by Helen Baxter

I was on a train going from Revelstoke to Vancouver. The train stopped some distance before Vancouver in a wooded area with no one about. All the passengers on the train were allowed to get off the train and watch Lord Strathcona pound in the “golden” spike marking the joining of the C.P.R. railroad from East to West.
As he put in the last spike, he said, “Stand fast, Craigahie”. I was amazed because that was the name of the village in Scotland in which I was born. As far as I know, the place where Lord Strathcona put in the golden spike and named Craigahie is still marked by a post bearing that name.

 

The last spike that joined the east-west construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway was driven at
Craigellachie B.C. on November 7, 1885. Pictured is Sir Donald A. Smith driving the spike. Immediately behind him is 17 year old Edward Mallandaine who went on to found the town of Creston, British Columbia

 

 

 

 

 

 

Donald Alexander Smith, 1st Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal, GCMG, GCVO, PC, DL (6 August 1820 – 21 January 1914) was a Scottish-born Canadian who became one of the British Empire’s foremost builders and philanthropists