CELPIP Reading Part 3 Practice Test: Pier 21: Canada’s Front Door

Paragraph A

For more than forty years, the first piece of Canada that many newcomers saw was a long shed on the Halifax waterfront. Pier 21 opened in 1928, at a time when most people crossing the Atlantic to Canada came by ship, and Halifax’s deep, ice-free harbour could receive large vessels all year. Between its opening and its closing in 1971, close to one million immigrants arrived there. Its location beside the railway was no accident. Once they had cleared immigration, many passengers needed only to walk a short distance to a waiting train, which would carry them inland, sometimes on a journey of several days to the Prairies.

Paragraph B

The people who passed through Pier 21 changed with world events. In the late 1920s, many were farm workers from Britain and from northern and central Europe, recruited to help settle the West. Arrivals dropped sharply during the Depression of the 1930s, when jobs were scarce and Canada tightened its immigration rules. During the Second World War, the building served a very different purpose, as roughly half a million Canadian service members left for Europe through the pier. When the fighting ended, it became the arrival point for tens of thousands of war brides, the wives of Canadian soldiers, who often came with young children.

Paragraph C

After the war, a new wave began. Refugees and displaced persons from war-torn Europe came in large numbers, followed by immigrants from countries such as Italy, the Netherlands and Germany, who were looking for work and a fresh start. Many carried all they owned in a few trunks and suitcases. Canada’s rules in those years strongly favoured Europeans, so the crowds in the immigration hall did not reflect the whole world. For those who did arrive, memories of the building are mixed. Officials examined documents and carried out medical checks, and the long waits could be stressful, especially for people who spoke little English. Yet volunteers from the Red Cross and from church and community groups were also on hand, looking after children and offering help to tired families.

Paragraph D

By the 1960s, air travel had begun to replace the ocean liners, and fewer and fewer immigrants were arriving by sea. Pier 21 closed in 1971, and the building was later put to other uses, while its history risked being forgotten. In the late 1980s, volunteers began working to save it, gathering the stories of those who had passed through, while Halifax community leader Ruth Goldbloom led the effort to raise funds. The site opened as a museum in 1999. It has since become a national museum, the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, where families can look for records of their parents’ or grandparents’ arrival in Canada and see exhibits on the country’s immigration history.