Excerpt from his biography:
On the very day, July 17, 1817, on which Major Thayer had been ordered to supersede Captain Partridge in command of the Military Academy, all Cadets deemed sufficiently instructed were graduated from the institution. XxXxxxx, being of the number, was on the same day promoted to be a Third Lieut. in the Corps of Artillery, and immediately after was assigned to topographical duty under Colonel Albert on the Survey of the Atlantic Coast, and of sites for fortifications on the Gulf of Mexico. While here, General Jackson was carrying on war against the Seminole Indians and had seized St. Mark's and Pensacola, then Spanish possessions. At once XxXxxxx, in his fiery zeal, volunteered as Aide-de-Camp to “Old Hickory,” and subsequently as Acting Adjutant General to General Gaines.
After successive promotions to Second and First Lieut. of Artillery, XxXxxxx was appointed, Jan. 27, 1823, to be an Assistant Topographical Engineer, attached to the General Staff with the rank of Bvt. Captain. Soon after, in 1824, under Secretary Calhoun's Internal Improvement System, he was assigned to duty on the survey of the summit division of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, and in 1827 of the James River and Kanawha Canal.
In this latter year the railroad mania began to rage in this country. At that time there were existing only a few insignificant local short roads, aggregating in length less than twenty miles, and there were few educated civil engineers in the United States to conduct larger works. Under these circumstances, the Government adopted the wise policy of loaning officers of the Army scientifically educated at the Military Academy, to assist railroad companies in carrying out more ambitious projects. In this manner our army engineers became the pioneers in railroad construction, and the educators of an able body of civil engineers, who, to this day, have continued the inherited traditions, methods, discipline, esprit-de-corps and high bearing of their distinguished predecessors.
The Baltimore and Ohio was the first important railroad undertaken in this country. In the annual report of the company, of Oct. 1, 1827, it is stated that “several able and efficient members of the Topographical Corps have been detailed in the service of the company. These officers [Captain XxXxxxx, Lieutenants Joshua Barney, Isaac Trimble, Richard E. Hazard, William Cook, Walter Gwynn, and John L Dillahanty, all graduates of the Military Academy] have examined various routes from the city of Baltimore to the valley of the Potomac, and along that ravine as far as Cumberland. They are now engaged in a general reconnoissance of the country between the Potomac and Ohio rivers.” Subsequently, the Directors of the Company very fully acknowledged their obligations to the General Government “for the unceasing and cordial support which the company continues to derive from the operation of that liberal and enlightened policy to which, from the commencement of their undertaking, they have felt themselves so much indebted.” The definite location of this road between Baltimore and Ellicott's Mills was entrusted to XxXxxxx and his Army assistants, by whom says the report of July 7, 1828, “it has been accomplished with a degree of precision highly satisfactory to the Board.”
Excerpt from New-York Spectator, August 3, 1835:
BOSTON AND PROVIDENCE RAILROAD. —We are happy to announce the completion of this great work. A train of cars came over the road yesterday, with the locomotive Whistler, in one hour and forty five minutes, the rails having been laid on the viaduct at Canton.
The preceding from the Providence Journal announces the fact that the rail road is completed, and we congratulate the public and the stockholders upon the event. The length of this road is forty miles—the construction is alike creditable to the stockholders for their enterprise, and to Major XxXxxxx, the engineer, for his skill. That both will receive a rich reward, we have no doubt. It is stated, that the receipts are about eight hundred dollars a day for passengers only, and it is calculated that they will be greatly increased by the transportation of merchandise, which is very shortly to commence.
Excerpt from Railroads of Rhode Island by Frank Heppner (2012):
XxXxxxx’s line was practically gradeless and had one dead-straight length of sixteen miles. This length of track was many years later incorporated into the Amtrak system, and today, it and two other straight stretches of track in Rhode Island are the only places on the Amtrak system where Acela trains are allowed to stretch their legs to 150 miles per hour.
On XxXxxxx’s chosen route, there was only one geological obstacle, but it was a formidable one for the times. Near today’s Norwood, at Canton, the Neponset River coursed through a valley that dipped about sixty feet below the surrounding terrain. It would have been possible to halt the tracks on either side of the valley and use inclined planes to transit the cars across, but a spectacular and fatal accident on the inclined plane at the Granite Railroad in 1832 made that alternative unattractive. In addition, inclined planes would have significantly slowed Boston-Providence travel time.
XxXxxxx chose instead to build a viaduct, which is a bridge made of a series of short spans, usually arches. At 615 feet of length and 70 feet of height, it was the longest and tallest railroad bridge in the world at the time it was built in 1835, and it is the only example of its type of construction in the western hemisphere. It is called a blind arcade cavity wall bridge. From a distance, the viaduct appears to be composed of a series of short masonry arches, but these are primarily decorative. The real support for the tracks is provided by two massive parallel stone walls that are essentially hidden by the arches. This type of construction is immensely strong. The locomotives of XxXxxxx’s day weighed about ten tons, pulled eight cars of about two tons each and traveled at 30 miles per hour. Today, the Amtrak Regional trains that travel over XxXxxxx’s bridge have engines that weigh in excess of one hundred tons and pull eight sixty-ton cars at 125 miles per hour.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/54690684@N07/6970979404/
I hope it's clear XxXxxxx represents 7 letters in his name. Not all his projects were flawless.
Excerpts from Second Annual Report of the President and Directors to the Stockholders of the Louisville, Cincinnati and Charleston Railroad Company—September, 1838
In submitting their second annual report the Board are gratified in being able to state that they have accomplished most of the objects to which their attention was directed by the Stockholders, at their general meeting in October last. The Charleston Railroad, which they were instructed to purchase, has been obtained on the terms proposed—that is to say—at 25 per cent. advance on the first cost of the shares—the purchase money being payable one third in cash and the balance in one and two years. The sum agreed to be paid for this road does not exceed its actual cost to the Stockholders, or its value to us. By this purchase we have secured a road, ready made to our hands—136 miles in length, extending from Charleston to Hamburg, on the Savannah river—opposite to Augusta in Georgia, where it meets the Athens Railroad, through which it will finally be connected with all the improvements now going on in Georgia and Alabama, and thus command to a very great extent the trade of the South and South West. The Charleston and Hamburg Railroad is undoubtedly destined to be The Great Highway between the North and the South and South West. By means of the Wilmington Railroad, extending from Wilmington in North Carolina to Halifax on the Roanoke river, of which upwards of 60 miles are already completed—a continuous line of Railroad and Steamboat communication will be furnished from Wilmington to Boston. By this route a traveller leaving Charleston will be able to reach Washington in two days, New York in three and Boston in less than four days. To travel from Augusta in Georgia to New York, a distance of 800 miles, will require no more than four days; and when the projected Railroads in Georgia and Alabama shall be completed, it will be entirely practicable to travel from the Gulf of Mexico or even New Orleans to Boston in less than a week…
The able report of Major XxXxxxx, the Chief Engineer, with the accompanying documents, will fully explain the operations of the Engineer department during the past year and the report of the Treasurer exhibit the state of the finances.
It will be seen from the report of the chief Engineer that we succeeded in South Carolina in inducing the planters to enter contracts for the graduation of the Road through their respective plantations—thus bringing into operation the Slave labor of the country for railroad purposes. The very strong objections urged against bringing white laborers from abroad, to mingle with our slaves on the large plantations—the necessary suspension of operations, where white laborers employed during the sickly season (unless we were prepared to witness a destruction of life shocking to humanity) induced us at an early period to make great efforts to prevail upon the planters to take contracts. In beginning this was found to be no easy task. By proper explanations, however, and making a small addition, in the first instance, to the estimates of the Engineer, the object was effected. The experiment has been so entirely successful that when the second division of the road was offered for contract, the competition was so great as to enable us to make contracts in every instance at or below our own estimates. Indeed, may now say, that in the Slave holding States, we can command slave labor to any amount for the construction of our Railroads, and this too, at reasonable prices. In reference to this subject, Major XxXxxxx, in his report, states
“The daily useful effect of this labor has been proved by our own experience, in the work now going on below Columbia—to be full as great, as that of the white laborers, on which elsewhere we mainly rely. Indeed it has in more than one instance exceeded what has fallen under my observation elsewhere. A negro has excavated of light earth, 23 cubic yards in a day, thrown the same into a barrow and carried it an average distance of 35 feet; and a whole gang has in like manner disposed of 18 cubic yards, while the labor of the white man at the North, on a similar soil, is estimated at 15 cubic yards, an amount which the negro is found to perform easily and cheerfully.” We consider this result as very auspicious for our enterprise. While the planters in these portions of the country, where slave labor abounds, will thus find profitable employment for their slaves, they cannot fail to become deeply interested in the success of the work; their lands will be rested— emigration prevented—the money expended on the Road will be distributed among our own people, and the country every way benefitted and improved. When in the progress of the work we shall approach those regions where white labor abounds, this will be called into requisition and the farmers and laboring men along the line will find constant and profitable employment, as well as a ready market for all their productions. Thus will this work, even in its progress, serve to enrich and fertilize the country through which it will pass—giving a foretaste of the more extended and substantial benefits, that must flow from its completion, and constantly swelling that tide of public opinion, on which we mainly depend for our success.
Major XxXxxxx expected LIRR would be a straight line to Greenport, but his successor found the terrain east of Hicksville too rocky, and detoured southeast. This caused Farmingdale to be born and to thrive. All "Boston trains" stopped there for water. Eventually, Republic Aviation put it on the World War II map.
http://web.mta.info/lirr/Timetable/lirrmap.htm
Here's a letter that mentions our subject's future brother-in-law...
October 6, 1828
Gentlemen:
At a meeting of the Board of Directors of the Baltimore and Ohio Rail-road Company this day, Capt. Xxxxxxx X. XxXxxxx was appointed a member of the Board of Engineers, of which I am instructed to inform you. I am also desired to acquaint the Board of Engineers that the Directors of the Company, having heretofore determined to send a deputation to England for the purpose of gaining information relative to the most approved construction of Rail-roads in that country, and the application of a moving power upon them, this day appointed Jonathan Knight, Esq. and Capt. Xx. X. XxXxxxx to that service. The Board have likewise instructed me to make application to the United States government for permission to engage Lieut. Geo. W. Whistler as assistant Engineer to those gentlemen. It is the desire of the Board of Directors that the earliest possible measures may be taken to commence the actual construction of the Rail-road at the Point of Rocks, as suggested in the First Annual Report of the Board of Engineers, this day submitted to the Directors, and I am especially desired to call your attention to this object.
P. E. THOMAS
President of the Baltimore and Ohio Rail-road Company
Major XxXxxxx, it might be helpful to know, was the brother of the mother of Alfred E. Neuman.
Excerpt from The Railroad and the State by Robert G. Angevine (2004)
The army officers who worked on early American railroads brought the military management system’s emphasis on hierarchy, accountability, and detailed rules and procedures to several of the lines they surveyed. The first railroad to receive army engineering aid was the Baltimore and Ohio. In 1827, the War Department assigned three topographical engineering brigades, headed by Lieutenant Colonel Stephen H. Long, Captain Xxxxxxx X. XxXxxxx, and Dr. William Howard respectively, to identify potential routes for the railroad. From the start, the surveyors conducted their surveys following military procedures, submitted regular reports to the company’s directors, and transmitted their findings on official army forms. Long and XxXxxxx soon became members of the company’s Board of Engineers.
As the Baltimore and Ohio advanced from survey to construction, the military influence on its organization increased. In June 1828, XxXxxxx drafted formal written regulations to direct the operations of its Engineer Department. XxXxxxx based his rules on [Winfield] Scott’s General Regulations, in some cases copying entire sections verbatim. The new rules established the hierarchy within the department, defined the duties and responsibilities of its members, and created a system of personal and financial accountability. When the first stone for the railroad was laid on July 4, 1828, the twelve army engineers working for the company were operating in a familiar system. XxXxxxx’s regulations continued to govern the activities of the Baltimore and Ohio’s Engineer Department through 1829 as the railroad laid its first track under the supervision of Lieutenant George W. Whistler.
A power struggle from civilian resistance to the army officers’ insistence on adherence to regulations, subordinance to authority, and use of analytically based engineering methods precipitated the end of military assistance to the Baltimore and Ohio in 1830. Long resigned in March and XxXxxxx left in April. The termination of aid to the Baltimore and Ohio did not, however, end the military influence on railroad management and organization. As one of the first and largest railroads in the country, the Baltimore and Ohio served as an organizational model for numerous other early American railroads. Moreover, XxXxxxx and Whistler went on to survey several lines in New England, where they promulgated new regulations governing the railroads’ organizational structure and operations. Anthropologist Frederick C. Gamst calls such operating rules “the sine qua non of railroading.” A set of fourteen operating rules may have been in effect on the Boston and Providence Railroad in 1835, when XxXxxxx was serving as chief engineer. A more detailed version of forty-five rules was in effect in 1839 on the Providence and Stonington Railroad, a continuation of the Boston and Providence. XxXxxxx had served as chief engineer of the Providence and Stonington from 1832 to 1837 and Whistler succeeded him. XxXxxxx and Whistler continued to refine their procedures when they moved on to the Western Railroad in Massachusetts.
Then it must have been Major McNeill. Of course, if not, what? me worry?
William Gibbs McNeill was Whistler's uncle (a much less famous portrait...)
Right as rain. New question please.
McCloud River Railroad engine number 6 had a split personality. What was it that made this possible?
McCloud River No. 6 was originally an 0-6-6-0 but was rebuilt into two 0-6-0T engines.
Mark
KCSfan McCloud River No. 6 was originally an 0-6-6-0 but was rebuilt into two 0-6-0T engines. Mark
Really close, but no cigar...
Choice of simple or compound operation?
rcdrye KCSfan McCloud River No. 6 was originally an 0-6-6-0 but was rebuilt into two 0-6-0T engines. Mark Really close, but no cigar...
The only thing I can think to add was that No. 6 was originally an 0-6-6-0T.
possibly when an 0-6-6-0T it occasionally pulled an auxiliary tender for longer stays away from water and ciak.
When originally built as an 0-6-6-0T No.6 is described as being basically two 0-6-0 tank engines "permanently coupled back to back". When split into 0-6-0T's the two resulting engines were numbered 5 and 6.
KCSfan When originally built as an 0-6-6-0T No.6 is described as being basically two 0-6-0 tank engines "permanently coupled back to back". When split into 0-6-0T's the two resulting engines were numbered 5 and 6. Mark
NOW you have it. The idea seems to have been to provide an engine that would work on a stiff (4%) grade, but wouldn't need to be turned. Less than stellar track, combined with the wierd dynamics of the wheelbases and drawbars, left the engine(s) on the ground more than once before it/they split. It/they were Vauclin compounds with the low-pressure cylinders on top. Baldwin described the engine as a "Duplex". As built, wood fuel was carried on the left side of the boiler, a half-saddle tank on the top and right carried water. Photos from later years show the wood bin replaced with an oil tank, retaining the half-saddle. The link below shows the linkage between cabs so only one crew was required.
http://www.trainweb.org/mccloudrails/LocoImages/Loco-0005-6.html
As an 0-6-6-0T McCloud River No. 6 was sure a weird looking engine. With wood racks mounted alongside her boiler firing her and the 0-6-0T's she was split into must have been a challenging job. On to a new question.
At one time there were four different through sleeping car routes between Chicago and Cincinnati. Name the railroads over which these operated and if any of them ran over more than one road what was the junction point(s) between the involved railroads?
The January, 1930 issue of the Guide shows four overnight sleeping car routes between Cincinnati and Chicago; two are on the same railroad and one is on a two-road route.
The Pennsylvania had a train through Logansport and the Southland through Fort Wayne (through cars from/to the West Coast of Florida). There is a note on the page with the Chicago-Cincinnati service directing the user to the pages with the equipment of the east-west trains to learn what through car service was offered; however, I could find nothing there about the Southland's equipment. There is information in the timetable itself that tells us that the train through Logansport carried Sleeping Cars.
The Big Four carried an overnight train.
The Chicago Indianapolis & Louisville and the Baltimore and Ohio ran a joint train Chicago-Indianapolis-Cincinnati, with the junction in Indianapolis.
Johnny
While not quite the routes I was looking for, I can't deny that you have come up with four different ones so you will be our winner, Johnny. I had forgotten that the Southland originally ran via Ft. Wayne and was thinking the PRR trains all ran on the Logansport line. Before moving on to the next question see if you (or anyone) can come up with the circa 1910 routes I had in mind.
The other Chicago-Cincinnati route must be C&O of Indiana. Entry to Chicago at the time was via the NYC&St. L. connection to the IC from State Linecrossing, and using IC's lakefront station.
The four routes I had in mind were: PCC&StL, Big 4, Monon/Cincinnati Hamilton & Dayton connecting at Indianapolis, and the Chicago Cincinnati & Louisville. In 1910, just three years after its construction was completed, The CC&L was purchased by the C&O and became the C&O of Indiana.
I don't know if or how long the C&O of Ind continued to run the Chi - Cincy sleeper but understand it was cut back before long to run just between Chi and Muncie.
The only other possible overnight sleeper service that I could think of was that of the C&O of Indiana--and it had been cut back to being a local sleeper between Chicago and Muncie by February of 1917.
Incidentally, the Detroit-Florida West Coast cars on the Southland were carried by the Wabash between Detroit and Fort Wayne--thus the PRR took the Chicago cars via Fort Wayne.
In 1958, the L&N still had five trains from Montgomery to New Orleans, all with through service from points east and north of Montgomery (one of these handled the Gulf Wind cars from Flomaton to New Orleans)--the Piedmont Limited, the Crescent, the Humming Bird, the Pan-American, and #1.. By the summer of 1960, there were only three trains, with essentially the same service: what trains were consolidated?
The Piedmont, Gulf Wind and Pan-American were combined west of Mobile. Eastbound the Pan-American was combined with the Crescent.
The Gulf Wind was always combined with either the Piedmont Limited or the Pan-American, so it was a different train that no longer run as a separate train south of Montgomery. This was not a combination of the Crescent and the Hummingbird, which came after 196--which left only two trains south of Montgomery.
Mobile was not the consolidation point. The Gulf Wind ran as a separate train east of Flomaton.
"no longer run ran " after 1969" I thought I had proofed it--and found I had missed at least two errors.
The five L&N trains from Montgomery to Mobile in 1957 (August 1957 OG):
WB (Montgomery-New Orleans)
33 Piedmont
37 Crescent
5 Humming Bird
1
99 Pan American/Gulf Wind
EB(New Orleans-Montgomery)
4
6 Humming Bird
34 Piedmont/Gulf Wind
98 Pan American
38 Crescent
The 1960 schedules (July 1960 OG):
33/99 Piedmont/Pan-American/Gulf Wind
98/38 Pan-American/Crescent
Rob, when I rode coach from Pensacola to New Orleans at the end of August in 1960, I ate breakfast in the Mobile-New Orleans diner that was in the consist of the combined Piedmont Limited/Pan-American + one other train that had run from Cincinnati to New Orleans; a trainman told me and some other passengers that the combined train carried the headend cars that had been carried on #1, so it was three trains in one plus the already combined Gulf Wind (so far as I know, it was never a separate train west of Flomaton).
You named two of the three trains that ran as one; that the headend cars of #1 were included in the train is a bit obscure. I do not know how the headend cars that #4 had carried were handled.
So, doesn't RC get to ask the next question? Le us have it!
L&N #s 1 and 4 still operated north of Montgomery in 1960. Depending on the amount of stroage mail handled at Montgomery it looks most likely to me that #1's cars were handled by the Pan-American and #4's cars were handled by the Humming Bird between New Orleans and Montgomery.
When a state government bought the right-of-way of a recently abandoned railroad, two new railroad companies were formed to operate it. One opened with 44-tonners, the others with a leased RS-1 and a couple of steam locomotives. Name the state and the railroads. (Yes, it was at least 50 years ago...)
Almost exactly fifty years ago, abandoned in January 1964, new operations started around April. The Rutland abandoned after a strike, and the two new railroads were the Green Mountain (I think the steam and RS-1) and the Vermont Railway (the GE's).
daveklepper Almost exactly fifty years ago, abandoned in January 1964, new operations started around April. The Rutland abandoned after a strike, and the two new railroads were the Green Mountain (I think the steam and RS-1) and the Vermont Railway (the GE's).
Exactly so. VTR got an ex-Soo Line/DSS&A RS-1 a few months later, Green Mountain eventually bought Rutland 405 and still uses it on home rails.
Green Mountain's steam was tied to Nelson Blount'sSteamtown, which was separated from Green Mountain after his death.
Both companies are now part of the Vermont Rail System, along with Clarendon and Pittsford (ex-Vermont Marble, some ex-D&H lines) and Washington County (ex Montpelierand Barre, B&M Conn River north of White River Jct., ex-CP from WellsRiver to Newport, all owned by the state of Vermont.)
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