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The Railroad building in Québec photograph album contains 154 photographs that document a survey team operating in various remote locations in the Canadian province of Québec from May 1906 to September 1909 during the construction of the National Transcontinental Railway.

The Railroad building in Québec photograph album contains 154 photographs that document a survey team operating in various remote locations in the Canadian province of Québec from May 1906 to September 1909 during the construction of the National Transcontinental Railway.

The album (18 x 29.5 cm) has brown leather covers with "Photographs" stamped in gold on the front. Most images are dated and are arranged in roughly chronological order from May 1906 to September 1909, but there is no identification of people or places. The presence of surveying equipment in several images and the coverage of many different places on the railway’s route indicate a traveling survey team as the likely source of the photographs. The group seems to have been present at all stages of the project, from clearing the land to laying the track bed to building overpasses.

Contents consist of images of worker encampments and log cabin villages, landscapes, scenes from Québec City’s tricentennial in July 1908, railway workers and women in camp, trestle construction, unidentified towns in various stages of development, and two portraits of Native Americans. Also of interest are numerous images featuring surveying tools and equipment as well as cameras.

The Strickland family photograph album contains approximately 124 photographs related to the Strickland family of Ontario, Canada.

The Strickland family photograph album contains approximately 124 photographs related to the Strickland family of Ontario, Canada.

The album is disbound and photographs are mounted on eight loose 35 x 43 cm board pages. The original sequence of the pages is unclear and several images appear more than once. Most photographs are studio portraits of individuals, group portraits taken in front of buildings, or scenic views. At least one of the studio portraits is the work of Montreal photographer William Notman. Several images appear to be half-images taken from stereographs.

Images of interest include views of the homes of Catharine Parr Traill and Col. Samuel Strickland on Lake Katchewanooka, Col. Strickland with his family and Traill holding a child, a Native American family beside a lake, a canoeing party and canoe portaging, a view of the front of “Westove” (Traill’s home after 1860) next to Christ Church, possible portraits of Traill as well as Susanna and John Moodie, a party on the front lawn of Col. Strickland’s property engaged in bird hunting and croquet, the grounds of the University of Toronto, and the musical group the Montreal Bell Ringers. Also of note are multiple portraits of children ranging from toddlers to adolescents as well as views of five unidentified buildings likely located in Lakefield, staged images of lumber camps, and an unidentified dam and bridge on a river.