Canadian Railroads > CP's big prairie passenger stations

During the 1920's and 30's, CP built large masonry stations at several of the bigger prairie towns along their transcontinental passenger train route. A simplified classical design was popular. One which survived only until the 1960's was the CP "Calgary Depot" which was replaced by an office block and the Husky observation tower.

The biggest and grandest of these big new stations was Moose Jaw SK. which included a clock tower and a grand hall (now a liquor store) and was situated at the end of the main street.(third image). Moose Jaw was the site of a huge WW2 air force base, and also was the location where Soo Line passenger trains from Chicago were combined with CP transcontinental passenger trains. The offices contained Divisional offices. One of the Moose Jaw legends relates to Chicago gangster Al Capone. One time when the "Law" was after him, he boarded a Soo Line train in Chicago and got off in Moose Jaw. He purchsed a hotel there and was a model citizen for several years. He made no attept to conceal who he was.

Regina is the Capitol of Saskatchewan and "main depot" for the RCMP. It is an important junction on CP but not a Division Point.
By 1992, although still identified as a Via station, Regina station had been converted to a casino.(second image)

Brandon, Manitoba is a division point station west of Winnipeg which has a rather grand downtown including another big CP station. For many years, Brandon had a large and impressive brewery beside the rail yard giving the place a much more urban feel than the size of the town would indicate.(first image).Brandon is home to the "Wheat Kings", a famous junior hockey team.

Until the 1940's, Brandon was a two railroad town as the Great Northern came into town from the south, and the GNR alignment is traceable in the shape of some downtown buildings.

Pioneer railroad photographer Lawrence Stuckey was a Brandon resident who lived to a great age. He started as a CP operating employee, but later quit to run a pharmacy (where he could process his photographs). Stuckey was a prolific trader of negatives and postcard size prints and some may have examples of his photography.

All these images were taken two years after the Via "Canadian" ceased operating over the CP route, meaning all these buildings were no longer passenger stations.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/30/14 09:07 by eminence_grise.

---

---

---

I've spent several weekends and many other nights parked on the track closest to the station in Moose Jaw Saskatchewan. One the best places to tie up the Sperry car for the night and Moose Jaw is still one of my favourite places in Canada. I've been in various parts of the station but by 1997 the Great Hall was closed off with some kind of foil or tarp or something IIRC. We usually walked around to Main Street on the sidewalk under the blue archways with the lights on them.

Jim