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Working Conditions


Traveling across the Pacific Ocean, and a short trip across the Georgia Strait to British Columbia, new Chinese arrivals disembarked at Yale where their work on the CPR began. During the gold rush Yale was prosperous, but once it ended it was sucked dry into a ghost town. It regained it's title for strength during the time of the railroad construction. They Chinese workers had to reach their destination by foot. The Chinese were divided into groups of 30 men. Each group carried vitals members to keep a group running, a cook, an assistant cook, Chinese record keeper, and a white foreman who dealt directly with the record keeper. There was two sections of the railroad - Port Moody to Yale (145 km, 90 mi.) and Lytton to Savona's Ferry - (113 km, 70mi.) that were built mostly with Chinese workers. Once arrived at their sites, working conditions were considered "dangerous". These conditions led to whats known as hundreds of death to maybe even a thousand. The Chinese workers were given the hardest work out of all the works building the CPR. Onward they were tricked into paying for their own equipment, and treated unequally with white Canadians.