The Canadian Pacific Railway Company, in the early days, was the privately owned railroad company in Canada which built Canada’s transcontinental railroad, running from Nova Scotia on the Atlantic Ocean to British Columbia on the Pacific Ocean. The CP competed directly with arch rival Canadian National Railways, which was owned by the Canadian federal government.
The aggressive and competitive Canadian Pacific made sure there was plenty of business for its passenger trains and goods created in Canada to move by its passenger trains by helping the immigration process from other parts of the world to sparsely-populated Canada. Today, the population of Canada (2016 census) is 35,151,729, the 38th most populated country in the world. By contrast, today, the population of the state of California is 39,250,017 (2017 census), or about four million residents larger than the entire nation of Canada. By land area, Canada is the second largest country in the world.
CP brought immigrants from Europe and Asia to help build the railroads, populate cities, and successfully carve farms out of the vastness of Canada. Some wags still say that every small town along the CP main lines in Canada has at least one Chinese restaurant because some of the Asian laborers building the CP chose to stay behind and establish themselves in a local business, and their descendants still live and work in those same cities and towns.
CP managers labeled their railroad and its offshoots the World’s Greatest Travel System. Included was CP Hotels (today, part of the Fairmont luxury hotel chain), CP Ships and CP Transport, and CP Air, which today is part of Canadian Airlines.
Canadian Pacific was known for the original Canadian passenger train, which operated from Montreal, Quebec and Toronto, Ontario to Vancouver, British Columbia. The same streamlined equipment, complete with Park Car domes, is operated today by VIA Rail Canada, after VIA was created in the 1970s as a Canadian version of Amtrak. The former CP Budd-built equipment has undergone several updates and refurbishments, and the Canadian is still considered one of the best passenger trains in the world and a joy to ride. In the late 90s, VIA underwent a company and route restructuring, and the original all-CP route of the Canadian was abandoned, and the Canadian was switched over to the transcontinental route of Canadian National Railways, the former route of the Super Continental.
Other famous Canadian Pacific trains were the Dominion, the Soo Dominion, the Mountaineer, and The Atlantic Limited to name a few.
When CP Ships got out of the passenger-liner business, the ships, which had become old and outdated, were sold to other cruise lines. Two of today’s notable cruise lines grew out of the sale of the ships.
On the east coast, a fledgling Carnival Cruise Line was began with old Canadian Pacific ships. From very humble beginnings, Carnival today has grown to be one of the largest cruise lines in the world, operating under the Carnival name, but also owning and operating other famous brands such as Cunard, Costa, Holland America, and ironically, Princess Cruises.
In the beginning, on the west coast, a similar entrepreneur to the founder of Carnival Cruise Line had a strikingly-similar business plan, and, with a single former Canadian Pacific ship, founded Princess Cruises. Today, Princess is a division of Carnival.
It was a later generation of Princess ships – early, but after the original CP ship – that had the Island Princess and its identical twin, the Pacific Princess.
Thanks to television producer Aaron Spelling, and the foresight of the owners of Princess Cruises, the Pacific Princess (and, Island Princess filling in as the Pacific Princess when scheduling was tight) became famous as The Love Boat, the Saturday night staple hour long show on ABC. Most travel industry historians will say without reservation The Love Boat (with Jack Jones singing the theme song) created today’s modern and thriving cruise industry, introducing a younger generation to vacation cruising, after the previous generation had abandoned the trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific passenger liners for jet airplanes.
Canadian Pacific managers understood a profitable railroad needed to be fed, whether by passengers or freight to haul, and, they found ways to do that by diversifying the company and creating the World’s Greatest Travel System. A railroad, hotels, ships, airplanes, plus a telegraph company and an express package company, all combined to make Canadian Pacific a powerhouse of Canadian history. Today, CP still operates its freight network from the east coast to the west coast, but, has substantial trackage in the United States, too, down and around the southern end of the Great Lakes and into New York State and Pennsylvania, plus deep into the Midwest.
Today’s modern version of the World’s Greatest Travel System may be All Aboard Florida’s Brightline service, which will soon inaugurate a daily schedule. While the service will be only between South Florida and Orlando in Central Florida, importantly, the new train stations and adjacent real estate developments spawned by the service will make a significant transformation to downtown Miami, and, on the north end, have its terminal inside of Orlando International Airport, providing connections to practically anywhere in the world.
What’s old is new.
Canadian Pacific poster illustrations via the Internet.