Читать книгу Along the Valley Line - Max R. Miller - Страница 9

CHAPTER

1

EVENTS LEADING UP TO THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE RAILROAD

On Thursday, April 20, 1870, over a thousand people gathered for the Connecticut Valley Railroad groundbreaking ceremony at James C. Walkley’s Haddam farm. The guests started to arrive in carriages at about ten in the morning and by noon a large crowd had assembled to witness this historic event. The group, led by the Chester Drum Band, headed down the hill from the house to a point near the Connecticut River where a line of stakes marked the center line of the new railroad. The ceremony centered on a number of spades next to carts and wheelbarrows. President Walkley, who had granted his land for the right of way, picked up a shovel, and after a short speech struck it in the ground and announced, “Gentlemen, the deed is done, the work is begun!”¹ A great applause and cheers for the president erupted followed by more music and speeches by various dignitaries. The directors of the road took up the shovels, and while the band played “Yankee Doodle,” the men cheerfully filled a cart. The ladies became enthusiastically involved too, as some of the guests joined in topping another cart before the entire group headed to the Walkley home to enjoy a feast. It was no small accomplishment to get so many people out to a farm in the country on a weekday, especially since there were no sources of transportation other than carriage and foot. But it had been a long time coming.

Nearly four decades before the Connecticut Valley Railroad (CVRR) would open its line from Hartford south along the west bank of the Connecticut River to Long Island Sound at Old Saybrook, the concept for the northern part of this line was considered. The Hartford & New Haven Railroad (H& NHRR) was chartered in 1832, and in 1835 the board of directors proposed a route from Hartford south to Middletown and on to New Haven. Thus the northern portion of the CVRR almost became part of the second railroad built in Connecticut. But when the planners in Hartford approached the town fathers of Middletown and asked them to put up $70,000 in order to be included in their new venture, the plan faltered. According to Middletown meeting records, people were receptive and interested in the new railroad, but they did not raise the money. The H& NHRR then opened a route via Meriden in 1838. Meriden, Middletown’s neighbor to the west, immediately benefited. Connecticut was in the process of developing industry and this infant railroad would soon be instrumental in helping it grow.

In 1849 the Middletown Railroad (the Berlin Branch) was built between Berlin and Middletown to be operated by the H& NHRR. This gave Middletown a taste of year round transportation for both passengers and freight shipments, even if it came at the end of a branch line.

In 1852 the Connecticut Legislature chartered the Middlesex & Hartford County Railroad to build a rail line from Hartford south to Long Island Sound. Successful opposition by the steamboat interests and difficulty in raising capital resulted in the legislature granting an extension to the Middlesex & Hartford County Railroad charter in 1855, only to lapse in the spring of 1858 with nothing but a survey to show for its existence.

By 1870 the New Haven, Middletown & Willimantic Railroad (later known as the Boston & New York Air Line) had finally reached Middletown from New Haven. Middletown’s town fathers invested $500,000 in the New Haven, Middletown & Willimantic Railroad and were now ready to financially support the proposed Connecticut Valley Railroad from Hartford to Old Saybrook, Westbrook or Clinton via Middletown.

It has been said that the seed for the CVRR was sown in a Hartford to Old Saybrook stagecoach that carried businessman Horace Johnson (who would later be known as a weather prophet because he accurately predicted the great blizzard of 1888) and Luther Boardman, president of a very successful metal tableware and silverware manufacturing company located in East Haddam. The idea spread fast and it was easy to convince president of Hartford’s Charter Oak Insurance Company, James C. Walkley—also a stagecoach rider and said to be the largest individual taxpayer in Haddam—that the construction of the CVRR was an excellent idea. Because railroads were proven enterprises by this time, these men knew that their organizations and the local economy would suffer if they were not connected to the rest of the country by rail. They had all experienced the hardships of stagecoach transports to Hartford and back over roads that could frequently be dusty or nearly impassible due to mud or snow. Sometimes, heavy snow accumulation necessitated sleighs to be substituted for stagecoaches. Of course when the Connecticut River was navigable, steamboats were utilized, but they did not always adhere to their published schedules and were often delayed or cancelled by heavy fog, freshets and on occasions in late summer by low water. In short, boats failed to meet the year-round reliability and frequency proposed by the railroad—essential to growing businesses.

The first organized meeting of the proponents of the CVRR had been held on March 21, 1868 at Middletown’s McDonough House. Interested organizers applied for a railroad charter from the legislature of the State of Connecticut. The needed charter was granted on July 17, 1869. The Connecticut Valley Railroad Company was organized on October 2, 1869, and five days later they commenced their first meeting and they elected: James C. Walkley, president; Luther Boardman, vice president; Levi Wood-house, secretary; Nelson Hollister, treasurer and Seth E. Marsh, chief engineer. From the beginning organizers tried to have at least one director representing each town that the railroad would serve. The directors also appointed a committee to prepare by-laws, rules and regulations to be presented for consideration at a future meeting.

Middletown, CT, 1868. Looking north at Main Street. The large building on the left is the front of the McDonough House where meetings were held to form the Connecticut Valley Railroad. The wide Main Street is unpaved and the sidewalks consist of wooden planks. PHOTO: ROBERT T. EASTWOOD, SR.

Surveying the proposed line started in late 1868 and was completed in 1869; it followed very closely the survey done for the chartered Middlesex & Hartford County Railroad of earlier days. The topography of the Connecticut River Valley gave the CVRR several unusual features. One was the fact that the line was laid out near the river and by-passed the business and population centers of nearly every town it served. In Hartford it was located on the west bank of the river at the extreme eastern edge of the city. The CVRR, also referred to as the Valley Line, went west of Wethersfield, east of Rocky Hill, more or less through the center of Cromwell and Middletown, east of Higganum, slightly east of Haddam and far to the east of Chester and Deep River town centers. By going through Centerbrook it fell far to the west of Essex. The plan brought track through the center of Old Saybrook with three stations: one at the north end of town, where it crossed the Shore Line Railway; then on to Saybrook Point and finally Fenwick. As it left the Dividend section of Rocky Hill it was forced to climb the sandy hills that now border the Tournament Players Golf Course. The steep sandy banks of the Connecticut River were unstable and would have created many problems if the railroad were closer to the river. This higher ground, at an elevation of 135 feet, is the highest point on the entire route. In later years the track on this high bluff was relocated even farther away from the river to avoid the risk of a washout that could send a train plunging into the water.

Before the 1950’s there was little flood control north of Connecticut and spring freshets downstream occurred almost annually. The line crossed many marshes, inlets, coves and flood plains along the Connecticut River. Rail workers built or constructed nearly three miles of the line on trestles to transverse these flood-prone areas because it was the quickest and cheapest way to avoid rough or hilly terrain further to the west. At the time of surveying for the track location, proposals included more than one route at several different locations. There were numerous reasons both for and against these different routes.

In January 1870, surveyors laid out the line from Cromwell south to a point near Chester Cove. In March 1870 they continued the line from Chester to Saybrook. (Saybrook was the original name for the present Town of Deep River. The name change to Deep River became effective July 1, 1947 after having been approved by the town, passed by the Connecticut State Legislature and signed by Governor James L. McConaughty.) There were two routes under consideration, the inland route via the center of Chester and the river route, which was the one chosen.

There were also two routes proposed from Saybrook (Deep River) to Essex. The river route would have taken the line through the center of Essex. The other was the inland “toll gate” route that passed close to the southern most tollhouse on the existing Middlesex Turnpike, bringing the railroad through Centerbrook. Samuel M. Comstock, a director of the CVRR from Oct. 2, 1869, owned an ivory products factory in Ivoryton, the western portion of Essex. He wanted the railroad to be as close to his factory as possible. His influence prevailed and the Centerbrook option was selected. Old Saybrook had been chosen as the southern coastal terminus because it was located at the mouth of the Connecticut River and was the best available seaport. The town was willing to support the railroad by purchasing CVRR stock. Westbrook had been rejected because the needed dockage and breakwater would be too expensive and would take too much time to build. Clinton was rejected because there were sand bars in the harbor that made it very shallow and the town, already served by the Shore Line Railway, expressed no interest in becoming a stockholder in the CVRR.

The spring of 1870 also saw the purchase of Lynde Farm at Light House Point, near Saybrook Point, by a group of 65 prominent Hartford men; one influential Hartford woman, Mrs. Samuel H. Colt; and one Old Saybrook man, Mr. Daniel C. Spencer—each subscribing to 40 shares of the New Saybrook Company, an organization formed to develop this land into a summer resort. The New Saybrook Company had close ties to the CVRR since four stockholders were directors of the railroad, and three were company officers.

By fall contractors were constructing a hotel, Fenwick Hall, and engineering a wagon bridge, more than a half-mile long, to span South Cove from Saybrook Point to New Saybrook (later named Fenwick). Near the south end of this bridge was a short draw span to allow small boats to pass. A year after CVRR was opened from Hartford to Saybrook Point the railroad was extended across the South Cove to Fenwick where a station was built. For many years Fenwick Station was in service only during the summer season.

In May 1870, less than a month after the groundbreaking in Haddam, the directors met again to consider the route of the railroad from “a northerly point in Wethersfield to some convenient point in said Hartford.”² The west route would have taken the railroad through the campus of Trinity College and into the existing Union Station. The railroad also planned to build its car shops and maintenance buildings next to the college. This route would have created 22 railroad-highway grade crossings in Hartford. The cost of excavating a cut to put the railroad below street grade and the price of the highway bridges needed to carry these streets over the railroad was prohibitive. Another consideration was the high cost of buying, or taking by eminent domain, many private homes. The city fathers knew too that if the railroad were built with numerous railroad-highway grade crossings the residents would be subjected to smoke and frequent noise from train whistles. Opposition was growing. Finally, Trinity College’s president and trustees attended the hearings held at Hartford’s Center hall and threatened to move the college from its present location if the railroad project went forward. The directors suggested an alternative eastern route between Colt’s Patented Arms Company and the Connecticut River. The cost of securing undeveloped land along the proposed eastern route would be uncontested and much less expensive.

Connecticut Valley Railroad Stock Certificate #144. Three shares ($300) made out on May 13, 1871 to Benjamin Douglas of Middletown, CT. It is signed by President James C. Walkley and Secretary Levi Woodhouse. It still has its revenue stamp attached. COURTESY MIDDLESEX COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY.

In fact, Mrs. Elizabeth Colt, Samuel’s widow, had her lawyers approach the railroad’s board of directors and inform them that she would subscribe to $30,000 of stock if the railroad were built on the eastern route near her arms manufacturing plant. At a September CVRR board of directors meeting, about 20 prominent and influential citizens of Hartford showed up and also offered to subscribe to $25,000 of the railroad’s capital stock if the easterly route were taken. The board of directors argued and voted on the two different routes nine times, the first vote coming on May 7, 1870. The eastern route was selected by a vote of 8 to 5 at a board meeting on November 17, 1870. This was such a bitter dispute that once settled, Director and Chief Engineer Marsh and Director Seymour immediately resigned. The board of directors then chose replacement directors: Joseph S. Woodruff and George Beach. On December 29th 1870 they appointed Hiram Fowler the new chief engineer.

A meeting of the board of directors on Friday, March 18, 1870 had opened proposals for rail construction of the Connecticut Valley Railroad. Of approximately 50 bids, there were 14 for the whole road, and the rest for various segments. The following day another meeting was held and by informal vote, the directors accepted a bid from New York’s Dillon, Clyde & Co. who was willing to take 15 percent of their bid in CVRR stock as final payment. Dillon, Clyde & Co. had a good reputation as they had contracted under the Union Pacific Railroad on the recently completed transcontinental railroad. Most recently, they had been working on the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad where work had stopped. This left the company in a good position to move to the CVRR. Their contract called for all the work including grading, masonry, building bridges and laying ties and rails. However, the contract specified that the CVRR would furnish ties, iron rails and spikes. This agreement to build the railroad was settled before the line was completely located.

Dillon, Clyde & Co. subcontracted the bridges to A. D. Briggs and Company of Springfield, Massachusetts. J.R. Smith supervised the construction of all the covered Howe truss bridges on the line—over the Sebethe River (Mattabesset River) and Sumner Creek in Middletown, over Higganum Cove and Mill Creek in Haddam, and probably over the Falls River in Centerbrook. Drawbridges were built to span the Park River in Hartford and at Chester Creek in Chester. Dillon, Clyde & Co. also engaged A.M. Wright of Greenfield, Massachusetts to lay the ties and rails. The CVRR contracted with Capt. Oliver B. Clark of Chester to furnish 165,000 ties at 53 cents each; and by March 23, 1870 Clark had delivered 80,000. The original rail was iron weighing 50 pounds per yard. Engineers utilized three steam shovels to construct this line—one at Fort Hill, Middletown, probably on the river side of the hill on which the Connecticut Valley Hospital is located; another in Cromwell where there are some big cuts and fills north of where the North Cromwell railroad station stood; the third in Haddam north of where the Arnolds Station was situated. Each steam shovel was said to be capable of moving 800 to 1,000 cubic yards of material in a working day.

Rail-mounted NYNH&HRR Steam Shovel, 1910. This photo was taken at a gravel pit located on the west side of the Valley Line about one mile north of Old Saybrook Station. Material from this borrow pit was used to fill in trestles crossing the north and south coves in Old Saybrook. This Model 40 steam shovel was built by Marion Steam Shovel Company of Marion, Ohio. COURTESY BARBARA J. MAYNARD.

Construction was paused in Deep River, on June 9, 1870, when an unidentified human skeleton was found about two feet below the ground surface. The body was removed to a more suitable burial plot.

Railroad construction during this time was very dangerous. On June 15, 1870, a laborer working on the section of the railroad that had been subcontracted to Ryan—one of the many subcontractors hired to grade one or more sections of the new line—was killed when a sand bank caved in. He was the first documented casualty, but there would be more death and suffering—and re-internments—on a construction project 44 miles long.

On September 14, 1870, George Long, a workman on the CVRR, was seriously injured by a premature powder blast at Dunham’s grove, three miles south of Middletown. All his clothes were blown off, the sight of one eye lost, and he suffered other serious injuries.

Grade Crossing in Middletown, 1872. This photo shows a Middletown grade crossing with the Connecticut River and Portland in the background. This is the earliest known photograph of the Valley Line. COURTESY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS & ARCHIVES, OLIN LIBRARY.

On November 23, 1870 the remains of Lady Fenwick, the first white woman to be buried at Saybrook Point, in 1645, was exhumed to allow the railroad to build over her burial site. Although her body had been in the ground for 225 years, remarkably, there were identifiable remains including an intact skull with a large amount of brown-reddish hair. Her body was reinterred at the present day Cypress Cemetery, a quarter of a mile west of the original grave.

On December 21, 1870 a boy working on the railroad at Deep River placed a mass of glycerin to melt over a fire and then walked away. Before he was 200 feet from the flame, the glycerin exploded with a concussion that shook every house in the village. The newspaper did not report if the boy survived the blast or not.

Of course the casualties did not end with the project’s completion. In time, for example, a dispute arose over the large number of highway grade crossings in Middletown. The Air Line, already built through Middletown, had more favorable topography and grade crossings were minimal. There were five grade crossings at the extreme western side of Middletown. The need for some large fills caused the Air Line to excavate some large cuts, which facilitated the building of bridges for streets to cross over the railroad. However, the level terrain along the Connecticut River necessitated 17 grade crossings: from north to south Miller, Portland, and Bridge Streets; Rapallo Avenue; Green, Ferry, Washington, Court, Center, College, William, Union, and South Streets; then three River Road crossings followed by an unnamed crossing in Maromas. Eventually there were 11 fatalities at six of these crossings. Seven of these highway grade crossings and one pedestrian crossing remain today.

In more than 80 years of newspaper microfilms, 138 total deaths were recorded—the last being on August 23, 1932. They are categorized as:

• Train wrecks: 9 (See Chapter 7)

• Pedestrian, automobile or horse & wagon grade crossing accidents: 23

• Trespassing, often drunkards stumbling and/or sleeping on the tracks: 59

• Suicide or murder staged to look like an accident: 4

• Employee accidents: 30

• Construction accidents: 2

• Employee & trespasser drowning (falling off railroad bridge): 11

Section Gang, n. d. View is from south to north of Valley Line track workers on a well-maintained section of the line in Haddam along the Connecticut River. It is believed that the man second from left is Joe Calendo, section foreman of the track gang that worked from the Arnold’s station area. PHOTO: CHARLIE CHURCH. COURTESY HADDAM HISTORICAL SOCIETY