In 1912, American mechanic Jack Haney and British writer Thomas Wilby set out to cross Canada by car—before Canada had a road to do it.
Their vehicle, a REO touring car dubbed The Pathfinder, started in Halifax and made its way through mud, swamps, railway ties, and wilderness to reach Victoria. Wilby, who refused to drive, rode in the back, and documented the journey in vivid prose, later published in "A Motor Tour Through Canada," published in 1914.
The Cross-Canada Brochure is a rare and unique artifact from the trip—not readily available online and far less known than Wilby’s 1914 book.
Unlike the book, which never names Haney, the flyer gives him full credit. His name appears in the text three times, and his portrait is proudly featured.
Over a century later, this forgotten 1912 Cross-Canada brochure, sponsored by the REO Motor Car Company and written by Wilby, tells the story of this grueling 4,200-mile trek. Roads vanished, rivers blocked the way, and they relied on train tracks and ferries to keep moving. Still, they made it—just not entirely by road.
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CROSS CANADA WITH THE "ALL RED" ROUTE REO
THE REO SALES CO.
General Sales Agents for Canada
THE REO MOTOR CAR CO. OF CANADA, LIMITED
St. Catharine, Ont.
By THOMAS W. WILBY
The All Red Reo was about to make history. Haney backed her down into the waters of the Atlantic, while his companion, Mr. Thomas Wilby, had taken some precious drops of the Atlantic to be poured into the far off Pacific.
The Good Roads movement had "arrived" in Canada. Something big spectacular, was necessary to arouse interest. It did not take such a stretch of imagination to see Canada opened up as a Tourist Resort to which millions of Europeans and Americans might flock when a continuous "all red" macadam and gravel coast to coast highway was laid out and perfected.
A Pathfinder was necessary, and a Reo was suggested.
In 1905 the Reo had been the first to make a double transcontinental trip of the American continent, and in 1910 it had captured the speed record by crossing from New York to San Francisco in a little over ten days and thereby smashed all other records to smithereens.
Nobody has ever attempted to lower Reo records. Precisely at four o'clock, the Deputy Mayor Martin of Halifax, handed in the letter for Vancouver, and with her escort of local cars, the clutch was thrown in, and the Reo had started on her memorable journey.
The pilot car, with Mr. Oland at the wheel, led the Reo to the outskirts, and left the Pathfinder with a parting.
At about nightfall, the car had gone forty mile, and it was decided to push on to Truro. Haney had his work cut out for him in that first baptism of mud. It was like a batter with a mingling of huge stones which had to be dodged.
Truro, sixty-six miles to the good, and dodging about for a garage. Then genial Mr. Chamber's face loomed up out of the gloom to pilot to shelter.
Chambers and McNutt - those two worthy citizens - piloted out of town around cock-crow next morning and then waving their hats, gave the first cheer of encouragement to the transcontinentalists as they sped on their way to their as yet shadowy goal.
Lovely woods - red clay and gravel soil - roads alternately muddy and good - tiny white steepled churches - wonderful views of Minas Basin, tawny against the blue hills of the opposite shore - tiny ballons of white clouds down on the Eastern horizon line - and then Parrsborough fifty miles for the morning's run and a lot of stragglers and local editor to optically overhaul the car and its occupants.
The pennants of Truro and Halifax struck the eye of the man of the Fourth Estate.
All day the pitching and tossing - the jerks and the throws which threatened to land the Pathfinder in the ditch, continued, and there is a lot of running on intermediate.
At 3.30 p.m. the Reo had ploughed its way to Amherst forty more miles to Moncton - the town of the famous tidal wave - the Bore.
A start is made at 7.30 for St. John, N.B. which is ninety-four miles away and which good city is turning out strong to do the Reo pathfinder car honor, must be reached by noon.
The roads of New Brunswick proved to be a little bit of Heaven compared with those of Nova Scotia, in spite of rough places. St. John is reached at 2.00 o'clock after an hour's stop for lunch. There is a giant 90 h.p. car containing Mayor Fink, Mr. T. P. Regan, President of the Automobile Association, Mr. Pugsley, and five other worthy citizens, is hurrying about to escort the Reo into the city, and fifteen miles out again. But not before a letter has been framed from the Mayor for delivery to the Mayor of Vancouver and a message from genial Mr. Regan.
We praise the New Brunswick roads inadvertently.
"Don't, don't ever let anyone about these parts hear you say that. We kick like thunder at our roads. We want better ones.
At fifteen miles out, there is a halt; the good St. Johners, and the Mayor shake hands with the trans-continentalists and cheer them vigorously. Impulsive, warm-hearted Irishman Regan plants the flag of his club on the Reo.
Fredericton Junction that evening, and 147 miles to the good.
The fourth day dawns. Fredericton is twenty-three miles away, and the program is a rush breakfast and an early start in the cool grey morning.
An old timer with watery eyes hails the Reo. He is 88, and wants a lift on the great historic ride; and on he is whirled in octogenarian astonishment in his first motor-ride to Fredericton.
The Editor of the "Gleaner" comes out, takes some notes, gasoline is taken on, and the car shoots again along the valley of the river, Andover for supper of a vegetarian kind and then a 24 mile dash in the twilight for Grand Falls, only to flonder on the way in a five mile swamp and stick upon a hill with Haney taking furtive glances into the tank, where the precious gasoline "was not."
At 9.30 p.m., the lights of Grand Falls 161 miles from the starting point, looked up out of the darkness.
The next morning, another early start over the bridge by the magnificent Falls, which have cleared their way through a gorge and on to Edmunston, where a fair and youthful seer in English toggery with a flaming red tie, a philosophic look, and a German accent, greets the Pathfinder.
It is the millionaire tramp, Dr. Der Ridder, author, lecturer, and intimate of Jack London, who reels off his Psalm of Life with Uncle Walt guilelessness, shook hands and wished the party all luck. Clocks are set forward an hour as the valley of the Madawaska is struck, and a bee line is made for the St. Lawrence at Riviere du Loup. An old man by the Temisconata Lake side, gasps incredulously when he finds the car is headed for Vancouver.
The St. Lawrence at last - stately, majestic, big as the big continent itself in its sense of grandeur by the waning post meridian light. Mountains - deep blue mountains with a bloom on them like that upon grapes - for a background; a boulevard for three miles out of Riviere du Loup and then the river trails, over which the Reo bounded along at a twenty-five knot clip to the night's destination. Makaraska, 144 miles from Grand Falls, made an easy Sunday run of 92 miles to the Citadel City, which Wolfe had won for England - and incidentally thrown in an Empire.
Frank Carrel, the genial owner of the "Quebec Telegraph" the good genius of the Automobile Association and prince of good fellows, was organizing the decorated automobiles for the Labor Day procession, and he Reo had to join the merry motor "cavalcade" to receive her Quebec pennant, and a last parting cheer from Frank Carrel and pilot Campbell of the Quebec garage, as the car headed bravely westward for Three Rivers.
There were the big lighthouses by the river; there were the sand hills which refused to be climbed until the trans-continentalists grew hill-wise, and backed up with about 500 pounds advoirpupois of lusty French-Canadian youth in the tonneau to get better traction, and then there was the welcome sight of Montreal on the eighth day out: the decoration of the Reo with the emblems of the Automobile Club of Canada which she was to wear proudly to the finish; and the big, big welcome outside the building of "La Patrie" and Eugene Tarte's hearty congratulations and hand grip. Mr. Houte, of that paper escorted the Reo to St. Laurent where, on behalf of "La Patrie," he tied on the Montreal pennant.
Corduroy roads; muddy roads; and then pretty lands and great level stretches marked the Valley of the Ottawa.
Two days from Ottawa and the car had pulled into Toronto by way of Kingston. The Ontario Motor League prepared the festive board, decorated the Reo with the club emblem, and there was a big showing of the guiding spirits of the Reo factory from St. Catharines.
Then the City Hall steps to receive Mayor Geary's message for Vancouver, and to get her customary flag. She covered the 106 miles to Gravenhurst in little over four hours and that was going some. But next morning, the fourteenth day out - there came a cyclone of trouble. The memorable spotwas Scotia Junction, which has the worst sand hill in all Canada.
Sixteenth day out.
The Georgian Bay and Lake Superior Country is the home of bush-land, swamp and rock, where the corduroy roads through impassable muskeg crop up at every turn like weeds, and huge rock present surfaces unscalable alike to beast and motor car.
All day the plucky Reo had a battle royal with the hills and muskeg and twists and turns of those narrow ghost-roads and, when 4.00 p.m. came, it didn't seem to be any nearer its goal than before. Nothing seemed to lead anywhere or anything in particular. Then a hill that looked like a rock cascade bed run dry barred the way.
Up the Reo shot, and there she hung like a lobster with its claws, only to have a whale of a time pulling herself to the top with block and tackle. There were more and more hills and then came a corduroy road in the end which threatened to roll her down again like the stone of Sisyphus.
No one will ever be able to say how she managed to clamber out from between the "rungs." Minute after minute passed, the wheels now spinning, now being locked in the deep ridges of those devilish hills, the engines roaring and moaning in protest, inch by inch she went up as the sun dropped lower and lower to the horizon line, and then as if she had given up all her mechanical courage, she would drop back again.
But finally won out, and had her front paws on the topmost pitch where mud and stones presented the most fiendish surface possible. All would have gone well, even at the snail's pace at which the car was compelled to run, had it not been for a long bridge ahead which had broken through. It was evident that the road was an abandoned one and was trying its best to hide.
A good hour was lost in filling up the gap, and it was good to see the Reo cautiously treading the planks with her padded paws and creeping inch by inch into safety and Trout Creek. This was the day we understood the true value of Dunlop Traction Tread Tires. The next 30 miles to North Bay was comparatively easy.
It took four days to make the 200 miles to the Soo, for in places there were no roads, and between Algoma and Blind River, the Reo had to be committed to the tender mercies of a crazy looking tug, which she boarded like Blondin walking a tight rope.
At the Soo, she took the freight boat for Port Arthur. Landed at Port Arthur, all sorts and conditions of citizens were drawn into a war council to find out the best ways and means to Winnipeg. Nothing very cheering was forthcoming. The old Dawson trail, which had been blazed for General Wolseley's Red River Expedition over thirty years ago, was found to be very much of a water route. Wolseley had used the chain of lakes where he could get no terra firma and the scows and tugs he had used were still to be seen rotting in the water.
MAYOR WAUGH OF WINNIPEG GAVE THE PATHFINDER A LETTER FROM THE EAST TO THE WEST AND MRS. WAUGH GRACIOUSLY TIED ON A BIG WHITE AND BLUE PENNANT AND THEN THE RED HEADED VALIANTLY INTO THE CANADIAN DEEP PIE OF BLACK MUD.
We reach Winnipeg 23 days out from Halifax through seas of gumbo.
Winnipeg delighted to do the Reo honor. Rain in torrents and cloud burst. Rain that for weeks had deprived Canada of a summer and had tried to make a second deluge. Sir Rodmond Roblin, Premier of Manitoba, tells his own tale of woe, as a motorist to the Pathfinder.
Fourteen miles that day, 90 the next, 103 the next, and 161 miles the next, when Regina was reached, tells the story more graphically than anything else of the long run out of the wet to the dry belt and through the heart of the golden prairies.
It was the old-worked dirt trail over which primitive man had walked, that ended where he became weary.
Motor along those virgin paths for days - paths worn by clumsy Red River carts, and christened by the drops of sweat that have tasted the burden of toil, scarred by the hoofs of myriad migratory beasts that for ages passed in single file over the brow of the hill to the grazing grounds and annihilation! The glamour of it all grips you.
Regina made a great fuss through its Automobile Association and Acting Premier Calder officially received the Pathfinder at the new Parliament Building. Wright, of the Reo garage, with Mrs. Wright, and accompanied by a congenial crowd in a third car, escorted the Reo all the way to Moose Jaw where Messrs. Irwin dined the entire party at the hotel.
At Lethbridge, there was a fine reception, and the Mayor escorted the party to the barracks of the North West Mounted Police, some of the brave troopers of which piled into the car to have their pictures taken while Mr. Mayor tied on the Lethbridge pennant. McLeod too, wasn't a whit behind in its welcome. Honorable Mr. Mackenzie and others, seeing to the creature comforts and piloting the car for some distance on the way to the stopping place for the night - Frank. The sight which presented itself as the Reo picked its way among the giant boulders, beggars description. Some of these fallen "Pebbles" by the roadside dwarfed the car to pigmy proportions, and it was only in human nature to have an intense sigh of relief when the region of the Great Slide and the Crow's Nest Pass had been left far behind.
ACTING PREMIER CALDER OFFICIALLY RECEIVED THE PATHFINDER IN FRONT OF THE NEW PARLIAMENT BUILDING, REGINA.
Cranbrook with about fifteen cars headed by the Mayor's and others containing members of the Cranbrook Automobile Association, turned out to see the send off and witness the tying on of the pennant by the Mayor's wife.
Several cars escorted the Reo into the forest and then left it to the attentions of the little pilot car driven by the genial McNab, and accompanied by the Secretary of the C.A.A.
At six o'clock the bridge leading into the swamp at Ryan was reached and there the party took a breathing spell. It was at once seen that the forest trail was no place for self-respecting motor cars. A team had been telephoned for ahead, but it never came until the ordeal was over.
At Yahk, where the glint of the steel rails and the lights of the station caught our eye, the men filed silently into the fitful lamp light of the inn.
No one openly told of their purpose but enough was heard to know there was a fighting chance in the ordeal to come. Ten minutes to stoke the inner man, five minutes to say farewell to the plucky pilots and the Reo crept into the darkness to a lonely railroad crossing.
The Reo was on the ties, with fourteen miles of dangerous work over the loops. Two pairs of eyes watchful to the front: two pairs of equally watchful eyes to the rear. The acetylene lamps piercing the gloom of that lonely mountain track, showing up vividly that green of the firs and mercifully hiding in its shadows the awful depths of the gorge below.
Nothing happened as hour after hour passed, and the incessant jiggling and rattling and bouncing over the ties continued and the wheels caught in the frogs of the switches and had to be jacked up to get them over the obstruction. At any moment the occupants were ready to jump. There was no thought or possibility of saving the car.
At Kitchener the ties were forsaken for the road, but what a road. It was a winding narrow ascent with steep pitches and long grades over a gorge which sent out roars of defiance from out of the darkness. Block and tackle had to be brought into requisition at least three times on one hill alone; and it was 3.00 a.m. when a road into Creston was finally struck and the Reo pulled up at the hotel of the sleeping town.
The next day there was no road, only a trail across the Kootenay and two broad rivers to ferry in order to reach the Lake steamer at Kootenay Lindsay for Nelson.
Mr. Wymont Williams, a ranchman, volunteered as pilot to the first ferry by a picturesque Indian Reservation of huts and tepees and through the ooze of a slough and thence he led the party by an almost invisible trail amid stranded log booms to the steep banks of the Kootenay, opposite Mr. Lewis' ranch and about 12 miles south of the steamboat landing.
THE "GREAT SLIDE" AT FRANK
THE SIGHT WHICH PRESENTED ITSELF AS THE REO PICKED ITS WAY AMONG THE GREAT BOULDERS BEGGARS DESRCRIPTION. SOME OF THESE FALLEN "PEBBLES" BY THE ROADSIDE DWARFED THE CAR TO PIGMY PROPORTIONS AND IT WAS ONLY IN HUMAN NATURE TO GIVE AN INTENSE SIGH OF RELIEF WHEN THE REGION OF THE GREAT SLIDE AND THE CROWS NEST PASS HAD BEEN LEFT BEHIND.
The broad and picturesque river was running low, and a log raft did duty as ferry some 20 feet below the tops of the mud banks. To get the car down to the level of the river was a Herculean task which required all the strength and ingenuity of five men and the aid of stubbing posts, ropes, and planks. Once on the raft, boats towed it across and a team hauled it up to terra-firma again. There were moments when it looked as though the career of the Reo would end there and then in a watery grave.
Nelson sent a deputation of all the cars in town - two - to meet the Reo and the next day, Mr. Clench piloted the transcontinentalists to Rossland through the picturesque Doukobhor country with its steep breakneck hills and over sand slides, high above the lovely Columbia River which fairly made ones flesh creep.
Just outside the mining town, one of the tires, which had been badly ripped by the railroad ties, gave up the ghost with a loud explosion. At Paterson, Customs Officer Woods would hear of nothing else but that the motorists should partake of his hospitality until morning; and a right good hospitality it was in spite of the temporary grass-widowerhood of the genial official
Next morning, Mr. Lorne Campbell, M.P., came over from Rossland in his car, with the Rossland pennant, and Mr. Wood piloted the car 30 miles until well on its way to Cascade City, where Road Superintendent Spraggett under direction of the British Columbia Government, had been waiting for hours with his car to pilot the Reo into Grand Forks.
Fine roads and dull weather along the valley of the Kettle River. The hills are steep by the old mining camps up in the clouds and there is a lot of shoulder to the wheel business which sets drivers and passengers blowing like grampuses in the short spells of rest amid those lofty altitudes. Spraggett is careful to explain that these roads are back numbers and not on the line of route of the coming Canadian Highway.
At Greenwood, Mr. Jackson, M.P.P. joins in the piloting with his big car, and by nightfall he has the cars overlooking one of the finest waterscape views in British Columbia, just ten miles East of the night stop - Fairview.
THE GRADES BEGGAR DESCRIPTION, AND THERE ARE SHEER DROPS DOWN TO THE CANYON STREAM FROM THE NARROW RIBBON OF THE ROAD THREE THOUSAND FEET ABOVE SEA LEVEL, WHICH HAVE A KNACK OF GETTING ON THE NERVES AND SENDING A SHUDDER DOWN THE SPINAL COLUMN OF EVEN A REOIST.
Mountains and lakes - and pretty towns like Penticton and Keremeos, nestling snugly in their valleys! - All these and the hills and the twists and turns and snakings and windings up hill and through dale were but the work of a summer's day for the valiant Reo.
The new road which British Columbia is constructing will be 95 miles long and pass far to the south, around the Hope Mountains so as to avoid steep grades and excessive altitudes.
The Reo now had to blaze a trail which motorists could temporarily use until Princeton and Hope were linked together in a direct line.
Steep mountain grades begin almost as soon as one leaves Princeton and get mixed up with the clouds and mountain tops until the Eulameen River far below begins to look like a mere trickle.
Pilot Thomas took the Reo car thirty miles along this breakneck road and then there hove in sight a car containing Messrs. Jackson and Creasby of Merritt - a town which as viewed from the winding heights of Nicola Valley, makes the heart leap with admiration at the beauty of the panorama below.
Merritt hospitality was not to be denied, and then a dash through Lower Nicola under Mr. Creasby's pilotage to Spences Bridge where the Government agent, Mr. Burr, took his place and piloted along the reaches of the Thompson River and through the ranch country to the beginnings of the old Cariboo trail at Ashcroft.
An incautious turn of the wheel, a too swift negotiation of any one of the countless downgrades and curves overhanging a river or valley would have meant instant destruction for both car and occupants. But Reo reliability was now a part of our consciousness.
The wild frontier life of the Cariboo Trail, along which the heavy 8 or 10 horse freight teams still ply to the far off goal of Soda Creek or Fort George, is like nothing else which either Canada or the United States affords.
Striking due west from this historic trail runs a narrow road, through the Marble Canyon and along this the Reo glided the next day in order to hit the grand and sombre solitudes of the Fraser River Canyon, some thirty miles north of Lillooet. For hours that seemed as they never would end, the Reo climbed the long circuitous route, only to climb, emerging finally upon the great sand and rock slides of the Fraser near Lytton. There darkness overtook the Reoists and to make bad matters worse the acetylene lamps were out.
FINE ROADS AND DULL WEATHER ALONG THE VALLEY OF THE KETTLE RIVER. THE HILLS ARE STEEP BY THE OLD MINING CAMPS AND THERE IS A LOT OF SHOULDER TO THE WHEEL BUSINESS WHICH SETS DRIVERS BLOWING LIKE GRAMPUSES IN THE SHORT SPELLS OF REST AMID THOSE LOFTY ALTITUDES.
The road for miles had wound in and out among the creeks, and it was rarely broad enough to leave a margin of safety on the curves. Twice the lamps were relit and twice they disappeared again and the danger of a precipitous fall into the raging torrent of the Fraser grew more imminent.
The oil lamps gave too feeble a light to be of any use in the inky darkness if a catastrophe were to be avoided. An Indian wagon loomed up out of the darkness.
It seemed as though one or the other must go over the precipice. Any moment might bring a string of freight wagons in sight.
"GOOD GOING"
There was only one thing to do, and that was to concentrate the little light such as the car possessed, so as to show where the edges of the overland lay. Wise unloosened a lamp and lying flat on the mud-guard, held it well forward of the front wheels while the car crept cautiously at a snail's pace.
One, two, three, and at last five miles had been covered in this fashion, when the faint light of Lytton came into view and the machine slid down the river bank, and made a sharp left turn into the small town.
ARRIVAL IN VANCOUVER
Luckily, the route between Yale and Hope though overgrown with an undergrowth of fern and brush, was still available and once at Hope, it was simply a matter of using the ferry of Lake Gibson, whose name is familiar to everybody who has used pack and saddle horse across the Hope mountains. Mr. Gibson was kindness itself to the Reoists, and not only gave them a public reception and dinner at Hope, but piloted the car along the Hope end of the Princeton Mountain road under construction.
Outside Chilliack, kind friends were awaiting the Reoists' advent to triumphantly escort them into town, where pilots and photographer from New Westminster, the headquarters of the Canadian Highway Association were seen in evidence.
New Westminster. Photographers, luncheon, leading citizens and speeches. Then Dr. Rowe from Vancouver, piloted the way to the Ocean Goal.
A crowd awaited the car's advent at the foot of the Hotel Vancouver steps. A cheer went up and Mayor Findlay and Mrs. Findlay came forward to receive the mails from the uttermost ends of Canada and to tie on the Vancouver flag.
Then congratulations and handshakes galore.
The tour was not yet over. Vancouver Island had to have its turn. The most westerly point had yet to be reached and so in drenching rain the Reo was shipped to Nanaimo, where a pilot car from the Victoria Automobile Association with Mr. Bannerman at the wheel and Mr. Inglis of the Victoria Daily Times alongside waiting with Mr. Sherwood, M.P. and Mayor Shaw to conduct the party to the hotel, where the festive board was spread.
Next day, with all her many colored streamers spread the Reo was photographed and then came the 60 mile run to the actual terminus of the 4200 mile "All-Red" Highway at Alberni. One cannot stand before this plain white wooden mile post with its arrow pointing due east to Halifax, without being moved by a sense of its significance.
Everybody cheered the brave little car as one might have cheered the national flag.
"From Halifax to Vancouver!" The long journey of 4200 miles was over.
Some day thousands of tourists and motorists from all parts of the civilized world will flock along it and make of Canada, one of the holiday resorts of the world.
But the car of cars that gave the great gift of the Nation was the "ALL RED" ROUTE REO.
That is a piece of Reo as well as Canadian history. Don't forget it.!