MAKING A NATION.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 1 March 1927, Page 7

MAKING A NATION.

* WORK OF A ItAIBW A 1

EPIC Ur TjIE CANADIAN l ACIeIC

Canada owles much oi her dc\ clopuionL and pi ogress to that curiously complex institution known us tne Can anion Pacific! Railway. There i.s notmng like it in.any other country. Most railways are content to remain common carriers, their so.e amoitiou being to earn dividends for hungry shareholders. The Canadian Pa-iiic per.orms this desirable function, out the real aim is far higher—the building up of the Dominion as a powerful member of tlic British community of nations. In 1899 the Canadian Pacific possessed 7000 miles of line, the hard-won fruits of 19 years’ laborious effort, and showed net earnings of £2,446,000. Last year the net earnings were £8,030,800. The interests of the company .stretched from Great Britain across Canada, to the Far East, and included the following: 20,000 miles of line. 28 Transatlantic steamships. 5 Pacific liners. 21 river and lake steamships. 13 modern hotels. 2,300 railway engines. 100,000 goods waggons. 120,000 miles of telegraph and telephone lines. But this no more than begins to tell the story of the Canadian Pacific’s many-sided activities. It is bent upon peopling the vast tracts of country which still cfy out for settlers, despite the steady influx of immigrants from all parts of Europe. V UNIVERSAL PROVIDER. To do this the company maintains an organisation of far-reaching dimensions, deals solely with the problems of colonisation and land improvement. Here are some of its ramifications : Irrigation schemes in waterless areas, including tue largest, of their kind on this continent. “Ready-made 1 ’ farms for colonists on . easy terms. Free “better farm trains” fitted as travelling agricultural colleges for the instruction of fanners in remote dist tricts. Supplying pure breeding stock to settlers. Furnishing cheap land to immigrants for development (on terms lower than those of private owners) and financial aid where necessary. Supplying of millions of young trees to tanners from its own tree nurseries. Obtaining farm help for. settlers at seeding and harvest time —on an average 50,000 a year. The -machinery for handling these diverse enterprises is like that of a national Government. There are'departments corresponding to Ministries — for example, the Department of Natural Resources —with staffs of experts ready to furnish instantly complete and up-to-date information on every conceivable subject, from the mineral wealth of the Dominipn to- the available supply of fruit-bearing trees in a remote corner of the Kettle Valley. The company’s settlement work in the prairie provinces has been on a gigantic scale. More than 55,000 fainilies have through its efforts occupied and partially cultivated 30,000,000 acres of land. l Irrigation is an important and Costly phase of Canadian Pacific railway land development. * An area of 3,000,000 acres was secured in southern Alberta —greater than the total irrigation areain "either California or Colorado —and is being made fertile ky water from the Row river at Calgary. The western section is already well settled, and the eastern section will be available as soon as the water supply is developed. This is only one of several irrigation schemes now under way. What impresses every experienced traveller immediately is the spirit ot co-operation shown bv all the employees of the Canadian Pacific Railway, from the negro porter in charge of a- colonist ear to the highest officials. They take a real interest in their work, whatevor it may be, and a reai desire to help e' erv ’person, howerbr humble, who mat ,be entrusted to their care.