CNR Radio
[4] It was developed, owned and operated by the Canadian National Railway between 1923 and 1932 to provide en route entertainment and information for its train passengers.
Programming was produced in English, French and occasionally in some First Nations languages, and distributed nationwide through the railway's own telegraph lines and through rented airtime on other private radio stations.
Radio was also intended as an innovation that made travel on CNR trains more attractive and provided it with a competitive advantage over its rival, the Canadian Pacific Railway.
[5] On October 9, 1923, the network made international news when it carried a broadcast of former British Prime Minister David Lloyd George being interviewed by reporters travelling with him on a Montreal to Toronto train.
[3] One of the network's most notable broadcasts was its transmission of the celebrations of the Diamond Jubilee of Canadian confederation from Parliament Hill in Ottawa on July 1, 1927.
[12] CNR Radio also produced, as a public service, educational programmes such as An Introduction to the Gilbert and Sullivan Operas, which was a series of lectures and performances for adults, and for children Radio Train in which an imaginary train travelled to a different location in each episode, with information about the sights and history of each locale.
[12] Romance of Canada was a series of radio plays written by Merrill Denison and produced at CNR's Montreal studios.
[9] Thornton hoped Romance of Canada would "kindle in Canadians generally a deeper interest in the romantic early history of their country".
In the same year, CNRM in Montreal broadcast a complete in-studio production of The Mikado and other Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas with a full orchestra and CNR Radio signed a contract with the Hart House String Quartet and in 1927, put them on national tour with broadcasts from each station in celebration of Beethoven's centenary.
[5] Three of the stations, CNRA in Moncton, CNRV in Vancouver and CNRO in Ottawa, were owned by the CNR and transmitted at a strength of 500 watts.
Bennett who, as a corporate lawyer who had had the Canadian Pacific Railway as one of his clients, proved sympathetic to its arguments and opposed any government competition with the CPR and was determined to strip the CNR of its radio network.
[5]A group of Conservative Members of Parliament successfully pressured Thornton, the radio network's principal champion, to resign as president of CNR in 1932 - he was also stripped of his pension.
[22] In November 1931, as a result of intense pressure from the Railway Committee of the House of Commons of Canada, the CNR ended its on-train radio reception service,[8] and ceased broadcasting entirely in 1932.
[5] Phantom stations also existed at various times in Saint John, Fredericton, London/Kitchener-Waterloo, Chatham, Brandon, Yorkton, Red Deer, two in Hamilton, a third in Toronto and one in Michigan.
