The Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) has always had strong community ties to the city of Port Coquitlam.
The title company town certainly did apply to the mostly blue-collar city up until the latter half of the 20th century. In those days, you or one of your family members possibly worked for the CPR, Essondale (Riverview) or the city. It was not uncommon to have two or three generations connected with CPR.
Doug Rowland was well-known in Port Coquitlam for his contributions to the sport of lacrosse; he was elected to the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1976. He worked as a telegraph operator with the CPR for many years, retiring in 1963. His father, Jacob, was the first station agent at Westminster Junction, which is what Port Coquitlam was previously known as, and lived above the station with his family after he arrived here in 1894. To make the story complete, Doug's son Glen was a CPR engineer for many of his 42 years of service, witnessing the transition from steam engines to diesel in the 1950s.
Bill Warren, whose career spanned more than 37 years (1948-1986) began as a brakeman during the steam era as well, and remembers the changeover. On Jan. 13, 1950, the first General Motors diesel units hauling transcontinental passenger train number seven arrived in Port Coquitlam to much fanfare.
The EMD FP7A and two F7B units generating 4,500hp were part of a three-month test as to the viability of replacing steam power with diesel-electric. The end of the 1950s saw the last remaining steam locomotives retired from active service with the railway, and by May 1960, the process was complete.
A recent retiree from the CPR is Shane Warren, Bill's son, whose last run was as engineer on the West Coast Express Train number two last month. Their family ties with the company date back to around 1900, when Thomas Greer, Shane's great-grandfather, owned the land where the Safeway at Shaughnessy Station Shopping Centre is today.
In those days prior to the building of the CPR yards, Schoolhouse Road (now Mary Hill Road) continued north to the old Flint Road, and Thomas operated a butcher shop there. After the railway bought his property for their new roundhouse, Thomas moved his house across from where the Commercial Hotel was by then under construction. The 12-stall roundhouse, built in 1912 by Sanford Gordon and Son, was very active during the heyday of steam, until torn down in the early 1980s.
Long-time PoCo residents may recall the CPR housing that existed along the south side of Dewdney Trunk Road (later Lougheed Highway) across from the Commercial Hotel well into the 1960s. Notable families who lived there through those years included the McDonagh, Stretch, Fryer, Duffus and McMitchell families. It was a time when you could set your watch by the whistle at the Roundhouse, heard all over town at 8 a.m., noon, 1 p.m. and 5 p.m., and hear the sound of steam engines labouring on a crisp clear night as they chugged their way through town.
In a company town known as Port Coquitlam.
Your History is a column in which, once a month, representatives of the Tri-Cities' three heritage groups writes about local history. Bryan Ness is with the Port Coquitlam Historical Society
