Donald Smith, known to most Canadians as Lord Strathcona, was an adventurer who made his fortune building railroads. He joined the Hudson’s Bay Company at age eighteen and went on to build the first railway to open the Canadian Northwest to settlement. As his crowning achievement, he drove the last spike for the nation-building Canadian Pacific Railway.

In 1896, Smith became Canada’s High Commissioner in London and was soon elevated to the peerage. He became a generous benefactor to Canadian institutions. This eminently readable biography brings to light new information, including details about Strathcona’s personal life and his scandalous marriage.