This Goat Gets Around

The picture on the front of this post card shows Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) locomotive number 3206 at work in the rail yard of Vancouver, British Columbia. Because it is working in the rail yard, it has earned the title of

"Goat". That is the term used to describe an engine that works in the rail yards. This particular photo is from around 1930, according the publisher of the post card. The good news for this engine is that it did not spend its entire life in the rail yard. When I went on line to see what I could find out about the locomotive, I stumbled on a picture of it on Vancouver Island. The front page of the Canadian Historical Railroad Association published a picture of this same engine working as a logging train. This is the text under the picture: "Once upon a time, main line logging trains were as picturesque as their backwoods counterparts, as witness this picture of two Esquimalt & Nanaimo timber trains meeting somewhere on Vancouver Island about twenty-five years ago, the loaded train headed by Canadian Pacific M-l-a class 2-8-0 No.3206." This quote is taken from the July / August issue (Number 113) of 1960. So, in 1930 the engine was working in the Vancouver rail yards, and by 1935 it had earned its way onto the island to haul logs to market.

The post card was published by the Head-end Rail Prints Company out of White Rock, British Columbia. They existed after 1971 because the address includes a Canada Postal Code (first introduced in 1971). However, a search on the internet does not lead to any other information about the company. The business currently at 1450 Johnston Road in White Rock, British Columbia is the Hygrove Design Company and it has a different Postal Code.