to Edmonton for work on the oil sands, and related industries ...."And they built the mines the mills and the factories for the good of us all"

 The second was students from Europe touring Canada and we can add a third one of kinda sorta skid row boozers, but that may be unfair.

The kids from Ontario – they looked to the future and what did they see…they saw an iron road runnin’ from the sea to the sea. Like the navies who came a hundred and thirty years before them, they came ready to “swing their hammers and earn their pay”, perhaps not building the railway, but building a new life for themselves in much the same way.

Tom and his girlfriend, Kirstin, were in the first class. Tom is 25, addicted to alcohol and nicotine. He had no chance, he said, with an Irish mother and German father. I am not sure how the genetics follow, but Tom is determined to drink Jack every day of his life, it seems. 

Tom in full battle armour

The bar car opened at 12 01 pm and Tom was usually at the door waiting. If you can believe this, the idiots that run Via Rail forbid the consumption of privately purchased booze on the trip, yet close the bar at 900 pm every night.

Well the lovely couple is off to work in Fort MacMurray and seek their adventure. Ironically Tom’s full name is Tom Collins.

Tom was in the observation car last night, engaged in a telephone chat, the contents of which could not help by overheard by all the occupants, at least Tom’s side of the conversation. The conversation went something like this:

TC : well I know you will be OK. You can use the blow up doll any time you feel that way:

Other Person: …..

TC: Yes, I know, but keep on trying and take a little more booze.

OP….

TC: yes, we will be in Edmonton soon and I will stop by the sex shop for you and get you something special.

OP…..

TC I gotta go now.

OP…

TC: Ok, good night, mom.

As an added note, Tom had not seen his mother in five years. 

The entire observation car uttered shocked gales of laughter. People were rolling out of their seats.

Tom’s girl friend Kirstin, 10 years his elder, had been given hallucinogenic drugs by her ex- boyfriend 10 years ago which brought on schizophrenic personality traits. She felt that she was being constantly followed and hence  taking  anti-psychotic meds, which likely did not mix well with alcohol. She was, however, a kind and dear person.

kirstin aka Ms. Tom Collins

The dining room is mixed seating, so there is always a new face to be greeted with the morning omelet. 

This morning’s meal was met by Edward Montgomery, an administrator with the U of Alberta in Edmonton, soon to retire and a devoted train traveler. Edward is a modest man, and as Oscar Wilde said, with much to be modest about. Edward is a good example of why living in the subterranean plebian class was so much more fun. Edward would not know a good time if it hit him full speed in the frontal lobes.

Last night I met Benni Hibert, a Mennonite minister from Saskatoon. Benni had been married for 54 years. He had lost his wife 12 months ago. As Benni said, he was 18 reversed, referring to his age of 81. Why he was in the common carrier section, I have no idea, but I was very happy to find him there.

 He and his wife left Russia before the war as they were pacifists and arrived in Canada to farm a “quarter section” which means 160 acres, I am told.

Benni - A Truly Lovely Man

Benni was a splendid man, and although I generally disdain conservative ministers, we had an immediate and intriguing bond. He was a truly remarkable man. I learned a lot about his church and his beliefs, many of which parallel mine. He believes that god is within every person and that the church should allow individual interpretation of the bible. He told me of how his wife sat with him chatting for 30 minutes after her death. It was a lovely moment. I shared with him the details of my similar moments. I woke up at 2 30 am to make sure he was awake for his stop at Saskatoon.

And then we have Jordan, am amazingly bright young kid who left home at 15 and headed out on his own. 

Here he is headed to Deadmonton, ready to work as a sandblaster on heavy equipment in Fort Mac. The young man's fancy was turnin' to the spring, he was restless to hear the hammers ring and his mind was overflowing with the visions of their day.

Jordan regrettably has chosen to fund his drinking problem with selling drugs, one transaction which I did witness on the train. Jordan, like Tom, opens the bar at 1 pm and frequents its presence until he is cut off. 

Now is the time to admit that I was his drink pimp a few times yesterday. Before I volunteered for this mission, he was paying $20 for a $7 drink, the balance being the fee to his buying agent, which seemed a bit steep, hence my volunteering.


Jordan has seemingly experimented with every conceivable drug known to man. His cocaine usage on the train was the first time I had witnessed a person doing coke…honest. He told me of the time he took 26 gravol pills for the high, explaining in some detail the pharmaceutical components of the drug and why it would create this euphoria he was seeking.

For the moment, I became Jordan’s mentor. I told him that I was an RCMP undercover agent and really what better cover could there be for a real RCMP undercover agent than to tell everyone that I was an RCMP undercover agent.

Jordan told everyone that Yannic and the two other Germans who by coincidence were on the train, Daniel and Joe, were secret agents conspiring to blow up the country.

Jordan’s diet consisted of chocolate milk and lots of alcohol, quite similar to the navvies who came before him, “Livin' on stew and drinkin' bad whiskey”…the life style yet continues.

Jordan’s life was indeed far too similar, selling drugs, boozin’, playing cards and generally seeing his life as “many a fortune lost and many a debt to pay”.

Ian from Australia bordered at Winnipeg and was headed for Jaspar. He had lived a few years in Finland and most recently Winnipeg. He was a strikingly handsome man, much like Yannic. We called them James Bond Senior and Junior. Ian had given up, at age 33, on the modern world and was headed to Ecuador where he could live modestly and enjoy the remainder of his years. He seemed quite determined to do this. Ian was a charming funny intelligent man. He was great entertainment.

We had some wonderful fun as they told their stories of life and their aspirations of the new lives ahead....and then there was the music...

Two girls, literally girls, as they could not have been more than 19, were on the train all the way to Vancouver. They were from Niagara Falls. Both sets of parents had split up and they had set out west for a new life. I did not meet them until we arrived close to Vancouver. Neither one had $15 in their pockets and had no idea of where they would spend the night and for that matter, neither seemed to care.

Scott had arrived on the train just outside of Winnipeg and to my utter horror, chose to sit down beside me which meant that I had a sleeping companion, a most unwelcome thought. Scott had worked for the City of Toronto Works department from which he had retired and was now living in modest splendour in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. 

Scott also started his day at the bar at 12 01 pm with two beers and by later in the evening, had switched to the hard stuff he carried in his porte-la-maine. Scott was the also buyer in the first drug deal I had witnessed. It scared me to see how some one could live like this. Scott was a slovenly, dirty alcoholic and then there were the disgusting aspects of his personality.

Scott....no words could capture my sentiments of Scott

I had lunch one day with two aboriginals, who were Cree, I believe, who were on the way to Vancouver for a medical treatment of some sort, the details of which even I did not want to know. They spoke of the mistreatment their elders had suffered in the residential school programs and stories of how other tribe members had hidden their children in the forests when the white people came to take away the children to these schools. 

Once taken, the children were there for the school year of 10 months. The parents were then required to transport themselves to the schools at their expense, often hundreds of miles away to retrieve their children for the summer months. It is hard to believe that a civilized country would treat its citizens in this manner, apart from the sexual and physical abuse suffered by these children.

When we arrived in Edmonton and headed out of Jaspar, the mountains appeared in such amazing grandeur. The train route differs from the highway and shows scenes not only of the natural beauty but also of small rural life, often in trailers parked by a mountain lake. 

Trailer park in eden

Just another majestic view

We also passed a famous part of the mountains where the mountain caved in unexpectedly when the explosives misfired. I should know the name of that place. Ok, I will work on this.

In 1881, the task of building the railroad across Canada had begun.

Some 15,000 Chinese immigrants were recruited from China to work on the railroad construction by contractors for the Canadian Pacific Railway.

It was the Chinese immigrants who were given the most dangerous dynamite blasting assignments through the mountain rock.

"Across the wide prairie our loved ones lie sleeping
Beyond the dark oceans in a place far away"

Landslides were frequent and many lives, being those of mostly Chinese labourers, were lost. 600 Chinese died as casualties of blasting.

"And many are the dead men too silent to be real"

It was estimated that for every mile of rail that was laid in the Canadian Rockies, four workers lost their lives.

The immigrant labourers were paid between $1 and $2.50 per day. Unlike the Canadian white workers, they were required to pay for their own food, clothing, transportation to the work site and medical care.

The families received no compensation for the loss of the lives of the workers and many were not even notified of the deaths of their relatives.

Those who survived the construction of the railroad often could not afford to return to China, nor afford to send money home.

Many suffered from scurvy as they were not able to buy fresh fruit or vegetables.

When the railroad was finished, the Canadian government gave 25 million acres of land to the white workers. The Chinese received nothing.

Many of the survivors settled in Western Canada, after which prejudice against the Chinese was rampant.


In Vancouver in 1907, there was an anti-Chinese group formed, known as the Asiatic Exclusion League. Approximately half of the city's then 30,000 residents were said to be shown protesting, wearing ribbons proclaiming "For a White Canada".

 
Legislation was passed in the western provinces denying the right of Chinese  and Japanese to vote in provincial elections.

As hard it is to imagine, the law in British Columbia was upheld by what was then the highest court, the British House of Lords in Cunningham v Tomey Homma. http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKPC/1902/1902_60.html

The issue presented for determination was not the apparent human rights violation as Canada had no constitution to allow it the court to do so, written or unwritten, but rather was based on a jurisdictional issue, whether the province had such power to pass the legislation under the British North America Act or whether such power rested in the federal government only.

It was not until 1949 that the ultimate court in Canada became the Supreme Court of Canada and not the British House of Lords. The Supreme Court of Canada in the Tomey Homma case had determined the law was beyond the power of the province and had set it aside, a decision reversed by the House of Lords, upholding the law.

 

Saskatchewan passed legislation in 1912 forbidding a Chinese person from employing white women. ( see Quon-Wing v The King) 

British Columbia passed a law forbidding Japanese and Chinese from working in mines, in an attempt to force them to leave the province.

The Canadian government in 1900 increased the $50 entry fee for Chinese immigrants to $100 and again in 1903 to $500, when it gained the name of "head tax". Chinese immigration declined from 5,000 in 1904 to 8 people the following year.

In 1923 Canada also imposed a suspension on Chinese immigration. It remained in place for 25 years.

It is these persons to whom Gordie referred:

We are the navvies who work upon the railway

Swingin' our hammers in the bright blazin' sun
Livin' on stew and drinkin' bad whiskey
Bendin' our old backs 'til the long days are done 

and


We have opened up the soil
With our teardrops and our toil


Regrettably it was a sad moment in Canada's history. It is not well publicized. The first I had heard or read about these moments was in second year law school, reading the case law deciding whether these laws were constitutional. It is really one of Canada's dirty secrets.


By the bye, navvy is the vernacular term for navigational engineer used to refer to the manual labourers working on major engineering projects - from wikepedia.



Sylvia came from Toronto and like the others, was headed west for new opportunity. She was a yoga instructor and also became somewhat pliant for a a gentleman from Winnipeg, who had also left behind his belongings and headed west, now seemingly together.

Sylvia - Downward Dog ready

Keith...the new yoga partner - a young man's fancy turned to spring

And so it is...at the mountain tops we stand, all the world at our command...good luck to them all and thanks for a most interesting and fun ride.  Thank you, Gordie for such wonderfully meaningful descriptive lyrics. You captured well the past and yet also set the path for the next generations.

You sang it well: "The song of the future has indeed been sung, o'er the mountain tops we stand, the future is at our command"