Ron Brown - The Train Doesnt Stop Here Anymore - An Illustrated History of Railway Stations in Canada

The Masters of the Station: The Railway Station Agents

At Work in the Station

Station agents once numbered in the tens of thousands and were the most influential men (only a few were women) in small-town Canada, more prominent than bankers and politicians and the envy of the clergy. According to others, the agents were surly and self-serving, more concerned about rules, forms, and freight receipts than they were about the comfort and convenience of passengers. But revered or reviled, the railway station agent, like the stations he manned, has vanished from the roll call of Canadian communities.

Before construction began on the Great Western Railway in 1851, Canadas railways consisted of only a handful of portage railways: the Erie and Ontario, the Montreal and Lachine, and the Champlain and St. Lawrence. Because these lines served only to transport passengers and a bit of freight from one waterway to another, agents roles were quite simple. As with the stagecoach and canal operations that preceded them, their first jobs were to ticket passengers and collect express charges, and drum up business for the railway. But, unlike stagecoaches and steamers, trains operated along a single track and a new function was added; making sure that trains didnt collide.

Before the telegraph and before standard time, that wasnt easy. No two communities had the same hour on their clocks at the same time, and trains operated as best they could, according to a simple timetable. All trains were required to stop while the engineers entered the station to sign the train order forms. If the train ahead had been late, the agent held up the train at hand until he assumed the previous train was clear. With no telegraph or other form of inter-station communication, he simply held his breath and hoped he was right.

However, by 1855, the Grand Trunk and Great Western Railways had become Canadas first trunk lines, and the telegraph was making train operations simpler and safer. Relaying train orders soon became the agents most important function. As orders would click in from the dispatcher in the divisional station, the agent had to carefully write them down. Because this task took up such a large portion of the agents time, sending and receiving telegraph messages became almost second nature. It was not uncommon for an agent to send a telegram with one hand while at the same time writing a letter, carrying on a conversation, or even reading a book.