Winnipeg
Winnipeg is the capital and largest city of the Manitoba province in Canada. The city is named after the nearby Lake Winnipeg. The name Winnipeg comes from the Western Cree word for muddy water. Known as the “Gateway to the West,” Winnipeg is a railway and transportation hub.
Swami Vivekananda boarded the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) train in Vancouver on Wednesday, July 26, morning at 10:45. This was a mere 15 hours after he arrived there from Japan in a ship. The train was headed east for Winnipeg, Manitoba. It was a grueling 60 hours of train ride.
July 28, 1893
Swamiji likely reached Winnipeg late night of Friday, July 28, or early Saturday morning. The Manitoba Free Press (Monday, July 31) carried the news of Swamiji’s arrival.
The report that Swamiji arrived “last night” was clearly a result of editorial laxity. The paper did not have a Sunday edition and the reporter’s story, filed late Friday night or early Saturday morning, was published in the Monday edition without revision. Also, Swamiji’s name was misspelt, something that happened repeatedly in media reports, especially in the early period of Swamiji’s stay in the West. Swamiji’s interview with the Manitoba Free Press reporter likely occurred soon after the train arrived.
In the same July 31 edition of the Manitoba Free Press we find a Saturday morning list of guests registered at the Manitoba Hotel—a notable name in the list is that of Miss Kate Sanborn, an American educator, author and lecturer, who was professor of English Literature at Smith College in Boston until 1890.
It was during this long train ride from Vancouver to Winnipeg that Swamiji and Kate Sanborn met. Impressed by Swamiji, Sanborn invited him to Boston to be her guest if ever he visited the East Coast. In less than three weeks, she hosted Swamiji in Boston which, coincidentally, led to his meeting with Prof. Wright of Harvard, whose letter of introduction made it possible for Swamiji to become a delegate at the Parliament of Religions in September.
There is no evidence that Swamiji stayed in a hotel in Winnipeg. The Manitoba Free Press refers to the arrival of CPR cars full of passengers bound for the World’s Fair in Chicago. These cars were routinely detached from the CPR train and were shunted to the southbound train for Chicago via Minneapolis. Swamiji likely remained aboard the railway car overnight in Winnipeg.
He departed sometime on Saturday, arriving in Chicago about 30 hours later on the evening of Sunday, July 30, 1893.
Sources
Swami Gambhirananda, Yuganayak Vivekananda (Bengali), Kolkata: Udbodhan, 1985.
Mr. Rainer Kossman, Winnipeg, Manitoba