HAGERSVILLE—While history is easily found in archives, personal memories often offer the best stories. As Hagersville’s 150th year is commemorated, the Hagersville Heritage Railway Committee (HHRC) is sharing their insights and collections to highlight the historical impact of trains on Hagersville, offering a glimpse into life along the railway.
From the Cayuga Heritage Centre archives, Curator Geneva Gillis says, “The completion of the Canada Southern Railway (CASO) … put Hagersville on the map.”
When the Hamilton and Lake Erie Railway line was extended from Caledonia to Jarvis in 1873, then completed to Port Dover in 1878, the impact was significant. Gillis explains, “The completion of the two new railways had a large impact on the growth of Hagersville with the advantage of a newly repaired road and two new railways.”
“A population boom followed,” she continues. “Lots were surveyed … (and) permanent brick business blocks, large homes, churches, and schools were built. Not only did this transportation development progress Hagersville into an industrial era, but set it on its way to becoming a bustling market village.”
A column in the June 13, 1974 Jarvis Record, entitled History of Hagersville, elaborates, “Hagersville’s growth in the late 1870s was rapid…. New stores and houses sprang up, including a steam agricultural implement factory, a steam grist mill, a steam saw mill, and a stone quarry.”
With 53 businesses operating by 1887, the writer concludes, “Hagersville’s situation at the junction of the railways, and growing demand for the products of its quarries, no doubt contributed to its growth. The progressiveness of its merchants must also have been a factor in bringing trade.”
Larry Lunn brings a wealth of knowledge to HHRC from his career. Originally from Wallacetown, he began working for the Penn Central Railway in November 1968. This was a year after the forced merger of Penn Central and New York Central, which he describes as “the worst merger in railway history.”
Lunn’s first day on the job was in Hagersville, prying up ties for the surfacing gang. In 1971 he married and moved to Hagersville, as it was the halfway point of his territory from St. Thomas to Niagara.
As a Class 1 Machine Operator, Lunn worked the rail crane, with rail tongs, a one tonne magnet, clam shell bucket, and couplers that could pull a rail car. He recalls, “It was a tough old crane to run.” The work involved a lot of travelling, handling ties, and ditching. A track permit was required to work and they had to know the times to get off for the trains. He laughs, “Not like the old days when they went by the smoke.”
HAGERSVILLE—Hagersville’s two train stations were located on the north side of King St. and west of Tuscarora St. Pictured below is the CSR Station (CASO), nearest the corner of King St. and Tuscarora St. Pictured above is the GTR Station. —Photos courtesy Cayuga Heritage Centre. 
HAGERSVILLE—Hagersville’s two train stations were located on the north side of King St. and west of Tuscarora St. Pictured below is the CSR Station (CASO), nearest the corner of King St. and Tuscarora St. Pictured above is the GTR Station. —Photos courtesy Cayuga Heritage Centre.
One memorable incident occurred in February 1978. After taking a Monday off, a call came the next evening from Assistant Supervisor Doug Warring, also of Hagersville, asking, “Have you had enough time off?” The train BM 7 was in the Grand River near Cayuga; 22 cars were at the Grand River bridge with 16 in the river. Lunn was at the derailment site for 19 days as railway crews and local construction companies worked on the cleanup. He says, “It was a bad one. I think there’s still steel in the river.”
After leaving the job in the late ‘90s, Lunn soon returned around 2000 to work for the Southern Ontario Railway CN Line. He worked on the line from Brantford to Esso, retiring in 2011 as a conductor/engineer.
The other railway enthusiasts on HHRC include Richard Blyleven, Glenn Cherry, and Peter and Jo-Ann Duns.
Blyleven grew up watching the trains on the CASO Railway from his family’s dairy farm in the part of Oneida known as Lythmore. At one time Lythmore had a train station, post office, mill, gypsum mine, and houses for the mine workers. As a boy he explored what remained of those structures, fostering an interest in ghost towns and trains.
Completed in 1873, the CASO was built by Americans. Blyleven’s research revealed that Cornelius Vanderbuilt, owner of New York Central, wanted a railway from New York to Chicago that avoided expensive Pennsylvania; Blyleven says, “This track was shorter, smoother, and more efficient. Americans travelled from New York to Chicago and went right through Hagersville.”
The rail line featured two sets of tracks – the north track travelled east to west and the south track travelled west to east – with “a train every 20 to 30 minutes.”
Blyleven and his sister Marilyn experienced the busy train schedule during a bike ride when they waited one after the other for two long trains. Not realizing another train was coming, Marilyn moved ahead. Blyleven recalls, “I hopped off my bike and grabbed her fender and we rolled into the ditch as the train passed.”
Blyleven’s former neighbour, 90-year-old retired dairy farmer George Wodskou, remembers the steam engine era and how black the ground was along the tracks because of cinders. “You wouldn’t believe the pollution,” he says. “Nobody was worried about it then.”
Wodskou still lives on his farm a short distance from the old Lythmore settlement. He says the section through Oneida was considered the worst set of tracks because of the curves. He recalls a train every 15 minutes during the war and adds, “You could set your watch by the eastbound 7 o’clock Flyer passenger train.”
Knowing the train times was critical for his education at Hagersville High School. He explains, “For country kids, when you got out of the one room school house, how did you get to high school?” The answer was the mail train at a cost of $3.10 a month. He admits that he often had to run to catch the train, but he never received detention for being late.
Glenn Cherry’s and Peter Duns’ interest in trains was also influenced by their proximity to the railway growing up. The Cherry farm was south of Hagersville in Garnet, which had a flag stop for the train. Cherry shares, “There was an old wooden trestle bridge that crossed the creek. Dave Smith – ‘Smitty’ – and I would gravitate to that trestle…. Smitty had the same interest in steam locomotives and trains.”
Cherry describes himself as a ‘railfan’. His interest is not just seeing the trains in action at scenic locations, but the trackage itself. He says, “It is amazing to watch the various maneuvers required to fully utilize the rails … the foresight, heritage, and execution.”
Cherry has exchanged photographs with other railfans, including a 1962 photo of a Canadian National steam excursion passing through Garnet with both the Cherry farm and the Garnet United Church in the background.
While growing up in Caledonia, Duns would look out the window as “a little guy” to watch the trains. He says, “I used to see the trains in Caledonia that would go to Hagersville…. The line that we have here (in Hagersville) today is the combination of those two (Caledonia) lines.”
A particular memory for Duns was after being in Port Dover with his family. He says, “We were coming home at dusk and stopped in Hagersville for the train. It was a passenger train and the lights were all on in the coaches. It’s something I’ve always remembered.”
Duns and his wife, Jo-Ann, raised their family in Hagersville and two of their four sons share their parents’ interest in trains. Since retiring, Duns’ interest has become a hobby. Jo-Ann has learned more about the trains from the committee. She says, “The trains went down into the quarries to haul out stone. These railway lines were made from the local stones from the quarry. That was something I learned from the fellas.”
Sharing Hagersville’s railway heritage is the aim of these train enthusiasts. Lunn notes, “The railway came through before Hagersville was a town.”
Hagersville grew with the railway and, in its hay day in 1945, 16 passenger trains went through Hagersville each day. Many neighbouring rail lines have now disappeared and Duns asserts, “We are lucky to have the rail service now that we have. It does provide jobs, it provides opportunities … (and) possible future opportunities too.”
Blyleven adds, “The railway made these towns. If the trains never went through Hagersville, it would be totally different than what we see now.”
To learn more about the history of the railway and its impact on Hagersville, be sure to visit the Hagersville Heritage Railway Committee display at Hagersville Ag Day on June 6, 2025.
