Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal Railway by Howard V Worley Jr Soft Cover
Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal Railway by Howard V Worley Jr NOTICE the back cover
Soft Cover
177 pages
Copyright 2004
CONTENTS
Title Page i
Dedication & Copyright ii
Introduction iii
Poemv
Contentsvi
Chapter 1 Men of Vision 1850-1899 1
Chapter 2 Building to Pittsburgh 1900-1904 17
Chapter 3 Highball! 1905-1907 59
Chapter 4 A Terminal Venture 1908-1916 87
Chapter 5 Capped Stacks, Curtained Cabs 1917 and beyond 101
Appendices:a. Motive Power:Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal Railway 105West Side Belt Railroad 113Wheeling & Lake Erie Railroad 121
b. Rolling Stock:Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal Railway 125West Side Belt Railroad 127Wheeling & Lake Erie Railroad 128
c. Track Diagrams and Profiles:Wabash Pittsburgh Terminal Railway 134West Side Belt Railroad 141
d. Subsidiary Companies 145
e. Real Estate and Structure costs 169
f. Monongahela and Ohio River Bridge costs 172
g. Wabash Building costs 173
Bibliography 175
Biographical 177
INTRODUCTION
The history of the United States is the story of its great railroad systems. American history in the mid to late 19th century was written by the building of the railroads, their expansion over the eastern landscape, and the push west to open new territories for settlement and commercial opportunity. Behind each railroad line were the men who conceived, financed, built, and operated them. Some were wealthy, very wealthy in fact, while others were of lesser means. They were bankers, engineers, financiers, speculators, politicians and builders, but first and foremost they were men interested in turning railroads into individual triumphs and great personal wealth.
These entrepreneurs are names familiar: Drew, Morgan, Vanderbilt, Hill, Fisk, and Gould to name a few. Each was an individual study in the hard driving, bare knuckled, money wielding, no holds barred way of doing business at that time. They were men who possessed huge egos, strong wills, widespread personal and political power, immense wealth, limitless energy, and were absolutely ruthless when dealing with foes or those who opposed them. Rules, regulations and laws meant nothing. Cornelius Vanderbilt put things in perspective when he said: "Law! What do I have to care about law? Hain't I got the power?" To get ahead and keep ahead on the mainline of railroad business required long days, sleepless nights, great expenditures of money, personal sacrifices and constantly out maneuvering opponents.
The railroad business itself was unregulated, rough and tumble, and rife with all sorts of problems. Major freight shippers each had their own way of doing business and, when coupled to the operating procedures of different railroads, created a tangled web of discrimination, favoritism and deceit. It was a turbulent, ugly, dark period of American railroad history. There were false billings and fictitious freight claims; discrimination against certain cities and commodities like beef, hay and lumber. Some railroads refused to supply needed cars and posted higher than average freight rates putting competing companies out of business. There was espionage and the use of cipher codes to throw off competitors, even to the point of painting out car numbers being tracked by opposition watchdogs. Passenger routes were not exempt either, regularly practicing ticket scalping and undercutting the fares of rival carriers.
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