See this World Before the Next pays homage to the romantic era of cruising to the world’s exotic destinations - in the first class style of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

Though the Canadian Pacific Railway was a national enterprise in name, its founders were free-traders in practice and global thinkers by nature. Before the rails from east and west were joined in Eagle’s Pass at Craigellachie, BC, on 7 November 1885, the company was operating ships on the Great Lakes, building a chain of tourist hotels, and already planning to launch end-of-track clear across the Pacific, laying the foundations for what would become the largest and most comprehensive transportation system in the world. What appeared to the public as separate companies popping up all over the map - Canadian Pacific Hotels, Canadian Pacific Steamships, Canadian Pacific Telegraphs, and so on - were, for operational purposes, mere departments of the worldwide administrative octopus known as the Canadian Pacific Railway: An Imperial Highway.

The first cruise ships offered unheard of luxury and an opportunity to travel to major ports and distant corners of the world. Contained in the book are glimpses of foreign countries and amazing sights, vintage brochures and posters, detailed two-way correspondence, timetables, engineering plans and photographs, news clips, sailing schedules, passenger bulletins and promotional materials, and cruise-ship ephemera and travellers’ diaries carefully culled from CPR and other archives by a patient and talented historian/archivist. The author’s three-decade interest in CPR cruise ship material and a predilection for scouring flea markets and old collections of ephemera have brought fascinating and exotic material to light.