Today’s Canadian Pacific city menus from the Chung collection fall into two groups: two have a portrait orientation and three have a landscape orientation. Two of the landscape menus continue with the archway theme that was found in several of the previous city menus.
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The first menu today features Winnipeg. Although the main illustration shows the Canadian Pacific rail yards in Winnipeg, they really could be anywhere. Smaller images show the interior of CP’s Royal Alexandra Hotel and the provincial capital. The art nouveau decoration around the archway might actually be found in a window somewhere in the world, though probably not in Winnipeg.
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The Ottawa menu has a painting of the Parliament building signed GFG, a signature found on several other city menus. This was Gordon Fraser Gillespie, a Montreal native who was one of the few artists who worked full-time for the railroad, eventually (in 1948) becoming the company’s art director.
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The menu for Saint John, New Brunswick, departs from the archway theme. The three illustrations on the cover all show trans-Atlantic steamships being loaded with grain and other products of Canada. Both this and the Winnipeg menus were used on dining cars for breakfast while Ottawa was a dinner menu on the Mountaineer.
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Another GFG-signed artwork shows the Palliser Hotel, with smaller illustrations of ranching, farming, and a hydroelectric dam. This may have been one of the first menus in the city series; at least, it is the only one I’ve seen from 1925 (on the Texas Compound web site), though this lunch menu is from 1926. The Chung collection also has one from 1928.
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Finally, we have a 1928 menu featuring Quebec City, including the Chateau Frontenac and a freight train emerging from what looks like Wolfe’s Cove Tunnel, which connected the port area with CP’s passenger station and main line.