Railway
History
In November of 1885 the Canadian Pacific Railway was completed all the way from Ottawa Valley to British Columbia making Canada linked from east to west. Train stations, villages, and towns sprang up along the railroad lines. Trains carried large loads of heavy goods. Immigrants travelled west by train, which was faster than by horse-drawn wagons.
PHOTO CREDIT: WESTERN DEVELOPMENT MUSEUM
The railways linked Canada from east to west.
Train Cars
The trains were often overcrowded and were cold in the winter. Immigrants often travelled on colonist railway cars, which are a type of passenger railway car that was designed to provide inexpensive long-distance transportation for immigrants in North America. Colonist cars were very simple accommodation for immigrants. These railway cars contained benches, wood bunks, and a tiny kitchen for cooking. Immigrants usually rode in colonist cars as far as they could and then completed the rest of the journey to their homesteads by wagons or carts pulled by horses or oxen.
Using the train was faster than by horse-drawn wagons.
The types of transportation available has greatly evolved since the 1800s and early 1900s.