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14- PORT PERRY STAR - Tuesday, April 1, 1997 "Scugog's Community Newspaper of Choice" Bigelow announces construction | Sketches of Scugog by Paul Arculus Sketches of Scugog is a historical column written by local resident and historian Paul Arculus and published in the Port Perry Star the first issue of each month. (J ® LJ Whitby desperately needed the north- south Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway to supplement the east-west Grand Trunk Railway. The GTR which initially ran from Toronto to Oshawa was opened in August 1856. By October that year passengers and freight travelled the entire distance from of the Royal Arcade in Port Perry going to build his "Royal Arcade," an elab- orate three story department store right on the main street of Port Perry. This was begun in 1868 and opened its doors in April 1869. At the same tine, the Jones Brothers, subject of last month's article built an imposing three storey brick store beside Bigelow on Queen Street. : The Anglican church adherents decid- ed to build a new church in Port Perry rather than in Prince Albert. John Ham Perry, a director on the PWPPR gave the land to the parish in Port Perry and in December 1866, work began on the build- ing on North Street. Within two years, the Presbyterian He then went on holiday and missed three meetings and when he returned asked to see the accounts for the company he was denied access. Boisterous Whitby Meeting At a noisy meeting in Whitby, on November 8, 1869, less than a month aft- er the glorious official turning of the first sod, the confusion on the board of direc- tors was made blatantly obvious. The meeting was reported verbatim fashion in the Observer and summarized in the Whitby Chronicle. John Perry was trying to push through an amendment to the charter of the PWPPR that would allow municipalities to underwrite the bonds of the railway without Montreal to Toronto. But Whitby was losing trade to the other centres which had direct access to a perpendic- ular route into Central Ontario. The towns which had them, particularly Port Hope and Toronto, were growing at a phenomenal rate. Readers may remember that the first contractors on the Port Whitby and Port Perry Railway, was the Toronto company, Kestevan and Starrat. This company worked for a few months in 1868-69 and, since the directors of the PW&PPR failed to provide any money to the company for the work which had been completed, they were forced to use their own funds to pay their workers. After Kestevan SI IIR oy 11 NL IMMEN Sy . ) : zl Ti CN i PS WE oe - mite TT ACI = ox . Plier . te ST WGC } of hy . ' - ' . 1a ' ¢ i > RO} . CRs <e ~ 1 iy ' - 0g 7 x viet g RUC ER 10.0 i+} 3. el. ' Ee we . oy! deel Sal A Od Peat SE A oh Lr Re AL Cah TRE Ly ES ET 5 RNR at ide Tha v Saad (ALY FRY] d i : . . | . : oo 1A . : i .§. | / $ 4 it Pl JE Rf IIR J PN L8 an 4.4 3 \ pe x | H i ; ty . { ' 8 Sie ' {ilat] 4 3. 4 K i . 3 \ 4 2 ' " / . ) % i Lo . . . k + 3 \ Ld ' i ~ x ay E STOCK seeking ratepayers approval. It should be remembered that most of the board members held elect- respective municipal councils or at least wielded substantial power over them. Board members James Holden and Dr. Gunn com- plained that board meetings were being held without inform- ing them. Illegal Contract Signing Holden restated what he had expressed in his let- ter to the Whitby Chronicle. He also informed the meet- and Starrat had personally ing that he had run out of money they Of New and St ylish Millinery Goods, Hats and Trimmings a- | attended a directors declared bankruptcy. Specialty and yory Cheap. A large Stock of Ladies' Mantles, Parasols, Dress Goods, Hosiery, meeting which had Contract Brok Gloves, Prints, Shirtings, Flannels, Cloths, 'Tweeds, Towelings, Tickings. Ready-made Clothing, i ontract Broken Xe. A Inred ¥ it's N ; A been called to si The i t board of di ¢. A large ¥tnok of Gént's New and Fashionable Hats. Ladies', Gent's . J Children's Boots . gn e 1nep ard of direc- and Shoes. A full Stock of General Groceries, Crockuay and Glatsware. 85000 worth of the construction con- tors of the railroad had bro- ken the original contract by demanding that the railway be built using the wide gauge as opposed to the originally contracted narrow PORT PERRY, May 13, 3350: Bankrapt 8tock Gonds to be Cleared Out at Wholesale Prices, 47° The highest Markut Prices allowed for all kinds of Farm Produce. JOSEPH BIGELOW, Joseph Bigelow's Royal Arcade, opened in April 1869. This is an advertisement from a May 12, 1880 Port Perry newspaper tract. President Bigelow had informed the direc- tors that they were $85,000 short and because of the short- gauge. The board had gen- erated investment in the railroad on the basis of the lower cost of building the line on a narrow gauge. However, they eventually realized that they would have to trans-ship goods at Whitby onto the GTR because of the wide gauge on that line. The trans-shipment of goods would create employment and create the need for warehousing in Whitby, but the board, dominated by Port Perry and Reach representatives had decided to change to the wide gauge with- out consulting with the contractors. Another problem was the fact that the board members and promoters had pro- mised to invest in shares in order to ass- ist in the capitalization of the line. It became obvious that although the munici- palities had made some payments to the PWPPR, the promoters had not fulfilled their own commitment. The municipali- ties had withheld full payment because of the change in gauge Building Boom in Port Perry The hiring of J.H. Dumble in September 1869 marked a new begin- ning. The details of glorious turning of the first sod were covered in February's article. The scurry of activity around the promise of the railway had stimulated the beginning of an economic boom in Port Perry. Many new and extensive buildings were erected. Joseph Bigelow announced that he was congregation, already happily expanding in Prince Albert decided to build a splen- did new church in Port Perry. In 1868, Port Perry High School opened its doors for the first time as Port Perry Grammar School on the second floor of a log school house on the sight of today's high school. Holden Complains On November 4, 1869, a letter from James Holden appeared in the Whitby Chronicle outlining the problems he had encountered as a director of the PWPPR. He made it clear that the original charter was for a narrow gauge line. He had per- sonally invested in the railroad on that basis as had the municipalities. The board's move to the broad gauge was con- trary to the charter and the intentions of investors. He pointed out that the contract to Kestevan and Starrat was awarded before the PWPPR had met the terms of investment and of incorporation. No engineer had been appointed and there was no survey plan upon which costs could be estimated. For these reasons Holden opposed the signing of the initial contract. After the Kestevan and Starrat debacle, the contract had been given to Dumble without a tender or public notice being published. Holden believed that this was because they still had not sold enough stock to qualify under the charter. age of investment, the meeting was adjourned with the understanding that the contract with the new contractor, Dumble, was not to be signed. The next morning it was revealed that Joseph Bigelow had signed the con- tract anyway. A number of other issues were raised which led Holden to summa- rize by stating that all the actions of the railroad to date had been illegal. He referred to John Perry as the "Great Goliath of Gath." Dr. Gunn had been the mayor of Whitby, was another director on the PWPPR. He endorsed all that Holden had stated. Gunn added that no conditions were set up for paying the contractors and no inspection of their work had been carried out. John Perry gave an angry and abusive reply to Holden and Gunn. Nevertheless, he admitted that the contractor, Dumble, had drawn up the contracts and specifica- tions all by himself. This factor served to underline the entire board's inexperience in railroad matters. Dubious Dumble Unfortunately, the new beginning for the railroad brought a new set of pro- blems. Why Dumble was hired is hard to determine. At the outset, his credentials seem reasonable. His father was an offic- er in the Royal Engineers and a member of a commission that delineated the Maine boundary. ed positions on their He then surveyed what became the Intercolonial line. The young Dumble was an engineer on the construction of the section of the GTR from Shannonville to Cobourg and had worked on the Victoria Bridge in Montreal. At 32 he took up the study of law. Upon close analysis, however, his busi- ness dealings were highly questionable. In 1865 Dumble became the managing director of the infamous Cobourg to Peterborough railway discussed in February's article. He was responsible for vast amounts of money, some of it unac- counted for, being poured into the flawed line. He had also been involved in a scan- dal when building the Hastings dam in 1867. He was the vice president and managing director of the Cobourg line when hired under mysterious circum- stances by the PWPPR in 1869. Directors also Dubious Chester Draper, a leading board mem- ber, was involved in shady dealings involving land purchases for the railroad in Whitby. In 1865, Draper had become sole owner of the Whitby Harbour. As a director of the railroad Draper was able to arrange for the line to run right to the end of his dock with sidings around his harbour. All this construction was paid for by the railroad. In a letter to the editor of the Ontario Observer in February, 1869, "A Resident Ratepayer" stated that "...there were not 10 men in the township who did not see through the plot...the company was squeezing $95,000 out of them. (Reach and Whitby Townships) for running a road from Port Perry to Crafty Chester's wharf." Another letter in the same issue said that the promoters were planning the PWPPR for the benefit only Whitby and Port Perry and that they plan to kill Prince Albert and Manchester by running the line around these communities. The writer also pointed out that many farm- ers in Brock and Mariposa who now go down the Centre Rd. to Manchester to buy and sell their grain would have to go on to Port Perry instead. The president of the railway, Joseph Bigelow, was accused of being in collusion with Dumble in falsifying certificates of performance. It was later revealed that Dumble received payment of over $100,000 for work which he claimed was complete. An investigation showed that the work which he had actually complet- ed was evaluated at no more that $50,000. Bigelow and other board mem- bers were already under a cloud of suspi- cion over some land purchases involving the railway. Bigelow also compromised his position by selling fencing and other lumber items from his lumber yards to the railroad of which he was president. The prices were allegedly above the going rate. Many readers at this point may have assumed a somewhat negative or critical view of Draper, Perry, Bigelow and other directors of the PW&PPR. However, cor- ruption and dubious business ethics were almost standard practice in the building of Canadian railways. As we shall see next month, not only were the alleged illegal activities of Draper, Perry, Bigelow, Dumble and others quite common, but they were extremely mild compared with what was happening at other railways being built across the country. Next month we shall see hovs such cor- ruption led to the first major political pro- blem faced by our young nation and ran all the way to the prime minister's office. ------