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“THE NEw MECCA OF IMMIGRANTS”... Esterhazy’s was not the only publication that tried to lure Hungarians to Canada and against which Thirring raised his voice. Others were partly disguised as advice and guidance attempting to support emigrants. The Canadian Pacific Railway, for example, published a Hungarian-English Dictionary with words that an emigrant needs to know when living on a farm in Canada." While the Cunard Steamship Company informed Hungarians about how to travel to Canada in an immigrant handbook containing practical advice on immigration, settlement, and the voyage itself. All these pamphlets and publications were in line with the program promoting the Canadian Prairies as the “Last Best West” in which promotional publications were made by the “Canadian government and distributed to potential settlers in Europe and the United States. Designed to dispel negative climatic and cultural preconceptions and extol the virtues of the Canadian Prairie for agricultural settlement, these pamphlets played a significant role in the aggressive immigrant-recruiting campaign staged by Clifford Sifton, minister of the interior from 1896 to 1905.”°° In the process of disseminating such information, rail and other transportation companies played a major role and although the main wave of immigration and immigration promotion took place prior to the First World War, a similar trend was visible in the case of the 1920s as well. THE 1920s: SAMUEL ZAGONYI’s ATTEMPTS TO COUNTER IMMIGRATION PROPAGANDA As previously noted, in the 1920s, immigration started again and also included previously non-preferred countries. Like before, immigration propaganda played a key role in disseminating information about Canada and immigration opportunities, with the railway companies assuming a major role. The “Railway Agreement” introduced above “authorized the two railways to recruit and select ‘agriculturalists, agricultural workers and domestic workers’ and settle them in Canada with the assistance of the Department of Immigration and Colonization. Therefore, the two railway companies de facto 18 Canadian Pacific Railway, Angol (Hungarian-English) (a helyes angol kiejtés pontos feltiintetésével): amit egy tanyán tudnia kell: a Telepítési és Fejlesztési Osztály által előterjesztve, Budapest, Királyi Magyar Egyetemi Nyomda, 1900?. Full English text available here: http://peel.library.ualberta.ca/bibliography/2490.html (accessed 10 May 2020). Cunard Steamship Company, Kanada: hogy utazzunk a Cunard Line vöröskemenyes gyorshajóival közvetlenül Kanadába, Budapest, Magyarországi Főiroda, 1910?. Full English text available here: http://peel.library.ualberta.ca/bibliography/3406.html (accessed 10 May 2020). 50 David J. Wishart, “Last Best West” in Encyclopedia of the Great Plains. Available at: http://plainshumanities.unl.edu/encyclopedia/doc/egp.ii.038 (accessed 10 May 2020). 49
