The Midland Railway of Canada was a historical

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

railway which ran from Port Hope,

Ontario Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...

to Midland on

Georgian Bay The Georgian Bay () is a large bay of Lake Huron, in the Laurentia bioregion. It is located entirely within the borders of Ontario, Canada. The main body of the bay lies east of the Bruce Peninsula and Manitoulin Island. To its northwest is t ...

. The line was originally intended to run to

Peterborough Peterborough ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in the City of Peterborough district in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Cambridgeshire, England. The city is north of London, on the River Nene. A ...

, but the competing

Cobourg and Peterborough Railway The Cobourg and Peterborough Railway (C&PRy) was one of the first railway lines to be built in Central Ontario, Canada. The line was initially considered in 1831 as a way to bring the products from the burgeoning area around Peterborough, Ontario ...

was completed in 1854 and the owner's plans changed. Redirecting the line northward, it opened as the Port Hope, Lindsay & Beaverton Railway, a much longer line than originally planned. A further expansion launched in 1869 pushed the line westward towards

, and prompted renaming as the Midland Railway. By the 1880s the area east of

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

was over-served by a number of short and generally unprofitable lines. Merger plans between the various lines began in 1881, which resulted in the Midland adding a

third rail A third rail, also known as a live rail, electric rail or conductor rail, is a method of providing electric power to a railway locomotive or train, through a semi-continuous rigid conductor placed alongside or between the rails of a track (r ...

to the

Toronto and Nipissing Railway The Toronto and Nipissing Railway (T&N) was the first public narrow-gauge railway in North America. It chartered in 1868 to build from Toronto to Lake Nipissing in Ontario, Canada, via York, Ontario, and Victoria counties. At Nipissing it would me ...

's (T&N) narrow-gauge line to allow Midland trains to follow the T&N lines into

Scarborough Scarborough or Scarboro may refer to: People * Scarborough (surname) * Earl of Scarbrough Places Australia * Scarborough, Western Australia, suburb of Perth * Scarborough, New South Wales, suburb of Wollongong * Scarborough, Queensland, sub ...

. The merger was officially completed in 1881. On 10 March 1882 the company arranged an enormous merger of many of the smaller railways in the area, including the

Whitby, Port Perry and Lindsay Railway The Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway (PW&PP) was a railway running from Whitby, Ontario, Whitby to Port Perry, Ontario, Port Perry, running north–south about 50 km east of Toronto. It was built to connect local grain and logging interes ...

Victoria Railway The Victoria Railway was a long Canadian railway that operated in Central Ontario. Construction under Chief Engineer James Ross began in 1874 from Lindsay, Ontario, with authority to build through Victoria County to Haliburton, Ontario, to ...

Toronto and Ottawa Railway Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

and

Grand Junction Railway The Grand Junction Railway (GJR) was an early railway company in the United Kingdom, which existed between 1833 and 1846. The line built by the company, which opened in 1837, linked the Liverpool and Manchester Railway to Birmingham via Warri ...

to become a greatly expanded Midland Railway with of track. Only two years later the

Grand Trunk Railway The Grand Trunk Railway (; ) was a Rail transport, railway system that operated in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario and in the List of states and territories of the United States, American sta ...

leased most of the lines in the area as part of a major expansion plan, and purchased them outright in 1893. The Midland was one of the earliest examples of a

rail trail A rail trail or railway walk is a shared-use path on a Right of way#Rail right of way, railway right of way. Rail trails are typically constructed after a railway has been abandoned and the track has been removed but may also share the rail corr ...

conversion in Ontario, started as a

Canadian Centennial The Canadian Centennial was a yearlong celebration held in 1967 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Canadian Confederation. Celebrations in Canada occurred throughout the year but culminated on Dominion Day, July 1. Commemorative coins were m ...

project. Today, the Midland Railway mainline forms a major portion of the Ganaraska Hiking Trail, the majority of which was opened in 1969.

History

Designs on Peterborough

Fierce competition between the

Lake Ontario Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. The Canada–United Sta ...

port towns of Port Hope and neighbouring

Cobourg Cobourg ( ) is a town in the Canadian province of Ontario, located in Southern Ontario east of Toronto and east of Oshawa. It is the largest town in and seat of Northumberland County. Its nearest neighbour is Port Hope, to the west. It is ...

drove development of transport through the area during the middle of the 19th century. The competition had started with the 1834 announcements of plans to run a railway from Cobourg to Peterborough, at that time a rapidly developing industrial town. The initial plans for the

went nowhere due to a lack of funds, especially after the

Panic of 1837 The Panic of 1837 was a financial crisis in the United States that began a major depression (economics), depression which lasted until the mid-1840s. Profits, prices, and wages dropped, westward expansion was stalled, unemployment rose, and pes ...

. The formation of the federal government and its ministry for development led to both Port Hope and Cobourg competing for funds to develop a line to Peterborough. The Cobourg line was designed to run across Rice Lake, and was therefore more risky than the Port Hope line that ran around the western end of the Lake. The Port Hope proposal was accepted, and The Peterborough and Port Hope Railway Company (P&PH) was officially chartered on 16 December 1846. Cobourg responded by rapidly building a

plank road A plank road is a road composed of Plank (wood), wooden planks or wikt:puncheon#Noun, puncheon logs, as an efficient technology for traversing soft, marshy, or otherwise difficult ground. Plank roads have been built since antiquity, and were comm ...

near their original railway route, which was completed by the end of the year. Meanwhile, the Port Hope plans received no further funding, and eventually went moribund. Cobourg's plank road proved impassible in spring and fall, and by 1850 had fallen into disrepair. Plans for a railway from Cobourg once again surfaced, this time more successfully. Construction on the line started in 1853, and the new

(C&P) reached Peterborough at the end of 1854.

Lindsay and Beaverton

With the route to Peterborough now being served by Cobourg, and their original plans having seen no development for six years, business interests in Port Hope looked further north for potential markets. They eventually selected the town of Lindsay due to its connection to the recently announced Trent-Severn Waterway, with a further expansion to the shores of

Lake Simcoe Lake Simcoe is a lake in southern Ontario, Canada, the fourth-largest lake wholly within the province, after Lake Nipigon, Lac Seul, and Lake Nipissing. At the time of the first European contact in the 17th century, the lake was called ''Ouentir ...

. The new railway received its charter on 18 December 1854 as The Port Hope, Lindsay and Beaverton Railway Company (PHL&B). Construction reached Lindsay in late 1857. By that time the Cobourg and Peterborough had proven to be unreliable due to its constantly failing bridge, and the Lindsay and Beaverton opened their Millbrook Branch to Peterborough in 1858. This was a serious threat to the C&P, who ousted their operator, D'Arcy Boulton Jr. Boulton soon took out the operations lease on the Millbrook Branch along with two partners, Henry Covert and John Fowler. The next year the three presented a plan to lease operations of the C&P as well. As soon as this was completed, the new operators laid off the men working to finally fix the C&P bridge over Rice Lake, and later sabotaged it so that it eventually fell into the lake around 1861. The PHL&B now had exclusive access to Peterborough, which they retained for some time. Further expansions were slow in coming. The line did not reach its planned terminus in Beaverton until 1 January 1871, and that same year the Millbrook Branch pushed north out of Peterborough to Lakefield, giving it access to the middle-area of the Trent waterway on

Katchewanooka Lake Katchewanooka Lake is one of the Kawartha lakes in south-central Ontario, Canada. It is about long and wide. The Trent Severn Waterway flows through Lake Katchewanooka into the Otonabee River at its outlet just north of Lakefield, continuing ...

. The competing Cobourg line started the similar Peterborough and Chemong Lake Railway in 1857, but this was not completed until 1891. The Railway started the 1870s in good financial condition. In 1870 its receipts were $242,157 against expenses of $113,227, an Operating Ratio of 47%. By this time the company had plans for a much more ambitious expansion.

Midland Railway

On 24 December 1869 the company was re-chartered as The Midland Railway of Canada (MR) with plans to drive around Lake Simcoe and the head towards Midland to provide access to

. In 1872

Frank Shanly Frank, FRANK, or Franks may refer to: People * Frank (given name) * Frank (surname) * Franks (surname) * Franks, a Germanic people in late Roman times * Franks, a term in the Muslim world for all western Europeans, particularly during the Crusa ...

was awarded the contract for the new fifty-three mile section. There were unforeseen difficulties with the ground and a rapid increase in labour costs, which ruined Shanly. The Midland was financially strapped, could not afford to pay Shanly for the extras, and seized the contract back in February 1873. At the same time the recession hit freight receipts which fell by 30% between 1872 and 1874. The first Midland Railway manager D’Arcy E. Boulton of

Cobourg, Ontario Cobourg ( ) is a town in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario, located in Southern Ontario east of Toronto and east of Oshawa. It is the largest town in and seat of Northumberland County, Ontario, Northumberla ...

was replaced by

Adolf Hugel Adolf (also spelt Adolph or Adolphe, Adolfo, and when Latinised Adolphus) is a given name with German origins. The name is a compound derived from the Old High German ''Athalwolf'' (or ''Hadulf''), a composition of ''athal'', or ''adal'', mean ...

of Pittsburgh. Hugel invested money in steel rails and struggled to cut costs. In recognition of his efforts to improve the line, the British bondholders agreed in 1874 to lower the rate on their investments, and not to cash the interest coupons. The line eventually reached Orillia in 1873, Waubaushene in 1875 and Midland in 1879. Net earnings and the ability to pay interest on the fixed debt declined sharply after 1875, the Midland was

insolvent In accounting, insolvency is the state of being unable to pay the debts, by a person or company ( debtor), at maturity; those in a state of insolvency are said to be ''insolvent''. There are two forms: cash-flow insolvency and balance-sheet in ...

and the ownership of the line essentially passed to the bondholders. The Chairman of their Committee was Sir Henry Tyler of the

and most of the other members were GTR nominees.

George Albertus Cox George Albertus Cox (7 May 1840 – 16 January 1914) was a very prominent Canadian businessman and a member of the Senate of Canada. Life and career He was born in Colborne, Upper Canada, in 1840. He began work as a telegrapher for the Mont ...

, a prosperous insurance agent for

Canada Life The Canada Life Assurance Company ( French: ''La Compagnie d'Assurance du Canada sur la Vie''), commonly known as Canada Life (''Canada-Vie''), is a Canadian insurance and financial services company with its headquarters in Winnipeg, Manitoba. The ...

and several times Mayor of

, took over as President of the MR in August 1878.

Merger

The Midland (144 route miles) was surrounded by railways which also were not making money: * The Grand Junction Railway of Canada (90 route miles) * The

Belleville and North Hastings Railway The Belleville and North Hastings Railway (B&NHR) was a short-line railway in Hastings County, Ontario, Canada. It branched off the Grand Junction Railway (GJR) north of Belleville and ended on the Central Ontario Railway (COR) outside Eldorado ...

(15 route miles) * The

(56 route miles) * The

(46½ route miles) * The

(114 route miles of 3' 6" gauge) Cox first floated a proposal to purchase the

in July 1881 in order to gain the supreme prize of direct Midland Railway access to Toronto. Negotiations continued throughout the Fall and Winter when the shareholders and bondholders were presented with a proposal for ''‘Approving an agreement between the Toronto and Nipissing Railway Company; the Whitby, Port Perry and Lindsay Company, the Victoria Railway Company, the Toronto and Ottawa Railway Company; the Grand Junction Railway Company and the Midland Railway Company for the purpose of consolidating said companies into one company, under the name of the Midland Railway of Canada.’'' The T&NR and the Midland Railway had always maintained good relations and since it was certain that the T&NR could not long survive in its present form, work commenced during the negotiations to lay a

from The Town of Midland to Scarborough Junction. The first through passenger train from Peterborough to Toronto ran on December 15, 1881. An Act enabling the merger came into force on Saturday April 1, 1882 and on that day the first official trains of the new Midland Railway of Canada travelled the system. On January 1, 1884 the GTR finally consolidated its hold on the Midland group of companies by leasing them. Amalgamation of the companies was authorized in 1893.S.C. 1893, c. 47 It was eventually absorbed into the

Canadian National Railway The Canadian National Railway Company () is a Canadian Class I freight railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, which serves Canada and the Midwestern and Southern United States. CN is Canada's largest railway, in terms of both revenue a ...

system.

Surviving Facilities

* 3 in Port Hope, 1 in Orillia, 3 of them being stations. Stations: Downtown Port Hope: Now known as Lent travel, (67 Walton Street, with an outbuilding present further down the trail marking the extent of the station) Northern Port Hope: Now the ministry of transport regional office (This station was the second built in Port Hope, much larger than the first station, at 138 Hope Street N, Port Hope) Orillia: Now an online shopping centre, 158 Front St. S, Orillia, ON Crew Lodgings: Downtown Port Hope: Now known as the Ganaraska Hotel (30 Ontario St. Port Hope) the building housed railway personnel overnight as their trains were loaded up to be sent up north the next day. Located a short distance away from the downtown station and the port facilities. There are also several locations going up towards Midland where evidence of the trackage is still visible, for example crossing the narrows between

and

Lake Couchiching Lake Couchiching ( ; from the Anishinaabe language, Ojibwe ''gojijiing'' meaning "inlet") is a medium-sized lake in Central Ontario, Canada, separated from Lake Simcoe by a narrow channel. Lakes Simcoe and Couchiching are popular spots for fishin ...

you can see the remains of a swing bridge, along with several kilometres of rail bed, as well as a bridge over highway 12 in Midland

References

* "Narrow Gauge Through the Bush - Ontario's Toronto Grey & Bruce and Toronto & Nipissing Railways"; Rod Clarke; pub. Beaumont and Clarke, with the Credit Valley Railway Company, Streetsville, Ontario, 2007. * "The Narrow Gauge For Us - The Story of the Toronto and Nipissing Railway"; Charles Cooper; pub. The Boston Mills Press; Erin, Ontario, 1982. * "Narrow Gauge Railways of Canada"; Omer Lavallee; pub. Railfair, Montreal, 1972. * "Narrow Gauge Railways of Canada"; Omer Lavallee, expanded and revised by Ronald S Ritchie; pub. Fitzhenry and Whiteside, Markham, Ontario, 2005.

External links

'The Narrow Gauge for Us' Charles Cooper's Railway Pages

{{DEFAULTSORT:Midland Railway Canada Defunct Ontario railways Rail transport in Northumberland County, Ontario History of rail transport in Kawartha Lakes Predecessors of the Grand Trunk Railway Standard-gauge railways in Canada