Learn Our History

The city, located at the intersection of two historical roads, was first settled in 1810. It was named the seat of the new Elgin County in 1844 and was incorporated as a village in 1852, as a town in 1861. In 1871, St. Thomas and the nearby village of Millersburg (a village east of the town) amalgamated.[2] In 1881 St. Thomas finally grew to become a city.

Ten years after the incorporation as a town, the developing village of Millersburg, which included these lands east of the London and Port Stanley Railway, amalgamated with St. Thomas.

In the late 19th century and early 20th century several railways were constructed through the city, and St. Thomas became an important railway junction. A total of 26 railways have passed through the city since the first railway was completed in 1856. In the 1950s and 1960s, with the decline of the railway as a mode of transportation, other industry began to locate in the city, principally primary and secondary automotive manufacturing.

CASO – Canada Southern Railway Station

The former Canada Southern Railway station in St. Thomas, Ontario was

built by American railway promoters between 1871 and 1873 to serve both as the local station and as the headquarters of the company. As such, this large and impressive Italianate-style structure served as the symbol of the railway.

After 1878 this regional rail line was controlled by the New York Central Railroad and, from 1883 until 1930, under the aegis of one of its subsidiaries, the Michigan Central Railway. Subsequently, the lease was transferred back to the New York Central until 1968 at which time the line was amalgamated into the Penn Central which went bankrupt in 1976. The company was reorganized as Conrail, which owned it until 1983 when it was purchased jointly by the Canadian Pacific Railway and Canadian National Railways. The St. Thomas station functioned throughout most of this period as the company’s administrative headquarters and the location of its main shops and yards…”

An Elephant Ear Sandwich on Rye Bread – The story of Jumbo

Bruce Ricketts

A guy went into a restaurant in St Thomas, Ontario on September 15, 1885.

He passed a sign that said that anyone who can order a sandwich that the restaurant cannot supply will get $1000.  He sits down, thinking this could be the easiest money he has ever made, and without even looking at the menu, he asks the waiter for an “Elephant Ear on Rye Sandwich”.  The waiter returns ten minutes later with a check for $1000 and hands it to the guy.  The guy says, with a smirk, “Out of Elephant Ears?”  “No,” replies the waiter, “we are out of rye bread.”

The essence of a good joke is that you don’t see the punch line coming.  The chance of being out of rye bread but not elephant ear is remote and what makes the joke funny. But for the people of St. Thomas, on September 15, 1885 – it was not a joke.

Jumbo was an African elephant, born in 1861 in the French Sudan.  He was exported to France in 1863 and then to London Zoo in 1865, where he became famous for giving rides to visitors.  Jumbo’s name is from a Swahili word, jumbe, which means “chief.”  Unfortunately, Jumbo grew bored in London and began to “act up”.

Jumbo was sold by the London Zoo in 1882 to the “The Greatest Show on Earth” – the Barnum & Bailey Circus, for $10,000 and shipped to New York City.  In New York, the ship was met by thousands of onlookers who wanted to catch a glimpse of the 12 foot high “monster”.  He was big, but not a monster.  Jumbo became very even tempered in New York.  He became the headliner of the B&B Circus and was featured on most of the Circus’ posters.

Jumbo was transported from venue to venue around the US and Canada in a specially built carriage.  The six ton Jumbo was accompanied by his handler, Matthew Scott.

On the night of September 15, 1885, the Circus was playing the town of St. Thomas, Ontario. The circus’ 29 elephants had completed their routines and all but two had been led from the big top to their waiting railway cars.  Only the smallest, named Tom Thumb, and the largest, Jumbo, remained until the end of the show to take a final bow.  After the completion of the show, as Matthew Scott guided Tom Thumb and Jumbo along the tracks, a loud whistle announced an impending doom.  An unscheduled express train, unable to stop, hit Tom Thumb, scooping him up on its cowcatcher and knocking him down a steep embankment.  Jumbo, who was leading Tom Thumb was caught between the embankment and circus train and had no place to flee.  He was hit from the rear.  The train was derailed and Jumbo was crushed; his skull reportedly broken in over a hundred places.   Still conscious and groaning, even with the massive injuries, the mortally wounded elephant was comforted by Scott until it died.

A life-size statue of the elephant commemorates the tragedy in St. Thomas.  Some towns folk also painted a circus mural on one of their buildings.

Jumbo’s skeleton was donated to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. The elephant’s heart was sold to Cornell University. Jumbo’s hide was stuffed and traveled with Barnum’s circus for a number of years. In 1889, Barnum donated the stuffed Jumbo to Tufts University, where it was displayed until destroyed by a fire in 1975. Jumbo’s tail, which survived the fire, is kept in the University archives. The great elephant’s ashes are kept in a 14-ounce Peter Pan Crunchy Peanut Butter jar in the office of the Tufts athletic director. A statue of “Jumbo” was purchased from an amusement park and placed on the Tufts campus after the fire, however this statue erroneously depicts an Asian elephant, not an African elephant. In honour of Barnum’s donation of the elephant’s hide and more than $50,000, Jumbo became the university’s mascot, and remains such to this day.

As a result of Barnum’s publicity the word “jumbo” is now synonymous with “large” or “huge”.  For example, a large hot dog or sausage may be called a “jumbo hot dog or sausage” and the the Boeing 747 is known as the “Jumbo Jet”.

Copyright 1998-2011 to identified authors.  All rights reserved.

St.Thomas – The Railway Capital of Canada

Why do we call St. Thomas Canada’s railway capital?

First, because St. Thomas was an important railway town. At its peak, St. Thomas was a hub for a multitude of prominent railways, and served as the primary stop on the Canadian short cut between Detroit and Buffalo. By 1914 a total of eight different railways brought in more than 100 trains per day.

A more profound reason is the importance of the railways to St. Thomas. To be sure, there were major cities in Canada that also served as booming railways centres. But the railways transformed St. Thomas from a town of just 1700 people in 1860 to a city of more than 35,000 people today. Between 1872 and 1880 alone the population shot up from 2,200 to 8,367. The railways brought St. Thomas jobs and prosperity.

They made St. Thomas known internationally, though the incident that made St. Thomas a household name was an unfortunate one. On September 15, 1885, Jumbo the elephant, star of the Barnum and Bailey Circus, was struck and killed in St. Thomas by a Grand Trunk locomotive. It took 150 men to move the carcass. On the one hundredth anniversary of Jumbo’s death, the city dedicated a monument to Jumbo, a 38-ton statue of the animal some believe was the largest elephant ever in captivity, and certainly the best-known non-human that ever lived.

New York Central Engine #5427

As the railways began to lose their prominence in the mid-20th century, St. Thomas saw its fortunes take a similar turn. There were many years the city did well to hold onto the population it had, and many believe that if not for a concerted effort to diversify its industrial base, St. Thomas might have faded into history altogether. Magnificent in its heyday, the Canada Southern Railway Station is still one of the largest buildings in the city of St. Thomas.

More recently, St. Thomas has become known as a centre for automotive production, but local residents have not forgotten the mode of transportation on which the city was built. Local attractions include the Elgin County Railway Museum and the North America Railway Hall of Fame. Every August people from St. Thomas and visitors from far and wide come to celebrate the railway influence in the Iron Horse Festival. The current community focus is a fundraising effort to save the old railway station, originally built in 1872. In addition to preserving an important historical landmark, the project also promises to rejuvenate the downtown core and serve as a testament to the enduring legacy the railways have left on St. Thomas, Canada’s railway capital.

Locals take one final opportunity to pose with the animal that gave the English language a new synonym for “large”.