Section Two

House built for Chinese labourers
working on construction
of the CPR, 1883
I-30869
Most of the work was by hand rather than by machines. The work was hard and dangerous and required workers to leave their families and homeland to live and work in remote, isolated areas for extended periods of time.

Railway construction
Chinese workers tent camp
Kamloops, 1886
D-04710
Immigrant workers lived in huts and tents in camps along the tracks or make-shift villages that lacked the luxuries of town life.

Laying track near
Salmon Arm, 1885
Detail of I-30811

 

Arrival in Vancouver of the
first CPR train from Montreal
in July of 1886
A-09737
The ceremony driving the last spike, symbolising the completion of the CPR took place at Craigellachie at Eagle Pass in British Columbia on November 7, 1885, and the first train from Montreal arrived in Vancouver in July of 1886.

First CPR station, and the
CPR docks, Vancouver, 1888
Detail of A-03232

As the western terminus of the railway, Vancouver soon grew into Canada's most important west coast port for exporting goods from Canada and importing goods from overseas.





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