[PRCo] Re: 4366 on Nevergreen

Tue Feb 14 22:59:09 EST 2012

Right Herb.   Now why does it always appear in railway publications?   If a company abandoned its franchise, that makes sense.   But most of them continued to provide alternate service.   

Of course there were some great exceptions.  I am thinking of lines that should never have been built in the first place.   A couple of my favorite examples are right here in Lancaster County.

The worst example of all was a company called the Lancaster and Southern Street Railway.   About 1905 it built a line from a hamlet called Martic Forge (which had about a half dozen houses) up a hill about 500 feet high and several miles long and finally terminated 6.1 miles away at a place called Hog Pen Station.   How poetic is that?    They had grandiose delusions of going farther but it never happened.   The most important traffic generator on the line was a religious camp meeting that was open for a few weeks in the summer.   In 1908 they had a runaway car on the hill ... a charter I think ... bringing people back from a funeral.  Afterwards some of them had their own funerals.  After that the state railroad commission looked at it and said, No Way, Jose.   So they rebuilt it by a longer route and reopened it in 1912.   In 1918 it gave for ever.   In the entire year 1912 it hauled 33,718 people logging 32,544 car miles ... about person per car mile ... and grossed $3,504.22.    The lost $33,208.25 hauling those people!  Move the decimal about two places to the right and you have a rough idea of what the losses would be in today's greenbacks.   Now if you were losing money on the shorter dumb route, why not be totally inept and double the length so you can lose more money!!!!!!

The L&S had a parent company, the Lancaster and York Furnace St. Ry.   It ran from Millersville, where a connection was made with the Lancaster system, to Pequea way down on the Susquehanna River.   In the summer, they ran hourly.   In the winter, the ran a single truck car every two hours.   For some idiotic reason, it continued until 1929 but by 1912 it had already accumulated deficts of over $44,000.  (Put that in 2012 dollars and you have accumulated deficits of about $4.4 million on no more than 19000 annual passengers (usually under 10,000) on a 12.5 mile line.  When it finally quit the local people in the bottom end of the county blamed the Atlee banking house in Philadelphia for stealing the profits.   What F**KING profits?   

The best L&YF story I know came from Harry Bortzfield, a motorman on the line, whom I interviewed in 1963, two years before he died.   He was telling me of a fall night ... rainy ... leaves all over the rails.   You get the picture Herb.   He came around a curve and the arc headlight illuminated a bull on the track.   He tried to stop and did nothing but slide on wet leaves.   The bull paid no attention to the whistle.   Harry drew out the story as long as he could before concluding with, "and there was shit all over."   (Saw his daughter last week ... she is now older than he was then.)

By the way, those two companies were "ABANDONED."   They walked away from the franchises.   I once counted the black dots within a half mile of the tracks on the old USGS maps ... I think it was something like 50 people per mile.   You don't make money with that kind of stupidity.  The owner, when it quit, rightly said he had built the line from "no where to no place."

_______________________

There was one other totally insane property in this county.  The Ephrata and Lebanon Street Railway built a battery car line from Ephrata westward to Lincoln and Hopeland in 1912.   Hey guys, there are already primitive automobiles running around then.  In June 1914 they reorganized as the Ephrata and Lebanon Traction Company so they could finish the crazy project ... and May 1915 the first car ran from Ephrata, 22 miles to Lebanon.   Also in 1915 the Lincoln Highway was created!   Such perspicacity to build a rural trolley line from a city of about 20,000 people to a town about 10,000 through nothing is mind boggling.   In 1924 it was sold on the court house steps.   You understand bankruptcy?  In became the Lancaster, Ephrata and Lebanon St. Ry.  and was controlled by Conestoga Traction in Lancaster.  By 1927 CTC (and Lehigh Power Securities abrogated their control), claiming it did not fit well into their management scheme.   I think what really happened is that they might have bought it for the power holdings and then concluded that having a chunk of Pennsylvania Power and Light facilities in the middle of Metropolitan Edison territory just didn't make sense .... my hunch and unproven.   In floundered for another few years and expired on Memorial Day 1931.   

To me the most amazing thing is that they bought four steel Cincinnati interurban cars when the electrified in 1915 ... slow, sluggish cars ... and rather than direct suspension, the spent a fortunate on catenary ... triple the money for overhead.   

It had not made any money since 1921.   But I have not delved into all the records.   Normal practice with railway mortgages was to only pay the interest until the mortgage was due, then you paid the principal along with the final interest coupon.    The company might have not put anywhere near enough money aside for the principal while showing a profit up to 1921.   We know they were in receivership in 1924.   In 1932 the state tried to get them to remove their tracks from what is now US 322 and found that they had simply close up shop and walked away.   Technically they abandoned because the bus service, incorporated and run by the same owner, was a totally different corporation.   

______________________

And in western Pennsylvania how about Fairchance and Smithfield which shutdown and then afterwards went to the PUC and said, 
We ran out of money and quit running.   Is that OK?  I guess we might say they abandoned. 

And how about Warren and Jamestown whose new lightweight cars were reposessed by Kuhlman and then scrapped because no one was buying them in the depression.

Did Olean, Bradford and Salamanca abandon?  Some of their routes probably because other bus companies like Greyhound took over.   

Then there was the Penn Central Traction in South Fork - Portage area of Cambria County .... two cars ... no sidings ... only one was ever used.   I think the line finally failed about 1918 and the cars wound up in Kansas.   

History lesson is over.   

On Feb 14, 2012, at 9:47 PM, Herb Brannon wrote:

> Where did the word "abandon" come from? Here's the whole story on it:::::
> a·ban·don  (-bndn)
> *tr.v.* *a·ban·doned*, *a·ban·don·ing*, *a·ban·dons*
> *1. * To withdraw one's support or help from, especially in spite of duty,
> allegiance, or responsibility; desert: abandon a friend in trouble.
> *2. * To give up by leaving or ceasing to operate or inhabit, especially as
> a result of danger or other impending threat: abandoned the ship.
> *3. * To surrender one's claim to, right to, or interest in; give up
> entirely. See Synonyms at
> relinquish<http://www.thefreedictionary.com/relinquish>
> .
> *4. * To cease trying to continue; desist from: abandoned the search for
> the missing hiker.
> *5. * To yield (oneself) completely, as to emotion.
> *n.*
> *1. * Unbounded enthusiasm; exuberance.
> *2. * A complete surrender of inhibitions.
> ------------------------------
> [Middle English abandounen, from Old French abandoner, from a bandon : a, *
> at* (from Latin ad; see * ad-*) + bandon, *control*; see bh-2 in
> Indo-European roots.]
> ------------------------------
> *a·bandon·er** n.*
> *a·bandon·ment** n.
> 
> *So, that's where it comes from ! Definitely not a "railfan" word. Sorry,
> couldn't resist that explaination.
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, Feb 14, 2012 at 13:28, Fred Schneider <fwschneider at comcast.net>wrote:
> 
>> 
>> Thank you very much Herb.
>> 
>> December versus February?   I have multiple pictures of those cars on the
>> back track at Keating out the trees.  My grandfather died in December 1953
>> and I seem to recall seeing several 4300s idle on the track at the far rear
>> of Keating car house when we went out for the funeral.  That would have
>> been the regular car and the spare.
>> 
>> I always had a big problem with the word abandon because in most cases we
>> didn't totally walk away, and route 12 is a perfect example.   Pittsburgh
>> Railways did not abandon the people out on Evergreen Road.   Far from it.
>> They provided a substitute service with the Manchester - Evergreen bus
>> route.
>> 
>> Route 8 Perrysville wasn't abandoned.  It was replaced by 11-D Perrysville
>> bus.
>> 
>> Where did this word abandon come from?   A railfan term Herb?
>> 
>> Glad you used the dictionary.   It's use in that context is one of my pet
>> peeves.
>> 
>> Authenticity of most railfan histories?   Some are better than others.
>> There is no one who can successfully proofread his or her own writing.  We
>> all need one or two or three independent and preferably subject sensitive
>> proofreaders.  The brain sees only what it thought it committed to paper,
>> not what was actually placed there, unless wait several weeks or months or
>> years and then read it when you have forgotten what thought you wrote.
>> Those who work in a total vacuum make a lot of errors.
>> 
>> I remember Donald Duke telling me that he sat down at a table with several
>> friends and they read out loud the galley proofs for the books that Golden
>> West Books was publishing.  Did it catch all the mistakes.   Don had a
>> pretty good record but I have still seen glitches that got through.
>> 
>> A few years ago I attempted to put all the route card information on a
>> computer file.   I gave one disc of it to one of the chaps at PTM to proof
>> read.   Too much work.   That person never did it.   Why did I put it on
>> computer?  Because many schools today are not teaching cursive.   There
>> will come a time when trying to read those cards, which are in cursive,
>> will be like reading a foreign language.   But I need someone in the
>> Pittsburgh area to read the file at the museum and the cards to find out
>> what mistakes I put into them.
>> 
>> 
>> On Feb 14, 2012, at 12:08 PM, Herb Brannon wrote:
>> 
>>> Here is a line from a website about Pittsburgh Rlwys Co.:
>>> "1954 witnessed only one outright abandonment, with North Side route 12
>>> Evergreen closing in February."
>>> Here is a table from a website called "eNotes" which shows a start date
>> in
>>> '08 and an end date in '59:
>>> 12 Evergreen Road via East Street  1908
>>> 1959[<http://www.enotes.com/topic/Pittsburgh_Railways#cite_note-per-20
>>> The
>>> table in the booklet, "The Street Railways of Pittsburgh, 1857 - 1959" by
>>> T. E. Parkinson, lists the following: 12-Evergreen - Feb 54 as the
>> closing
>>> date.
>>> 
>>> Makes one wonder about how accurate any history books, about any area's
>>> history, really are. Why are several PRCo Rt 12 sources indicating Feb
>> 54?
>>> 
>>> Now to the semantics of "abandonment" versus "last day of
>> service"........
>>> 
>>> Who are "We" ?
>>> From Mr. Webster:::::
>>> a-ban-don -- to give up; forsake; to give in to emotion -- .
>> a-ban-don-ment
>>> n.
>>> 
>>> Nothing was given up, forsaken, or given in to until December 6. To say
>>> ".....last day of scheduled (or) revenue service...." then that would be
>>> December 5.
>>> 
>>> I'm sticking with December 6 for Rt. 12 "abandonment". "We" can say it
>>> however "they" want.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Tue, Feb 14, 2012 at 08:45, Edward H. Lybarger <trams2 at comcast.net
>>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> Re abandonment dates:  We try to cite the last day of scheduled service
>> as
>>>> the termination date.  In the case of Route 12, that was Saturday,
>> 12-5-53.
>>>> December 6 was the first day without the trolleys.
>>>> 
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementix.org
>>>> [mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounce at lists.dementix.org] On Behalf Of
>> Herb
>>>> Brannon
>>>> Sent: Monday, February 13, 2012 10:49 PM
>>>> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementix.org
>>>> Subject: [PRCo] Re: 4366 on Nevergreen
>>>> 
>>>> For what it's worth:::::
>>>> 
>>>> *1946 PRCo Guide Routing:
>>>> 
>>>> 12-Evergreen
>>>> Evergreen Rd at City Line, Inbound to East St, North Ave, Sandusky St,
>>>> Robinson, Ninth St Bridge, Ninth, Penn to Seventh; Outbound via Seventh,
>>>> Seventh St Bridge, Sandusky, North Ave, Madison, East St, Evergreen Rd
>> to
>>>> City Line.
>>>> RUNS RUSH HOURS ONLY
>>>> 
>>>> All other times from East St at Evergreen to City Line and return to
>> East &
>>>> Evergreen only.
>>>> 
>>>> *
>>>> Also the book Pittsburgh Railways, by R Beal, indicates the line
>> abandoned
>>>> 6 December 1953. The last car operated on Rt 12 was 4393 and it was also
>>>> the
>>>> last  double-end car in regular service on the PRCo system.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Herb Brannon
>>> In Cuyahoga Valley National Park
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Herb Brannon
> In Cuyahoga Valley National Park
> 
> 