Building the Kettle Valley Railway

Construction started in 1910. To meet the deadline, McCulloch started building at both ends at once, beginning in Merritt and Midway. At Midway, the KVR line would link with CPR track and continue east to the Kootenays. At Merritt, the line would meet up with the CPR line from Spences Bridge. The first section of the KVR to be completed connected Brookmere with Merritt. Railway building was booming in Canada. McCulloch sometimes had trouble finding skilled labourers. At times there were as few as 200 men working on the line, and progress was slow. But between 1911-1915, over 1,000 men worked on the 60-mile section from Penticton to Hydraulic Summit. At the peak of construction, he had 5,000 men working at once. In the Okanagan Valley, immigrants from Scandinavia and central Europe made up the labour force. McCulloch travelled mostly by horseback to check on the quality of the work.