The Canadian Officers’ Training Corps, McGill Contingent was established in 1912 so that students could be trained as militia soldiers in anticipation of the international crisis that came to be World War I (1914-1918). The C.O.T.C. was directly connected with the 148th (McGill) Battalion of the Canadian Expeditionary Force but was also associated with a variety of other units at the time. The first commander of the contingent was V.I. Smart – a McGill railway engineering professor. The C.O.T.C.’s mission changed with the beginning of World War II (1939-1945) whereby it solely focused on training officers for the Canadian Army. By the time the contingent ceased operations, it had trained over 12,000 soldiers.

The Canadian Pacific Railway Company (CPR) was incorporated in 1881. In 1882, Sir William Cornelius Van Horne (1843-1915) was hired as CPR general manager to oversee the construction of the transcontinental railway over the Prairies and through the Rockies. He became CPR's vice-president in 1884 and president in 1888. Completed in 1885, it connected Eastern Canada to British Columbia and played an important role in the development of Canada. The company established hotels, shipping lines and airlines, and developed mining and telecommunications industries (CP Steamships, CP Air Lines, CP Oil and Gas Limited, and CP Telegraphs). In 2001, Canadian Pacific separated into five independent companies, with Canadian Pacific Railway returning to its origins as a railway company. CPR is a public company with shares trading on the major stock exchanges in Toronto and New York.