Steam on the Kettle Valley: A Railway Heritage Remembered

T.D. Regehr is a professor of history at the University of Saskatchewan,
and the author of Mennonites in Canada, 1939-1970: A People Transformed.

Railways once played a central role in Canadian life. Produced in
cooperation with the Royal British Columbia Museum (where the author is
curator emeritus), Steam on the Kettle Valley is a judicious blend of
photographs, maps, personal recollections, colorful stories, history,
and authorial commentary.

The Kettle Valley Railway was built to serve the transportation needs
of southern British Columbia and to channel the trade of that region to
the transcontinental mainline of the Canadian Pacific Railway. The
terrain it passed through was rugged; this book provides first-hand
accounts of the construction of some of Canada’s most spectacular
trestles and bridges. The Kettle Valley Railway was southern British
Columbia’s economic lifeline for the better part of three decades, but
then highways emerged as a more convenient and less expensive
alternative to rail passenger and freight service, and gradually various
sections of the line were closed. This book commemorates an important
aspect of southern British Columbia’s history.