New York and New England Railroad
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Overview | |
---|---|
Dates of operation | 1846–1898 |
Successor | standard gauge |
The New York and New England Railroad (NY&NE) was a railroad connecting southern
Today, most of the original New York and New England lines have been abandoned. A segment in Massachusetts is now part of the
History
West from Providence: 1846-1863
The corridor from
Southwest from Boston: 1847-1867
At the
On May 1, 1849, the Southbridge and Blackstone Railroad was incorporated to extend the line west from Blackstone to Southbridge. The Midland Railroad was incorporated May 2, 1850, to build a new entrance to Boston, merging with the existing one south of Dedham. The two companies were consolidated with the Norfolk County Railroad on December 12, 1853, to form the Boston and New York Central Railroad, which had the intent of continuing southwest through Connecticut all the way to New York City. The first section of this extension was incorporated in May 1853 as the East Thompson Railroad, forming the Connecticut portion of the Southbridge and Blackstone.
The extension from Blackstone southwest to
Combined routes from Providence and Boston: 1863-1898
In May 1863, the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad was chartered to take over operations of the failed lines and continue the line west to
In the meantime, the
On February 11, 1867, the BH&E leased the Norfolk County Railroad, finally reopening the full line from
By 1869 the BH&E leased the
On September 9, 1872, the
The
Various sources note the Boston Hartford & Erie as failing and falling into receivership in 1870, yet it was during the Panic of 1873 that 89 of the country's 364 railroads went bankrupt. The New York and New England Railroad Company was chartered by special act of the Massachusetts legislature on April 17, 1873. Such was the mess of the Boston Hartford & Erie's mortgages and land titles that the NY&NE did not enter into possession of any of the BH&E "system" until sometime in 1875. Alvin F. Harlow in Steelways of New England states that the NY&NE did not get possession of the Hartford Providence & Fishkill line until 1877.
Through its entire existence (1873–1895) the NY&NE was always bedeviled by uncertainty in its land titles. Symptomatic of this: the $20 million common stock of the NY&NE originated as the $20,000,000 principal amount of the "Berdell Bonds"; the chartering legislation said the NY&NE was to "succeed to the rights of the Berdell Bondholders". There was a 10% assessment levied on the Berdell Bondholders as part of the chartering legislation, which also appropriated the necessary monies for the state to pay its assessment on its $3 million of Berdell Bonds. For some reason $1,000 of Berdell bonds were never issued so for years the NY&NE had $19.999 million of common stock outstanding.
Through all this the receivers of the BH&E and the later management of the NY&NE continued to hold on to the BH&E's Norwich & Worcester lease which was a major part, if not the principal prop to the entire system's existence. The N&W and its related Norwich Line steamers (passenger and freight) made money, enough that the NY&NE could afford to pay 8% (reduced from 10% by negotiation ca. 1885) on the N&W's capital stock.
In 1881 the extension from
Also in 1881 the
The
There was a December 31, 1883/January 1, 1884, receivership that got referred to at the time as the "Midnight Receivership" which featured the NY&NE officers trying to find a federal judge to issue a receivership order before the end of the year. This receivership was over by 1886.
Cyrus W. Field had become a major figure behind the NY&NE by 1886 but after the state of Massachusetts refused to sell him the $3 million in stock it held (instead disposing of the shares to a rival group because of concern about Field's close association with Jay Gould) Field sold his holdings in the NY&NE. The Massachusetts sale of NY&NE stock was part of a deliberate policy on the part of Massachusetts to get out of owning railroads; the sale of the Hoosac Tunnel line to the Fitchburg in 1887 was also done under this policy, a declared policy of Massachusetts Governor Andrew.
The new NY&NE President in 1887 was Jabez A. Bostwick, a Standard Oil partner of John D. Rockefeller. Rockefeller's brother William sat on the board of the New Haven. With Rockefeller lieutenants in both camps one wonders whether the NY&NE-NYNH&H "rivalry" may have been a Standard Oil "Divide & Conquer" policy to get low rates and other benefits out of both roads who together controlled nearly all rail business in New England south of the Boston and Albany Railroad (running through Massachusetts from Boston to Worcester, to Springfield, Pittsfield and on to Albany, New York).
The final bankruptcy of the NY&NE happened on December 27, 1893, and the company was reorganized on August 26, 1895, as the New England Railroad; Stuart Daggett in Railroad Reorganization states the 1895 NY&NE reorganization featured a hefty 20% assessment on NY&NE common. The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad leased the company for 99 years from July 1, 1898, at 3% on the preferred (normal dividend) and common stock. The New England Railroad was merged into the New Haven in 1908.
Many sources state that most of the NE stock had early on been acquired by the New Haven, probably bought in 1895 when NY&NE stockholders who did not want to forfeit their shares for non-assessment dumped their shares on the market. Baker in Formation of the New England Rail Systems claims there was a mini-Northern Pacific type corner in 1894 in NY&NE common when parties "Friendly" to the Boston & Albany tried to buy controlling influence in the NY&NE and the New Haven had to buy a large position in NY&NE common. Both parties apparently wound up together buying more NY&NE common than actually existed; worse, the New Haven had had to pay high prices for near worthless shares.
The most well-known and prestigious train of the New York & New England Railroad was the New England Limited of 1891, a crack Boston - New York passenger train. In 1891, the Pullman Palace Car Company refitted the train with luxurious new cars decorated in white and gold, inspiring the advertising department to call it the White Train and folks along the line to call it the Ghost Train as it sped through their towns after dark. It caught the romantic imagination of New Englanders and even after it was long gone, Lucius Beebe, a Bostonian and noted railroad writer, felt compelled to memorialize it.[2][page needed] Famed author Rudyard Kipling memorialized the train in a popular verse:
- Without a jar, or roll, or antic,
- Without a stop to Willimantic,
- The New England Limited takes its way
- At three o'clock each day,
- Maids and Matrons, daintily dimited,
- Ride everyday on the New England Limited;
- Rain nor snow ne'er stops its flight,
- It makes New York at nine each night,
- One half the glories have not been told
- Of that wonderful train of white and gold
- Which leaves each day for New York at three
- Over the N.Y. & N.E.[3]
New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad: 1898-1969
Much of the major foundation of the line of the NY & NE was the legacy of the Hartford, Providence and Fishkill Railroad, whose mainline ran from Providence, Rhode Island, west to Plainfield, Connecticut, to Willimantic, to Vernon, to Hartford, to New Britain, to Waterbury, to Danbury, and finally to Brewster, NY.[4] Several portions of the line in Connecticut, including Danbury to Hawleyville and Waterbury to Bristol, were double-tracked in the late 1910s.[5] This work included the construction of the Pequabuck Tunnel, which opened in 1910.
Until 1955 the NY, NH & H ran passenger trains from Boston to Blackstone, to Putnam, joining the above line at Willimantic and continually finally to Waterbury. This included the weekday limited stops Nutmeg train.[6] The last remnant of service on this line was a Hartford-Waterbury segment that ended in the 1960s.[7]
As time passed and sections were abandoned, the former NY&NE main lines became minor branches. In 1965, the city of Bristol, Connecticut, paid $15 million to build a new spur (partially using a segment of the pre-Pequabuck Tunnel mainline) to a new General Motors plant on Chippens Hill to convince the company to keep its operations in the city.[8]
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Branches
In addition to the two main lines to
Dedham
The original Boston line ended at Dedham with a connection to the Boston and Providence Railroad. In 1883 what had become a branch to Dedham was abandoned. Prior to that, a new branch just to the east had been built in 1881, and was supplemented in 1890 by a connection to the south.
Medway
The
Valley Falls
The Rhode Island and Massachusetts Railroad was chartered in 1875 and opened in 1877, connecting the main Boston line at Franklin to the Providence and Worcester Railroad at Valley Falls. The New York and New England Railroad leased it in 1887.
Milford/Hopkinton/Ashland
The
The
The Milford, Franklin and Providence Railroad was organized in 1868 and opened in 1883, extending the line southeast from Milford to Franklin.
On April 1, 1897, the New England Railroad leased all three companies.
A short section from Franklin to Forge Park/495 is in use by MBTA Franklin/Foxboro Line service, while the section from Forge Park to Milford remains in freight use. From Milford to Ashland is abandoned and being converted to the Upper Charles [Rail] Trail. A 1.4-mile (2.3 km) segment of the Upper Charles Trail completed in 2011 uses the right-of-way from I-495 to the Hopkinton line.[9] In July 2020, the state awarded $50,000 for design of the Trolley Brook Trail, a 1⁄2-mile (0.80 km) segment of rail trail on the right-of-way in Ashland.[10] It will be the first segment of the 7 miles (11 km) of the trail in Ashland.[11]
Woonsocket/Pascoag
The line eventually running from Brookline, Massachusetts, to Harrisville, Rhode Island, was originally built as a competitor to the NY&NE's Boston line. The first section opened in 1852 as part of the Charles River Railroad. It reached Woonsocket, Rhode Island, in 1863, and in 1891 the Woonsocket and Pascoag Railroad opened, continuing the line to the Providence and Springfield Railroad at Harrisville. In 1873 the NY&NE obtained the line to Woonsocket via a merger; on April 1, 1896, the New England Railroad leased the continuation past Woonsocket.
Providence and Springfield
The Providence and Springfield Railroad was chartered in 1853 and opened in 1873 from Providence, Rhode Island, northwest to Pascoag. An extension to Douglas Junction on the NY&NE main line in Massachusetts opened in 1893, and the New England Railroad leased the line on July 1, 1896.
Southbridge
The
Pawtuxet Valley
The
Norwich and Worcester
The Norwich and Worcester Railroad was an 1837 consolidation of the Boston, Norwich and New London Railroad Company of Connecticut and the Worcester and Norwich Railroad Company of Massachusetts when both state legislatures passed acts allowing the merger.[12] Neither of these companies had built any railroad but the new one proceeded to build one from Norwich, Connecticut (later New London) north to Worcester, Massachusetts, including the Taft Tunnel at Lisbon, CT. The Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad leased it in 1869, and the lease continued through the reorganizations. Connections were provided with the Providence line at Plainfield and the Boston line between Putnam and Mechanicsville. In 1886 the New England Railroad company renewed the lease [13] that it acquired from the Boston, Hartford, and Erie.
Until 1955 the line served as the basis for Boston-bypassing run-through train, the East Wind from New York to Bangor, Maine, via the Norwich and Worcester line.[14][15][16]
New Haven
The
Rockville
The Rockville Railroad was incorporated in 1857 and opened and leased to the Hartford, Providence and Fishkill Railroad in 1863. It was a short branch from the main line at Vernon north and east to Rockville.
South Manchester
The
Springfield
The
Connecticut River
The Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad was formed in 1888 as a consolidation of two smaller companies, opening in 1885 and 1888. The New York and New England Railroad leased it in 1892, as a branch from the main line in Waterbury east to Cromwell on the Connecticut River. The company went bankrupt and was reorganized in 1898 as the Middletown, Meriden and Waterbury Railroad, and was immediately leased by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad.
Station listing
State | Milepost | City | Station | Connections and notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
R.I. | Providence
|
Providence
|
Union Station serving all railroads in Providence
| |
Dike Street | junction with Providence and Springfield Railroad (NY&NE) | |||
junction with New York, Providence and Boston Railroad (NYNH&H), location: Garfield Avenue and Cranston Street | ||||
Cranston
|
West Providence | |||
Cranston | ||||
Warwick
|
Natick | |||
West Warwick
|
River Point | junction with Pontiac Branch Railroad (NYNH&H)
| ||
West Warwick | Presumed to serve village of Arctic? Possibility of station formally located at 15 Factory Street | |||
Coventry
|
Quidnick | |||
Anthony | Possibility of station formally located at Laural Avenue and Pilgrim Avenue | |||
Washington | ||||
Coventry | ||||
Summit | ||||
Greene | ||||
Conn. | Sterling | Oneco | ||
Sterling | ||||
Plainfield | Moosup | |||
Plainfield | junction with Norwich and Worcester Railroad (NY&NE) | |||
Canterbury | Canterbury | |||
Lisbon | Lisbon | |||
Sprague | Versailles | |||
Baltic | ||||
Scotland | Scotland | |||
Windham | South Windham | |||
Willimantic | junction with New London Northern Railroad (GT), NY&NE line to Boston and Boston and New York Air-Line Railroad (NYNH&H) | |||
Andover | Andover | |||
Bolton | Bolton | |||
Vernon | Vernon | junction with Rockville Railroad (NY&NE) | ||
Manchester | Manchester | junction with South Manchester Railroad (NY&NE) | ||
Buckland | ||||
East Hartford | Burnside | |||
East Hartford | junction with Connecticut Central Railroad (NY&NE) | |||
Hartford | Hartford
|
junction with Hartford and Connecticut Valley Railroad (NYNH&H)
| ||
West Hartford | Elmwood
|
|||
Newington | Newington Junction | not a station junction with Hartford and New Haven Railroad (NYNH&H) | ||
Newington | ||||
New Britain | New Britain | junction with New Britain and Middletown Railroad (NYNH&H)
| ||
Plainville | Plainville | junction with New Haven and Northampton Company (NYNH&H)
| ||
Bristol | Forestville
|
|||
Bristol | ||||
Plymouth | Terryville | |||
Waterbury | Waterbury
|
junction with Naugatuck Railroad (NYNH&H) and Middletown, Meriden and Waterbury Railroad (NYNH&H) | ||
Oxford | Towantic | |||
Oxford | ||||
Southbury | Southbury | |||
South Britain | ||||
Newtown | Sandy Hook | |||
Hawleyville | junction with Shepaug, Litchfield and Northern Railroad (NYNH&H) and Housatonic Railroad (NYNH&H) | |||
Brookfield | Berkshire Junction | not a station junction with New York, Housatonic and Northern Railroad (NYNH&H) | ||
Danbury | Danbury | junction with New York, Housatonic and Northern Railroad (NYNH&H) and Danbury and Norwalk Railroad (NYNH&H) | ||
Mill Plain | ||||
N.Y. | Brewster | Brewster | junction with New York and Putnam Railroad (NYC) and New York and Harlem Railroad (NYC) | |
Towner's | Towners | bridge over New York and Harlem Railroad (NYC) | ||
Hopewell Junction | Hopewell Junction | junction with Dutchess County Railroad (NYNH&H)
|
Boston line
For stations between Boston and Readville, see Fairmount Line. For the line those between Dedham and Blackstone, see Norfolk County Railroad.
State | Milepost | City | Station | Connections and notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
Mass. | Douglas | East Douglas | ||
Douglas | ||||
Douglas Junction | not a station junction with Providence and Springfield Railroad (NY&NE) | |||
Conn. | Thompson | East Thompson | junction with Southbridge Branch | |
Thompson | ||||
Mechanicsville | not a station original junction with Norwich and Worcester Railroad (NY&NE) | |||
Putnam | Putnam
|
junction with Norwich and Worcester Railroad (NY&NE) | ||
Pomfret | Pomfret | |||
Abington | ||||
Elliott | ||||
Hampton | Hampton | |||
Clarks Corner | ||||
Windham | North Windham | |||
Willimantic | junction with New London Northern Railroad (GT), NY&NE line to Providence and Boston and New York Air-Line Railroad (NYNH&H) |
Modern-day usage
Within the last 10 years, funds have been set aside for a
See also
- Airline State Park
- Edson Joseph Chamberlin
References
- ^ "Washington Secondary bike paths". Greenways Alliance of Rhode Island. Archived from the original on May 13, 2003.
- ^ Beebe, Lucius (1965). Two Trains to Remember: The New England Limited and the Air Line Limited. Privately printed.
- ^ Morgan, Bryan, ed. (1973). The Great Trains. New York, New York: Crown Publishers Inc. p. 162. Archived from the original on 2010-12-05 – via Air Line Rail Trail website.
- ^ Karr (2005), pp. 83–85.
- ^ "Annual Report of N.Y., N.H. & H." Hartford Courant. October 3, 1907. p. 11 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ New York & New Haven April 1955 timetable, Table 18
- ^ Karr (2005), p. 88.
- ISBN 091465909X.
- ^ Cockroft, James. "Milford Upper Charles Trail History" (PDF). Friends of the Milford Upper Charles Trail.
- ^ "2020 MassTrails Grant Awards". Commonwealth of Massachusetts. July 2020. p. 1.
- ^ "Ashland Trail Committee Receives $50,000 State Grant; Baker-Polito Administration Awards $4 Million to 55 Trail Projects". Ashland Source. July 31, 2020.
- ^ Poor, Henry V. (1860). Railroads and Canals of the United States of America. New York: John H. Schultz & Co. p. 213 – via Google Books.
- ^ "AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE NORWICH & WORCESTER RAILROAD COMPANY AND THE NEW ENGLAND RAILROAD COMPANY IN REGARD TO THE LEASE OF THE NORWICH AND WORCESTER RAILROAD TO THE BOSTON HARTFORD AND ERIE RAILROAD COMPANY". Annual Report of the Board of Railroad Commissioners. Vol. 29. Boston: Wright & Potter Printing Co. January 1898. p. 173 – via Google Books.
- ^ VanBokkelen, James. "Fragmented Railroads, Variegated Passenger Trains".
- ^ Karr (2005), pp. 105–108.
- ^ New York, New Haven Railroad (April 24, 1955). timetable (PDF). Table 7 – via Streamline Memories.
- ^ "Washington Secondary Bike Path". State of Rhode Island Department of Transportation. Archived from the original on July 22, 2012.
- Karr, Ronald Dale (2005). The Rail Lines of Southern New England. Pepperell Massachusetts.
External links
- Railroad History Database
- Edward Appleton, Massachusetts Railway Commissioner, History of the Railways of Massachusetts (1871)
- Philip C. Blakeslee, A Brief History Lines West Of The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad Co. (1953)
- Edited by Richard M. Bayles, History of Providence County, Rhode Island (1891)
- Dorchester Atheneum: Midland Railroad
- PRR Chronology
- Turner, Gregg M. The New York and New England Railroad, (2021),