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Walter Volovsek: Time Windows — A Bridge to Castlegar

Although Castlegar was born in 1897, it took a railway bridge to infuse the town with life.
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The Heckman photo is remarkable as it shows buildings relating to former Sproat’s Landing and the farm of Thomas Sproat himself. Courtesy of Exporail: The Canadian Railway Museum; CPR Fonds, Heckman No. 2508a.

Although Castlegar was born on paper in the fall of 1897, it took a railway bridge to infuse the embryonic townsite with life.

Nearly a decade previously, Albert McCleary had the future city all to himself, with his vegetable gardens, ram pastures, and ferry operation. He witnessed the development of Sproats Landing directly across the river, and the beginnings of the first railway in the Kootenays as it started inching its way from the Landing towards Nelson in 1890.

Seven years later it was joined by the Columbia & Western line, extended by Augustus Heinze from Trail to a spot slightly beyond not-yet-named Castlegar.

The following winter Heinze sold his rail charter, existing lines, and smelter to the CPR, and they immediately proceeded with preparatory work for the extension of the line into the mineral-rich Boundary district. Construction was commenced in June of 1898 and completed when the rails reached Midway in October 1900.

The obvious next move was the construction of the missing link, a bridge across the Columbia, which would join the Columbia & Kootenay with the Columbia & Western line. That move led to the abandonment of the former Robson terminal, and the establishment of a major junction, with its new stationhouse and service buildings, at Castlegar.

In early September 1900, the CPR announced plans to proceed with the construction of the train bridge just slightly upstream of the former steamer landing dock. A month later, a contract for the construction of the bridge abutments and five piers was signed with John Gunn of Winnipeg.

Work commenced at the beginning of November, with surveying of the new alignment, which cut into Edward Mahon’s portion of the Castlegar townsite and altered the location for the future stationhouse. Stone cutting commenced later that month at a quarry at Five Mile Point on the West Arm.

At the same time, a provisional trestle was built from the north abutment to tie in with the active line a bit upstream of Waldie Island. No serious work could proceed on the piers until the approach trestle was completed, which would allow the delivery of heavy granite blocks.

Work on the piers commenced in mid-January 1901, with a workforce of around a hundred. A team of carpenters was busy constructing the necessary wooden falsework across the river.

As was the case on the earlier rail contracts, CPR forced unreasonably low bids which led to worker dissatisfaction over wages, and slower than required progress. It did not help that John Gunn would not allow any work on Sundays. Under pressure, he put on extra shifts and night work was undertaken under the illumination of floodlights.

In March even the Sunday rule had to be broken, in the rush to get the six piers completed before the arrival of the freshet. In April, W.P. Tiernay & Co. had 12 teams and 50 men employed excavating the big curving cut through the Castlegar townsite. By the end of the month the end of the work on the piers was in sight, and “the work has advanced to a point where the danger from high water is infinitesimal.”

When it did come, the high water delayed progress somewhat. The superstructure from Dominion Bridge Company started arriving in August. In September the segments nearest the shore were installed on the piers, and by October 23 The Nelson Miner could report:

“The swing section of the Robson bridge has been placed in position, but there are yet two spans of the rest of the bridge to be erected.”

By the beginning of December, all the spans were in place and rails were being laid by CPR crews. Soon the bridge became functional in allowing the transport of excavated materials from the Castlegar side across the river to act as fill around the long approach trestle. That work, mostly by the CPR now, took an additional four months before the bridge was opened for passenger traffic in the last week of April.

We have a unique view of some of the earlier activity, captured by W. Heckman on May 29, 1901. He worked for the CPR engineering department and took on the specialized responsibility of documenting features along the company’s lines. He was in our area on several occasions, and his image of the bridge piers is especially valuable.

In it we see the falsework flooded by the high water of the freshet; the bridge piers sparkling in their novelty, and in the shadows, several sturdy buildings of old Sproat’s Landing.

I was surprised to see that they survived the 1894 flood. The rails to the steamer landing are visible just above the water, men are working on the abutment to which the trestle connects, and a bit downstream can be seen the clearing and building remnants from Tom Sproat’s farm, which gave the landing its name.