This bunkhouse scene shows immigrant lumber workers relaxing after a hard day in the bush. Sometimes forty to sixty men were accommodated in one building. Often there were no windows to provide ventilation. The men slept on double-tiered bunks spread with hay and blankets. Notice the clothes hanging from the rafters to dry and the fiddler at the back, barely visible through the smoke from the woodstove and the pipes the men smoked. Private organizations, such as Frontier College, founded in 1899, attempted to ease the passage to citizenship by sending instructors directly to the bush and railroad camps where basic English and civics were offered. Teaching was often done in bunkhouses such as the one pictured here after a full day of arduous work.
