1869—A. O. Pattison, now G.T.R. Agent at Clinton, Ont., was ticket seller with the “G.T.R.” at Brantford, Canada, in the days of C. J. Brydges and W. J. Spicer. Conductors Ausbrooke and David McHaffy were his contemporaries.
1869—Toronto, Grey & Bruce Railway, Toronto to Owen Sound, Ont., and Teeswater, was built by Edmund Wragge.
1869–1875—Walter Shanley, a Montreal railway engineer, constructed the Hoosac Mountain Tunnel. He was a Canadian M.P. and lived for forty years in the St. Lawrence Hotel at Montreal.
1871—John Francis, youthful, alert and clever, was day operator and ticket clerk in the old station at Prescott Junction, Ont., laying the foundation with a little wrestling and scuffling thrown in, for his gradual progress to the General Passenger Agency of C.B. & Q.R., Chicago.
1873–4—International Bridge from Black Rock, N.Y., to Fort Erie, Ont., endorsed jointly by C.G.W.R. and G.T.R., built at a cost of $2,000,000, was opened to traffic at this time. C. Czowski and D. L. Macpherson were the contractors. Thomas Matchett, now C.T.A., C.P.R., Lindsay, Ont., was installed as the first telegraph operator at Fort Erie by H. P. Dwight, Superintendent of Montreal Telegraph Co., Toronto.
1876—Intercolonial Railway, opened for traffic Levis, Quebec, to the Maritime Provinces, was constructed under commissionership of C. J. Brydges.
1881—Nicholas Weatherston managed the Grand Junction Railway at Belleville in this year. A graduate of the “Great Western”, he was long with the Intercolonial Ry. at Toronto, and his father commenced work in 1835 on the Normanton & Leeds Railway built by the famous George Stephenson.
1883—Regime of the late (Sir) William White and John W. Loud, at the period of the G.T.R.—G.W.R. merger, Toronto, when George Pepall, Asst. Foreign Freight Agent, G.T.R. to-day, was Inwards Freight Clerk and D. de Cooper, now C.F.A., L.V.R., was employed on the “Outwards” desk.
1891, Dec. 7—St. Clair Tunnel, Sarnia, Ont., to Port Huron, Mich., opened to travel. It was begun in 1888, cost $2,500,000 and was electrified in 1906.
Entries in diary of E. de la Hooke, London, Canada—City Ticket Agent, Grand Trunk Railway. Callers who registered at his office:—