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Winter
2005
Canadian
Pacific Railway Employee Communications
Room 500 401-9th Ave S.W. Calgary AB T2P
4Z4
Berton Kept the Dream
Alive
Pierre Berton during the filming of the
Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation's National Dream.
With author Pierre Berton's death on
30 Nov 2004, the CPR lost a great chronicler of its past glories. We
also bid farewell to an elder statesman whose views on our transportation choices
for the future are going to be sadly missed.
If you're over 50, you'll remember the sensation caused by the publication of
Berton's two-volume epic on the building of the CPR back in the early
1970s. If you haven't hit the mid-century mark, then you missed
something that would have made your heart swell with pride in being associated with
the CPR. In both "The National Dream" and "The Last Spike",
Berton marshalled the English language in his inimitable way and sent it off to
paint a graphic account of the human trials and travails of building "The
Impossible Railway". With his newsman's sense and his incredible facility for
engaging the reader, Berton effectively became the greatest unpaid publicity agent
this company ever possessed.
The passage of more than 30 years and numerous re-readings have not
dulled my original admiration for Berton's skill in relating the railway's place in
history. The language is so alive, he could inspire with only a few, carefully
chosen words. For example, the Canadian West before the coming of the CPR was known
as the Great Lone Land. Berton neatly summarized the effect of the railway's
construction by simply describing the West afterward as " a land no longer
lonely". Soul-stirring stuff.
Hard to imagine now, but the spotlight Berton focused on the CPR wasn't universally
welcomed at the time. The early 1970s were difficult days for railroading, an
industry already down on its knees financially in the northeastern U.S. In Canada,
it was the time of the rancorous debates over the
less-than-compensatory Crow Rate for grain traffic and the
rationalization of a branch line network and a passenger service that had been
hammered by competition from government-funded highways, waterways, and
air facilities.
Misguided railway critics found ammo in Berton's books, pointing to such things as
the lands granted to the railway for building the transcontinental line as proof -
at least in their minds - that the CPR was somehow shirking its historic
responsibilities. These were issues some executives wished would remain dormant.
But those things are largely resolved today. What remains is the glorification of
the spirited people who built the CPR that's still to be found in the numerous
reprints of Berton's books. What will be missed is the praise for the benefits of
railroading he expressed in later years. He was a vocal environmentalist and he
spoke often at public meetings and media forums about the insanity of the choices
our society has made.
In Berton's opinion, the answer was greater reliance on trains. He wanted more
freight off the highways and on the rails. He believed commuter trains were the
answer to controlling suburban sprawl and breaking the North American automotive
addiction. He predicted a revival of the popularity of fast passenger trains on
routes such as the Quebec City-to-Windsor corridor. Berton put his
money where his mouth was on this last point, frequently taking the train when he
went to Kingston, Ottawa, or Montreal for book launches or speaking engagements.
Berton was a humorous, but brutally frank person. Shortly before his death, he
told me he was proud of his 50 books, but he didn't believe they would outlive him
by more than one generation. On this point, I think he was wrong.
When he came out to greet the arrival of 2816 at a CPR grade crossing near his home
just north of Toronto in 2003, he was swarmed by railroaders who wanted to
congratulate him on his railway writings.
Many were younger employees, who had him autograph their already
dog-eared copies of the books.
That's proof to me that Berton won't be forgotten. I think the onslaught of time
will make him even more appreciated in railway circles. Let's hope - as he did -
that there will be other writers who will follow him in telling the many tales of
the CPR - past, present, and future.
This Momentum magazine article is copyright 2005 by
Canadian Pacific Railway and is reprinted here with their permission. All
photographs, logos, and trademarks are the property of the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company.
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