NOT a Harmon.

As soon as I pick up these two post cards, I can tell that they were not published by Byron Harmon. The paper is thinner and the finish is glossy.

They are actually published by the Gowan Sutton Company out of Vancouver, British Columbia. Gowan and Sutton were both English by birth but came to Vancouver from two different ways. Gowan came through Manitoba (in 1913) and Sutton came via Ontario (in 1918); they were both photographers.

They formed the F. Gowan Co. on March 17, 1919 (Gowan had 4,000 shares to Sutton's 2,000 shares) and on March 17, 1920 they formed a partnership called the Gowan Sutton Co. Ltd. Frank Gowan sold his shares in the company in 1929 after his wife died. I cannot find if Sutton changed the name of the company after that. Frank Gowan developed a series of post cards for both the Canadian National and the Canadian Pacific Railways.

These two post cards are part of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

The first one tells us that it is on the Canadian Pacific Railway, in fact, it says that this is the "CPR TransCanada Limited near Field, BC." My research tells me that this one of Frank Gowan's photographs. The script is the same as the script on so many other of his photographs. The post card itself is a silver gelatin print.

The second post card is also a silver gelatin print, but this one has been colorized. A bit of green has been added to the picture to let us know that we are in a forest; and a bit of red has been added to the passenger cars, while some green found its way onto the observation car. The title has been put to the bottom of the post card and it is now in block letters. I wonder if this is the result of Mr. Sutton's work after he took full ownership of the company...

They both have a very similar rubber stamp on the back - like Byron Harmon's. It tells us the name of the publisher, that the address goes on the right and the correspondence goes on the left.

What Goes Up, Must Come Down!

Finally!! A train that is not going up the Kicking Horse Canyon, but down! This is a Byron Harmon post card - the words at the bottom blend into the white foreground very well. But, I can read that he has written, "966. Lower Spiral Tunnel" onto the picture.

The engine that we are looking at is carrying a train about 3,000 feet long. The Lower Spiral Tunnel is just short of 1,000 yards long and this train is sticking out on both ends of the tunnel.(P.S. Notice that observation car at the back of train, again.) This is one strong steam engine. It is a Selkirk. It was built to do exactly what it is pictured here doing. They ran trains from Taft, British Columbia to Calgary, Alberta. I picked up the following information from the Wikipedia website.

The Selkirk locomotives were 36 steam locomotives of the 2-10-4 wheel arrangement built for Canadian Pacific Railway by Montreal Locomotive Works, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. They were named after the Selkirk range of mountains that they crossed.

The first of these was built in July 1929. Altogether, twenty were constructed before the end of this year bearing numbers 5900 to 5919. All of the Selkirk locomotives (5900 through 5935) were initially assigned to handle both freight as well as passenger trains between the major division points of Calgary and Revelstoke a distance of 262 miles. They were also used for 23 miles in pusher service from Revelstoke west (uphill) to the wye at Taft, assisting the road engines of both freight as well as passenger trains up the steep grade to this location. The Laggan Subdivision covered the Eastern portion of their assigned territory 137 miles and included the Field Hill and the famous Spiral Tunnels while the Western portion of their territory consisted of the Mountain Subdivision which covered the remaining 126 miles and included the famous Rogers Pass, the Connaught Tunnel and Stoney Creek Bridge. The grades encountered had a maximum of 2.2 per cent with curves of 12 degrees or 480 feet (150 m) radius. Rated at 78,000 pounds-force tractive effort, on the lesser grades they could haul 1,050 short tons unassisted and without the booster cut-in. The booster engine added an additional 12,000 pounds of tractive effort up to a maximum speed of 20 miles per hour. Due to their extreme weight, they could not proceed west of Taft to Vancouver.

The Canadian Pacific Railway's classification was T1a. Montreal Locomotive Works built another ten of these successful mountain locomotives during November and December 1938. The Canadian Pacific Railway assigned them T1b class. They were numbered from 5920 to 5929. Modifications led the T1b to be ten tons lighter while increasing steam pressure from 275 to 285 pounds per square inch. A further six Selkirks, classed T1c, were built by the Montreal Locomotive Works shop in 1949. They were the last standard gauge steam locomotives built in Canada for a Canadian railroad.

OOPS!

That isn't Mount Ogden!! That is Mount Stephen!

But, don't worry. This mistake was not made by my hero, Byron Harmon. This is a post card that is two and a half inches wide and four inches long. I can tell by the printing at the bottom of the post card that this is NOT Byron's handiwork. The script is way too fancy.

But, let us look at the post card, anyway. This is a beautiful shot of Mt. Stephen. It was named after George Stephen, the first president of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

Through my 15 power magnifying glass, I can see that there are two engines pulling the passenger train up the canyon and about to enter Mt. Ogden. It is in Mt. Ogden that the Lower Spiral Tunnel is located. As you look a the front of the train, you can see that it is about to pass a white sign, the sign says, "YOHO". That is the name of the station at which the Lower Spiral Tunnel is located. Yoho is the name of the National Park in which all of this is situated, but it is also a Cree word that means wonderful or awesome. A great description for this area of the world.

Along the Kicking Horse River...

... AGAIN!

Once again, we see a post card showing the struggling train as it heads up the Kicking Horse Canyon next to the Kicking Horse River. The words scratched onto the bottom of the picture say,"777. Mt. Field and Kicking Horse River." This train looks as if it is on its way from Golden, British Columbia to Field.

It is a passenger train of nine cars; the observation car at the back tells me that the Canadian Pacific Railroad certainly knew the stunning beauty of this area would be a great attraction to paying passengers. I wonder if this car simply went back and forth from Revelstoke, British Columbia (or even Vancouver) to Calgary, Alberta and back over and over and over...


Once again, I include some biography about Byron Harmon from the website: "http://www.harmonphotography.com/artists/byron.html"

The most ambitious and photographically lucrative trip of Harmon’s career was a self-initiated trek across the Columbia Icefield with writer Lewis Freeman in 1924. What made the expedition so impressive was not only the crossing itself but the inclusion of a pack train of 15 horses loaded to the teeth with photographic and motion picture equipment. In one instance of extremely bad weather near the beginning of the trip, Harmon lost,”more supplies in two days than the recent US Geological Survey expedition lost in its three months voyage through the rapids of the Grand Canyon. Even at that, however, we were never seriously handicapped by a shortage either of food or of photographic supplies”1. Also included in the supplies were several carrier pigeons Harmon had bred himself and an early radio device, the intent being to, prove that radio reception was possible in the wilds of the western mountains, and “wanting to see if the pigeons could thread their way through the peaks back to Banff” 2. In both cases the experiments were successful. The trip followed, primarily, the line of the Continental Divide and included many dangerous river crossings as well as the treacherous ice travel. In one extreme case of photographic stoicism, Harmon camped in one spot for eight days waiting for the perfect light on Mt. Columbia. The trip yielded 400 stills, 700 feet. of film, an article for National Geographic, and a book by Freeman entitled On the Roof of the Rockies.

Working Hard!!

Once again, we are in the Kicking Horse Canyon. I have chased trains for many years in this area. There are some areas where the highway is right next to the railroad tracks and others up high where some very spectacular views can be had. I know from my own experience why Byron Harmon would have so many pictures of trains taken in this area. PLUS, it is close to Banff, his adopted home town.

In this picture There are two engines puling a passenger train up the hill toward Banff, after passing Field, Yoho, Stephen, Divide and a few other stations. I tried to read the numbers on these engines with my magnifying glass, but could not. I can't even see the wheel arrangements clearly, but it looks like they could be either 2-6-0s or 2-6-2s.

Letting my imagination carry me away, I like to think that Bryon was spotted by the first engineer who is blowing his whistle to recognize Byron and his camera's presence.

Again, more about Byron from the website:


Harmon reached the peak of his career in the early 1920’s. Although by this time his participation with the Alpine Club had petered off, he was organising his own mountaineering trips with purely photographic objectives, allowing him to seek out the ideal situations for mountain photography. As well, his work had gained national and even international recognition.

Going UP!

These two post cards are pictures of the same view. And, they have the same writing on the bottom of the picture to identify where it was: "772. Kicking Horse Canyon." I have both of these cards in my collection because one is in black and white while the other is done in sepia tones.

One can tell by looking at the rapids in the river that the train is headed up hill. What I do not know is where the picture was taken and what mountain is in the background. My experience while chasing trains in the Kicking Horse Canyon is that this might be at the bottom of the canyon where today a very large bridge flies over the river and trains tracks. The highway is in the middle left of the card just as the river bends to the right. I think that this closeness places the scene where I just described??? I will have to take my collection with me next time we head west from Edmonton at that latitude.

The train in the picture only has one engine and it is a freight! Maybe there is a pusher at the back helping it up the mountain slopes. Anyway, this one certainly is working!! Look at that smoke coming out of the stack.

Here is a profile of the elevations along the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railway as it goes from Calgary, Alberta to Golden, British Columbia through the Rockies. I found this on the wall of the Whyte Museum in Banff, Alberta.

It shows that Calgary is 3,248 feet above sea level; the second station is Cochrane (a town in Alberta) at 3,749 feet; Morley, which is a very flat plain on an Indian Reservation, is at 4,067 feet; three stations later we are in Canmore, Alberta (another town) at 4,284; then Banff is at 4,521 feet; Castle Mountain (we will see this in a later blog posting) is at 4,880 feet; Stephen (the tallest point on the chart) is at 5,321 feet; then it drops down to Field, British Columbia at 4,064 feet.
So, you can see that the change in the elevation from Morley to Stephen is the same as the change in elevation from Stephen to Field. However, the distance from Morley to Stephen is about 67 miles and the distance from Stephen to Field is only 13 miles.

More about Byron Harmon from the website:


In town, Harmon pursued his civic responsibilities as enthusiastically as he did his photography. After 1908, his business continued to expand and additions and renovations to his commercial building, Harmons, became almost yearly events. He lent his time and energy to many boards and committees and was an outspoken businessman in the community. He garnered a reputation as a quiet, amiable man with a good sense of humour, dedicated to his work, his family, and his town. Portrait work became an active pursuit for Harmon again, as well, and he recorded many famous images of the Stoney Indians both on their reserve at Morley and during the Banff Indian Days celebrations in Banff.

Getting Even Closer

I thought that the last blog post had a close up of a train along the Kicking Horse River; I was mistaken.

Take a look at the picture on this post card. While it is not in the best of shapes, it does show a very close up view of another train on the CPR mainline. Through my 15 power magnifying glass, I can see that the engine number has four digits, but I can't make out what they are. The train does seem to be double headed, as per usual on this section of the mainline. There is writing along the bottom right hand toward the corner. It says,"357. Kicking Horse Canyon." It was written there by Byron Harmon when he developed and printed the post card. The back has the stamp on it that tells us that it is his card and provides reminders of which side is for the address and which side is for the correspondence.

This poor post card has several bends and creases in it. But, it is a Byron Harmon original and so it stays in my collection. So, a bit more about Byron:(taken from the website: http://www.harmonphotography.com/artists/byron.html)

In 1906 The Alpine Club of Canada was formed under the Directorship of Arthur O. Wheeler. With Byron’s noticeable presence in town, Wheeler invited him to become a charter member and the official club photographer. To compliment it’s lofty ambitions, the ACC was committed to publishing an annual journal, which would feature prominently Harmon’s photos. The opportunity was a rare blessing and afforded Harmon a shot at reaching his goal of photographing every peak in the Rockies in as many moods and settings as possible.

Two Alpine Club trips in particular accounted for a sizeable body of Harmon’s collection and increased his stature as a photographer and a mountain goer. The first was a trip into the Purcell Mountains with Wheeler and Himalayan climber Dr. T. G. Longstaff in 1910, during which Harmon discovered and photographed Bugaboo Glacier.. The second was a three-month expedition the following year into the Mt. Robson area with Wheeler, mountain guide Conrad Kain, and four scientists from the Smithsonian Institute. For Wheeler, the trip was a chance to explore new territory in preparation for a later ACC camp and to scout out the Canadian Rockies’ most lofty peak; for the scientists it was a great look at the flora and fauna of the northern Canadian Rockies; and for Harmon it was an intimate look at some of the wildest country in Western Canada. During the trip, Harmon and Kain made a first ascent of nearby Mt. Resplendent, 3362 meters. During a future trip Harmon would photograph a party summiting the ridge of Mt. Resplendent, one of his most famous images.