Introduction

From the gloom pervading in the late 1840s the central Canadian economy rebounded quickly. Despite a brief check in 1852-3, growth was rapid.(1) With this prosperity returned the active promotion of railway schemes. Several projects even began construction, most of them calculated to draw goods and people into the growing port communities served by the Royal Mail lines.(2) The major exception was one to which wary steamboat proprietors paid close attention, the Grand Trunk Railway. But while its long term implications may have affected plans for capital development, in the short run the Royal Mail lines' entrepreneurs were confronted with the internal tensions exacerbated by the practice of sub-contracting.

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Chapter 5 appeared in FreshWater.