Rise and Fall of the Manitoba Railway Garden‪.‬

Some say that the Canadian railway garden was invented in Killarney, Manitoba. Others say Montreal. Both are right--and wrong. Certainly, it can be proved that by the 1890s the Canadian Pacific Railway Company (CPR) had seized the initiative and had become a leader in the Canadian railway gardening movement. And yes, its beautification program began through the efforts of two men -- N. Stewart Dunlop, a CPR tax and insurance commissioner in Montreal, and David Hysop, a CPR insurance claims adjustor, who lived in Killarney. Dunlop knew that many CPR employees were cultivating bits of ground near stations and other railway buildings. An enthusiastic gardener himself, he thought he would encourage their efforts by sending them flower seeds from his own garden. By 1901 Dunlop evidently had established a widespread seed exchange, for he had become known as "the flower man" throughout the CPR system.