“As Important As The President”

From the Federal Identity website, a website dedicated to documenting Canadian corporate identities and graphic design.

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“As important as the President

‘A messenger boy is as important in his sphere as I am in mine. The minute a single man slacks on the job a bolt begins to rattle.’

Sir Henry W. Thornton,

Chairman and President,

Canadian National Railways.

It is not magnitude alone which makes Canadian National a truly great railway system. Neither is it perfection of equipment. It is something more rare — character. There are 108,000 men in the army of Canadian National employees and they possess one common characteristic — enthusiasm.

Among these 108,000 men one thought has been preached and practised and preached again — a messenger boy is as important in his work as the president in his: every man must do his job or the whole will falter.

An intangible thing, esprit de corps — but a mightier force than all the mammoth locomotives which take the Rockies in their stride. It has made Canadian National a great railway and a great institution, alive with enterprise and purpose, like the virile young nation of which today it is the nerve and sinew.

The Canadian National Railways System has over 23,000 miles of track, a chain of hotels, vacation resorts, steamships, a telegraph system, radio stations, an express service. It has the mightiest locomotives and the most luxurious equipment that men can build or money can buy. It spans a continent from east to west and links the Great Lakes to the shore of Hudson Bay. The largest railway system in America.

Radio reception on Canadian National trains today — telephone connection from moving trains to home and office perhaps tomorrow. The last word in steam locomotion today — new marvels of oil-electric locomotion on the horizon. Maximums of efficiency and luxury today — better, finer, greater things tomorrow. That is the product of enthusiasm. It is the character of a railway system in which messenger boy and president have the same unceasing urge to greater achievement.”