The official opening ceremonies of the New Westminster Southern at the international boundary on the east side of Blaine, Washington, on a snowy February 14, 1891. Here, what would be known on the Canadian side as the entry port of Douglas, a Fairhaven & Southern train and its passengers await the arrival of the Canadian excursion train originating 24 miles away at Brownsville, across the Fraser River from New Westminster. In the distance, where the two trains will meet, is an arch to commemorate the historic occasion -- the first international rail connection in British Columbia (indeed, the first west of Manitoba). On board the train from Brownsville is Lieutenant-Governor Hugh Nelson of British Columbia, members of the New Westminster Board of Trade, Surrey Council, and other prominent citizens.

This section of track no longer exists, abandoned as the Great Northern's main line when the coastal route was built along Semiahmoo Bay some years later, skirting the west side of Blaine as it went north into British Columbia. The famous Peace Arch at the boundary in Blaine today, built in 1922, was first proposed in 1913 by Sam Hill, a former executive of the Great Northern who had married the oldest daughter of James Jerome Hill, the company's president.