To Build a Nation

It is one of the biggest hydroelectric power plants in the world. Embedded nearly half a kilometer beneath the Cambrian Shield, its massive powerhouse creates enough energy to light three cities - forever. When it was built, Churchill Falls was the largest construction project in the free world. Harnessing this force of nature in the wilds of Labrador would become a battle against the elements and the odds. For Canada, Churchill Falls was an economic engine. For Newfoundland, a tainted coming of age. For the men who built it, an undertaking that challenged the bounds of engineering itself... the creation of a cathedral.

They said it couldn't be done. But men built the White Pass and Yukon Route railroad. They carved it from sheer walls of granite, muscled it across deep canyons and pushed it up the slopes of each mountain that stood in their way. Building this railway in the 19th century was an exceptional achievement. What sets the White Pass apart is how quickly it was built two short years, and where it was built, at high latitudes, in very cold weather. And it is built without the tools today's engineers take for granted - GPS, laser beam surveys, heavy equipment and heavy-lift choppers. So how did they build this railway in 1898? They built it by hand.