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Timeline

Explore the ups and downs of BC's salmon canning industry. Use the filter to investigate themes including technology, environment, social changes, and global events.

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Transportation

1885

Canadian Pacific Railway is completed

The Canadian Pacific Railway takes four years to build and is part of Canada's promise to British Columbia when it enters Confederation. Once complete, the CPR provides access to central and eastern Canadian markets and shortens the shipping distance for canned salmon to European markets. With the completion of the railway, many of the men who built it found work in the growing salmon canning industry.

Two men stand looking at a Canadian Pacific train engine on a track. The train car reads "Canadian Pacific 3213."

A train is seen on the CPR track. c. 1894 Image D-01476 courtesy of the Royal BC Museum and Archives.

1914

Completion of Grand Trunk Pacific Railway

The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway connects Prince Rupert with the rest of Canada through Winnipeg and opens a land-based transportation route for canned salmon from northern canneries.

A celebration at Fort Fraser for the linking of the steel on the Grand Pacific Railway. Text on the image reads: "Linking up of steel on G.T.P. Transcontinental 1914."

Completion of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. Image B-00326 courtesy of the Royal BC Museum and Archives.

1914

Completion of the Panama Canal

The completion of the canal shortens the steamship route from Vancouver to Liverpool by over 9000 km or 23 days.

Black and white photograph of a construction site with five railway tracks going through it.

The excavation and removal of dirt at the Culebra Cut, during the construction Panama Canal in 1907.