Here are two more menus from the transportation history series that we haven’t seen before. The first shows an 18th-century man-of-war ship. It was used on the Empress of Canada in August, 1965.
Click image to view and download a 1.4-MB PDF of this menu from the University of British Columbia Chung collection.
The menu still offers an 11- or 12-course meal, but the number of items in each course has been greatly reduced. The 1962 and 1963 menus took both inside pages to list these items. This one needs only one, with the other one offering a dinner suggestion and and suggested wines. There are four appetizers instead of 10, two entrées instead of three, and so forth. There is also no sorbet between entrées for cleansing the palette; passengers would have to drink water or wine to do that.
Click image to view and download a 2.0-MB PDF of this menu from the University of British Columbia Chung collection.
The development of lighter-than-air balloons capable of lifting people into the atmosphere stunned the world in the late 18th century. In 1803, a man named Étienne-Gaspard Robert took several balloon flights in Europe. Part scientist, part showman, Robert (whose stage name was Robertson) drew the fanciful balloon that appears on the cover of this menu as a prediction for the future.
Not surprisingly, the caption on the back of the menu encourages people to fly Canadian Pacific Airlines instead of a balloon. Unfortunately, the Canadian government favored its own airline over Canadian Pacific for the best routes to Europe, which may be one reason why it continued to operate ocean liners for so long.
This menu was used in June, 1971, on the Empress of Canada, by then Canadian Pacific’s last ocean liner. Despite declining patronage, this menu is closer to the ones of 1962 and 1963 than the 1965 menu shown yesterday, with ten for d’oeuvres, three fish, three entrées, and so forth. The releve, however, is once again roast turkey. I like roast turkey, but I’m surprised to see it on almost every empress dinner menu we’ve seen from the 1960s.