[PRCo] Re: Changes to Power Company Empires

[Edward H. Lybarger]

I'm in the process of working up some info for our operators on this
subject.  A few items come to mind:

1.  Duquesne Light never owned Pittsburgh Railways.  They were owned by the
same parent, as was Clairton Street Railway, but DLCo didn't come on board
until 1912.  DLCo became the repository for the residual Philadelphia Co.
records in 1951 because the other two major subsidiaries had been sold off
or separated.

2.  We must be very careful when we use modern utility company names to
imply ownership in long-gone transportation networks.  For example,
Allegheny Power is an operating identity for three electric utilities (all
of which still have their own identities), not a current corporate name.
The parent company names here were West Penn Electric Co. (immediate
predecessor to Allegheny Power System, now Allegheny Energy) and sucessor to
West Penn Traction and Water Power Co., which in turn was owned by American
Water Works and Electric (the post-bankruptcy identity of the old American
Water Works & Guarantee).  West Penn Power Company never owned the railways
company.  The railways company owned half of the power company, with the
other half held by one of the parents.  I'm sure some other companies'
arrangements were similar.

3.  I chose a 1918 McGraw's Electric Railway List for this, since it depicts
the industry at its largest.  At that time, of course, a number of these
relationships below did not yet exist.  Met Ed was owned, it says, by
Reading Traction & Light.  Conestoga was part of United Gas & Electric.
United Railways & Investment owned the Philadelphia Company at this time.
Standard Gas & Electric bought it in 1924, but did they buy all of UR&I as
well?  I don't know.  The Williamsport lines were owned by the Lycoming
Improvement Company.  Jersey Shore and York Railways were independent.
Hanover & McSherrystown was part of Keystone Utilities...did that become
part of Met Ed?  And West Penn's Maryland and West Virginia properties
hadn't been acquired yet.

4.  The conclusion I reach on this discussion of power company parents is
that 1918 is not really the right year to try to study it.  I think most of
the holding company activity peaked in the 1920s and thus I should be
looking at a 1930 McGraw's...I'll have to see how close we come to that in
the library.  What I'd really like is a complete set of Moody's Utilities
from about 1885 to 1960.

5.  If we want real power company-trolley company relationships, it is
probably better to first examine the origins rather than the mergers.  Then
the story can play through.

Any thoughts from others?

Ed

-----Original Message-----
From: pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org
[mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementia.org]On Behalf Of Fred
Schneider
Sent: Saturday, September 24, 2005 7:44 PM
To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
Subject: [PRCo] Changes to Power Company Empires


Ah, so.  There were two generations.   Not at all unlike this family.

And now you've given me an excuse to figure out how to connect my
color printer!

Some day we will not doubt redo the first display that we did at PTM:
the electric, light, gas and transportation industry.   When we do, I
would love to be able to produce a map that shows all the major power
companies in Pennsylvania today that had electric railway
subsidiaries at one time in the past.  Of the top of my head they
included but are not limited to:

Duquesne Light Co.
    Pittsburgh Railways
    Beaver Valley Traction Co.

Allegheny Power Co.
    West Penn Railways
    Chambersburg, Greencastle & Waynesboro
    Wheeling Traction
    Hagerstown & Frederick
    Mon-West Penn

PPL Electric Utilities
    Conestoga Traction
    Lehigh Valley Transit
    Williamsport Passenger Ry.
    Jersey Shore Electric
    Ephrata and Lebanon St. Ry.

Metropolitan Edison (These were the people made famous by TMI)
    Reading Traction and Light Co.
    Schuylkillvill Valley Transit
    Roxbury Chestnut Hill & Norristown
    Reading St. Ry.
    Oley Valley St. Ry.
    Lebanon Valley
    Lebanon & Annville
    York Railways
    Hanover & McSherrystown

And there were many more.  Problem is companies jumped ship from time
to time and were combined with one organization one year, and a few
years later with another.

The PPL Electric Utilities was Pennsylvania Power and Light Co., part
of Lehigh Power Securities, which was part of Electric Bond and Share
Co.  EBASCO was owned by General Electric ... a railway example like
NCL of how to stack the purchasing department cards in your own
favor.   If someone wants to see the Lancaster Birney car, I'll be
happy to show you a piece of apparatus with all possible hardware
obtained from General Electric.

There were also some unique small power companies that served the
public when they felt like doing it.   Lancaster and York Furnace St.
Ry. sold off excess direct current to farmers in southwestern
Lancaster County PA but only during the day.  Any normal farmer
should be in bed at night.  Wind up clocks would get him up.  By the
time he had to get up, the power plant would be up and running again
because the trolley would need it.   And when the last car was in the
barn at night, the power plant would again be shut down for the night.

Guess I've got to go to the PUC and find out who serves whom for
starters.