K&P Railway Locomotive, 1901

This gorgeous photo was taken on a glass negative plate in 1901. Visible on the train is the label “K & P Ry No. 1”, marking it as the very first locomotive of the Kingston and Pembroke Railway Company. The photo was taken at the Carworks yard, which was located near the railway crossing on Montreal Street. The Kingston and Pembroke Railway was incorporated in 1871 to support the lumber, mining and agriculture industries in eastern Ontario. A funny fact about the company is that while its name suggests that it was intended to travel between Kingston and Pembroke, it in fact only traveled between Kingston and Renfrew. By 1884, railway had been laid from Kingston to Renfrew, but another railway company, Canadian Central Railway, had already built a track from Renfrew to Pembroke, making it unnecessary for K&P to build one. So the last station on the K&P line was actually located in Renfrew Ontario, not Pembroke.