QUOTE: Hinton is a town in western Alberta, Canada, about 70 km northeast of Jasper and about 300 km west of Alberta's capital city, Edmonton. Population: 9,405 (2001) The town of Hinton was named for W.D. Hinton, Vice President and General Manager of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway. The community was officially recognized in 1928. The exact location of the town of Hinton has changed ten times in its history, its sites scattered along a line some twelve kilometres in length. The original location was along Hardisty Creek, where an aboriginal group from the Jasper area had left members stricken with smallpox while the rest of the group travelled to Lac Ste. Anne to find medical aid for the smallpox epidemic which was ravaging the indigenous population in Alberta. The area was thus dubbed Cache Picote (Smallpox Camp) in 1870. Jack Gregg established a trading post at Prairie Creek in 1888 to serve travellers along the Jasper trail. The creek is now known as Muskuta Creek after an incorrect interpretation of the Cree name by white settlers. The construction of the railroad saw the establishment of a construction camp at Prairie Creek in 1908. The Canadian Northern Railway also established a station called Bliss, 8 km from Prairie Creek, in 1914. In 1915, Dalehurst became the postal station for Hinton. Entrance, another important centre to Hinton, served as its communications centre. Entrance was so named due to its location at the entrance to Jasper National Park. The Canadian Northern Railway became an aggregating force as settlements grew around the operations of this company. The company, however, abandoned its track in 1926. The population of Hinton experienced a boom during the 1930s when American entrepreneur Frank Seabolt and two partners opened the Hinton coal mine in 1931. Shortly thereafter, a recession caused the population to dwindle to less than 100 people, but the town rebounded in 1955 with the opening of a pulp mill. The mill brought rapid construction to Hinton and to the neighbouring village of Drinnan, and the two communities amalgamated in 1958 to form the present municipality of Hinton.
QUOTE: BudKarr Posted: 18 Oct 2005, 14:01:14 Posts: 136 Joined: 16 Sep 2005 Location: Wherever I happen to be Good Afternoon Captain Tom and staff. I surely enjoyed the New Haven fallen flag data and thank you for honoring my request. I am a bit surprised that more of your regular customers have not inundated you with their selections. Nevertheless, thank you. I cannot imagine that anything coming from me will be either enlightening or informative to those who know the NH. But here are a few tid bits of information regarding that prized railroad: * Unlike the majority of other railroads, passenger train revenue was largely responsible for the success of the company. * The railroad was considered to be a compact railroad, connecting virtually all of the towns and cities of Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. * The final order for steam locomotives by the NH was in the 1930's for ten streamlined Baldwin 4-6-4's Hudsons. * The showcase of the NH direct rail link between Boston and New York was called the Shore Line Route. This route covered 229 miles and was the only direct rail link between the largest of the northeast cities. * In 1938, a new service appeared on NH freights called trailer-on-flatcar (TOFC) and was introduced between Boston and New York City. * Patrick McGinnis took over the NH in 1954 and changed the livery to the flashy orange, red and black which won immediate acceptance by the traveling public. Unfortunately, the rest of Mr. McGinnis' efforts were not so well received as the railroad began its downward spiral. * A toy train company owned by A. C. Gilbert in New Haven, Connecticut, successfully marketed their NH replica trains. The GE EP5 electric locomotive was one. Some years earlier, Gilbert's line of trains, called American Flyer, produced the Pullman-Standard "turtle roofed" toy streamliners that became known throughout the region as "American Flyer cars" in the real railroad world. (Life imitating art?) * Perhaps one of the NH's most successful ventures involved the purchase of Rail Diesel Cars from the Budd Company of Philadelphia in 1952-53. Forty cars were put in use over nearly 920 route miles of service. These self-contained cars, called Shoreliners, quickly ignitied the commuter rail growth for decades to come. * The NH vanished from the scene in 1969 when a federal court ordered that it be included in the Penn Central, which had previously absorbed the bankrupt Pennsylvania and New York Central railroads. The PC went bust in 1970. Note: The aforementioned was obtained through internet resources. I think a nice cold draught is in order, one of those Keith Ales you talk so much about please. The Union Pacific advertisement is interesting and one only needs to read between the lines to get a feel for the times. That is a well done series that you have put together and I hope you do not become weary of sharing those nostalgia posts with us. It is indeed a shame that one's efforts sometime go completely unheralded or noticed. It just may be that many take them for granted as another sign of the "routine" at Our Place. BK
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