Recently added to my bookshelf: A Prairie Odyssey - Allan Beaven and the Tree Planting Car by Dianne Beaven (published in 2011, with 2023 Update). A one-time advertisement by the Dauphin Rail Museum caught my eye and I've been thoroughly enjoying reading the writer's unique perspective on her father Allan's long association with the unique travelling Tree Planting Car (TPC - as she refers to it, and so will I). The 5.5x8.5 perfect-bound book is chock-full of anecdotes, history, photos and remembrances - an enjoyable, well-illustrated read! I've gleaned information from the book and added to this post (that languished in draft form for quite a while) showing the various TPC's that roamed CN and CP lines.
The Canadian Pacific TPC prepares to welcome another group of farmers and schoolchildren at a community on the Prairies during the 1950s (CP photo - top photo. - note the end-of-car collapsible bracket for flag-flying). The cars were a cooperative effort between railways and the Canadian Forestry Association (CFA) to teach and encourage soil and moisture conservation on the treeless prairie. Planting shelter belts to protect farms from the ravages of wind and drought was encouraged. TPCs were a popular attraction throughout their 55 years of service. Captioned 1950 (below):
GENESIS OF TREE-PLANTING PROGRAMS
The writer notes that very little was previously recorded about the TPCs and the men who shared their expertise as lecturers, usually for little remuneration. Beginning with the completion of the CP line to the West Coast, beautification of stations and enticement to settle the area around them were major efforts by railways. The Canadian Forestry Association took up the cause in the 1920s as an innovator and sponsor for forest conservation, with CN and CP subsidizing a rolling home for the program in TPCs that were maintained by them at almost no cost.
The railways carried the cars gratis, placing them at each station. Station agents would make contact with the TPC staff to assist whenever possible, and even section men or carmen did maintenance on the TPCs as needed.
In an era when travelling Chautauqua shows, Better Farming Trains and school cars travelled widely, it was the social and geographic isolation of farming communities that made all three popular. Residents of these areas were eager for education, culture, entertainment and human contact from the 'outside world'. People were interested in the unique experience of learning about trees and tree planting on a railcar, and a visit to the TPC was the only real entertainment they would have during the year. TPCs were the oldest secular teaching missions in the West. Operating for 53 consecutive years, travelling 263,000 miles and hosting four generations totalling 1,500,000 visitors, the TPCs accounted for the planting of 500,000,000 trees on over 100,000 farms. If planted at six-foot intervals, these trees would circle the globe 27 times!
In the 1930s, the term Conservation Car was adopted as the former TPC travelled farther from traditional crop-growing areas to forested areas.
THE PROGRAM SPREADS AND SUCCEEDS
The TPC encouraged the planting of seedlings grown in the Indian Head, SK Nursery. Opened in 1901, the nursery's first year saw 58,800 trees distributed to 47 farmers. Becoming a model forestry farm, education and the planting of shelter belts were its main objectives. The 1886 Experimental Farm Station Act had established farms at Nappan, NS; Brandon MB; Indian Head; and Agassiz, BC and the Central Experimental Farm in Ottawa. Conifers, namely spruce and pine, were five to eight inches tall. Deciduous caragana, willow, maple, ash and poplar were shipped bare-root or as cuttings. Another Saskatchewan farm was established at Sutherland, near Saskatoon, in 1913. Over the next 41 years, both nurseries distributed 180,604,380 deciduous trees and 3,655,206 evergreens, resulting in the establishment of shelter belts around buildings, fields and gardens on many thousands of formerly treeless farm properties.
I can remember seeing the Indian Head farm during a trip west with my aunt and uncle in 1981. In A Prairie Odyssey, anecdotes included many other names of places I'd visited: Cedoux, Conquest and Imperial, SK to name a few. None of these were mainline cities or even towns. Farmers, students and townspeople were all welcome to attend one of multiple lectures, film screenings or presentations made in railway stations and schools within the many communities visited by the TPC.
CANADIAN PACIFIC TPCs
- CP 114 (above) - a suburban coach built 1906, only used for a short time as early as 1919.
- CP 121 (above) - also built 1906 at Montreal's Angus Shops, donated to the CFA in 1921 and fitted out at Angus, with lecture and demonstration space for 72 visitors. CP 121 operated as TPC for 38 years, renumbered to CP 54 (top photo) in November, 1942 and retired and scrapped at Weston Shops in Winnipeg in April, 1959.
- CP 64 - built as first-class day coach at National Steel Car 1451 in August, 1926. Refitted and assigned to CFA in March, 1959. When lettered as Conservation Car, it sported a white-painted car roof:
Canadian Pacific Spanner employees' magazine articles on the TPC in June 1959 (above) and September 1960 (below, plus four archival photos)
Canadian Forestry Conservation Car (former CPR 64) in Edmonton, AB – June 1964 – Ken Hooper Collection – Great Canadian Plains Railway Society / Galt Historic Railway Park for the Manitoba Forestry Association - Courtesy Jason Paul Sailer:
Lettered for the Manitoba Forestry Association:
An interior renovation in 1970 included the addition of educational displays, improved lighting and painting. CP's Prairie Region Vice-President (and chairman of the Prairie Provinces Forestry Association) cut the ribbon upon completion. But the car would only roam the rails for three more years. As road links improved, and information was provided to farmers in other ways, the railways were less willing to carry and spot the cars from town to town.
In 1973, CP retired TPC 64 and donated it to the Manitoba Forestry Association. It was moved to Hadashville, MB on the Greater Winnipeg Water District Railway, completing the move on a flatbed truck to the Sandilands Forest Discovery Centre. A suitable segment of track was prepared for the placement of the car. Allan Beaven was involved with programming and education as manager of the Manitoba Forestry Association until his retirement in 1978 at the age of 75! With its protective overhead shelter removed, 64 is soon to be moved to the Manitoba Agricultural Museum at Austin. (colour photo shared via Mark Perry):
Mark Perry visited the site in October, 2022:
THE MOVE TO AUSTIN
After nearly fifty years in Hadashville, the TPC was removed by two large cranes, placed on a special steerable-wheel flatbed trailer and taken on a circuitous route over the 357 kilometres to Austin, MB - home of the Manitoba Agricultural Museum - on November 8, 2022. The museum had agreed to add the car to its exhibits and built a protective roof over it. Once in Austin, the prepared track and trucks were ready to receive the car. This, following some initial difficulty finding the pins holding the car onto its trucks due to an extremely large cache of fir cones that some industrious squirrel had collected there!
CANADIAN NATIONAL TPCs
The CFA operated a program through Ontario, Quebec, the Maritimes and British Columbia, similar to the TPCs on the Prairies.
- CN 6065 - Forestry Exhibition Car, 1920 to 1932.
- CN 15021 - Donated by CN, this wood-body, steel-underframe 80-foot car was built for the Canadian Northern Railway at CC&F's Amherst, NS works in 1914, as 14-section tourist sleeper 9408. Renumbered CN 2211 in 1920, steel-plated in December 1926. Rebuilt by CN in the early 1950s, reconfigured as combined lecture car and library and renumbered 15021. It was turned over to the CFA on February 22, 1954.
CN 15021 wore an overall olive green scheme with gold lettering. Canadian Forestry Association heavyweight car from the CFA Archives, Library & Archives Canada undated photos, posted to social media by Rian Manson, showing the car's opposite side:
Another photo of CN 15021 in this black & white scheme in 1962.
CN 15021 wore a white and green 'Parklands 74' Parkland Regional Library scheme as shown in this cool 1976 photo posted to Flickr. CN 9098, built in 1953, wore an overall white 'Extension Services Division' in an accompanying Flickr photo.
Lots o' links:
- Excellent 'Sitting in the Lap of History' video by the MFA showing CP 64's crane lift on at Hadashville and off at Austin. The MFA itself has apparently gone into hibernation.
- Comprehensive PowerPoint presentation based on Dianne Beaven's book with many additional photos. Well worth watching!
- Black Cat Publishing decals for CN 15021.
- Black Cat Publishing decals for CP 64.
- Allan Beaven was a Memorable Manitoban!
- CTV Winnipeg covered the move of CP 64.
- CN 15021 in Vancouver, 1962.
In Part 2, (see an upcoming post) more about CN 15021 in its later life as a museum display car.
My thanks to Jason Gilmore, President of the Dauphin Rail Museum for listing and making this excellent book available to me!
Running extra...
I was proud to share the Platforum (can it really be four years ago?) with VIA engineer Jordan McCallum. This week, Jordan is celebrating 30 years with Canada's railways, now in the right-hand seat. Congratulations, Jordan! Thanks for being a faithful supporter of Trackside Treasure and best wishes celebrating your career as you roll on to year 31 and beyond!
Though I hate to disappoint my Instagram friend Travis the goalie and his goal of the Canadian returning to CP rails - they are never, ever, getting back together!
2 comments:
I also sent a few "VIA" items to go on display...
Thanks for sharing the image of the forestry car at Edmonton, it goes well with your informative writeup about these cars!
Good job and thanks, Jason!
Eric
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