gordonhunter
CPR Passenger train on north end of High Level Bridge, Edmonton, Alberta, ca. 1958.
Early morning arrival from points east (Wilkie, Sask.?, Hardisty?) just minutes from the North Edmonton Station. Maybe it was even the midnight train from Calgary but I doubt it - no sleepers. The picture is from the late fities. My father was a brakeman at the time and worked the midnight run between Calgary and Edmonton for years but also on trains that ran east from Edmonton via Wetaskiwin and possibly Lacombe. (Some years later I worked once as a brakeman on one of the latter but it was a freight and out of Red Deer. The poor conductor, Quinlan by name, had two green brakeman but he was very patient and gracious, inviting us to dinner at his home in Coronation where we overnighted, we brakemen in the caboose. It's a memory of what seems a very distant time - generally no more cabooses or brakemen on freights).
At this time I was still at an age when being allowed to drive the family car was a privilege worth getting up early for so my father, arriving on this train, had the benefit of being met at the station to be driven home back across the bridge. Ironic, in that I now leave my car (or cars, to be exact) parked for weeks or months at a time in favor of a bicycle.
I would probably have worked on the servicing of this engine as a wiper (the starting position for fireman and locomotive engineer in those days) in the CPR roundhouse in South Edmonton during the summer school holiday.
The poles on the sides of the bridge were no doubt for trolley wires for the earlier streetcars which had been phased out almost 10 years ealier (Thank you, General Motors). Today a group of dedicated Edmontonians rebuild, maintain and run an impressive collection of vintage streetcars over the bridge during summer months.
CPR Passenger train on north end of High Level Bridge, Edmonton, Alberta, ca. 1958.
Early morning arrival from points east (Wilkie, Sask.?, Hardisty?) just minutes from the North Edmonton Station. Maybe it was even the midnight train from Calgary but I doubt it - no sleepers. The picture is from the late fities. My father was a brakeman at the time and worked the midnight run between Calgary and Edmonton for years but also on trains that ran east from Edmonton via Wetaskiwin and possibly Lacombe. (Some years later I worked once as a brakeman on one of the latter but it was a freight and out of Red Deer. The poor conductor, Quinlan by name, had two green brakeman but he was very patient and gracious, inviting us to dinner at his home in Coronation where we overnighted, we brakemen in the caboose. It's a memory of what seems a very distant time - generally no more cabooses or brakemen on freights).
At this time I was still at an age when being allowed to drive the family car was a privilege worth getting up early for so my father, arriving on this train, had the benefit of being met at the station to be driven home back across the bridge. Ironic, in that I now leave my car (or cars, to be exact) parked for weeks or months at a time in favor of a bicycle.
I would probably have worked on the servicing of this engine as a wiper (the starting position for fireman and locomotive engineer in those days) in the CPR roundhouse in South Edmonton during the summer school holiday.
The poles on the sides of the bridge were no doubt for trolley wires for the earlier streetcars which had been phased out almost 10 years ealier (Thank you, General Motors). Today a group of dedicated Edmontonians rebuild, maintain and run an impressive collection of vintage streetcars over the bridge during summer months.