Western Maryland Railway
The Western Maryland Railway (WM) was an American railroad company based in the states of Pennsylvania , Maryland, and West Virginia . The company was based in Baltimore . The company was incorporated into the Chessie system in 1983 . The largest expansion of the route network was around 1340 kilometers.
Route network
From Baltimore the most important main route leads west via Westminster to Hagerstown , Williamsport , along the Potomac River to Cumberland , the Appalachians are crossed at Frostburg and finally along the Youghuogheny River to Connellsville . From Cumberland, a branch line runs southwest to Elkins and on to Durbin and Webster Springs . In Hagerstown a route branches off to Shippenburg to the north . A branch line runs from Highfield on the main line to Gettysburg and York and rejoins the main line at Emory Grove.
Due to the strategically favorable integration between Connellsville with connection to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad , the Pittsburgh and West Virginia Railroad and the Pennsylvania Railroad and Shippenburg with connection to the Reading Company , the route was often used by continuous trains from the New York area in the direction of Pittsburgh / Chicago and used in reverse. This connection became known as the Alphabet Route .
history
The company was founded on May 27, 1852 as the Baltimore, Carroll and Frederick Rail Road Company and shortly thereafter renamed Western Maryland Rail Road. The majority owner was the city of Baltimore. Construction of the first line began on July 11, 1857. On August 11, 1859, the first 16 km section between Owings Mills and Relay House was inaugurated. On June 15, 1861 it became Westminster and in May 1862 Union Bridge was reached. Due to the outbreak of the American Civil War , railway construction had to be suspended. The railway was only affected by the war through occasional smaller raids . The railway played an important role during the Battle of Gettysburg . The company was responsible for the transport of Union troops and the removal of the wounded. After the war, construction continued westward to Hagerstown and on December 17, 1873, the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal was reached in Williamsport. At the other end of the line, a link to Baltimore began. Under President John Mifflin Hood, the company expanded from 1874. So he bought railroad lines to Gettysburg and York and built the line from Hagerstown to Shippensburg, thus establishing a connection to the Pennsylvania Railroad. After leaving the World Cup, the city of Baltimore sold its shares to George Gould in 1902 . With his stakes in the Missouri Pacific Railroad , the Wabash Railway and the World Cup, he tried to create a transcontinental railroad. Over the next 10 years, Port Covington in Baltimore was connected, the stretch along the Potomac extended to Cumberland, where there was a connection to a company of the Gould Empire. This had become necessary because the competing companies Baltimore and Ohio and Reading Company no longer tolerated trains of the Gould Empire on their routes. Due to various difficulties of Gould's companies, the company had to file for bankruptcy in 1908. Business continued under the new name of Western Maryland Railway from 1910. On August 1, 1912, the connection from Cumberland to Connellsville was completed. After completion, this route had the lowest gradient over the Appalachian Mountains. Western Maryland became a link on the Alphabet Route.
After the end of Gould's empire, John D. Rockefeller took control of society. In 1927 he sold his shares to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, which soon increased their shares to 42.88% of WM shares. However, the Interstate Commerce Commission ruled that the company could not exercise its stock rights. The shares were therefore handed over to a trustee. The B&O received the economic advantage, but had no influence on Western Maryland.
In 1954 the operation was completely converted to diesel locomotives, and the last pure passenger train ran in 1958. On February 23, 1968, the ICC overturned its previous decision, allowed the acquisition of further shares by B&O and the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad and now also allowed the economic Influence. In the following period there were several studies on the integration of Western Maryland into the system of C&O and B&O, including the Central Railroad of New Jersey and the Reading Company . The result of these investigations led to the decision to buy up the remaining shares. At the end of 1972 the Chessie system owned around 92% of the shares. In the following period, redundant lines began to be shut down, especially on the section along the Potomac River, where the B&O had a parallel line. From 1975 the east-west mainline of Western Maryland was closed. The company's trains were now run on the routes of the B&O. In 1983, the World Cup was finally taken over by B&O.
Traction vehicles
Steam locomotives
The need for locomotives also developed in line with the goods being transported. Both powerful vehicles were needed to transport the coal trains and fast locomotives were needed to transport goods on the Alphabet route.
From 1900 1'D locomotives of the series H-4 to H-9 were used. The latter, in service from 1921, developed the same starting tractive effort with 318 kN as the medium-sized 1'E1 '. From 1918, the Western Maryland locomotives with the 1'E wheel arrangement (series I-1 and I-2) began to use. These locomotives originally intended for the Russian railroad weighed 190 tons and had a higher pulling power than the (1'D) (D1 ') - "standard locomotives" of the USRA.
From 1909 two (1'C) (C1 ') locomotives from Baldwin were used as push locomotives. This was followed by seven more in 1911. However, because the H-9s were more powerful, the locomotives were put into shunting service in the late 1920s.
Mallet locomotives of the type (1'D) (D1 ') were used for the heavy coal trains from the Connellsville region from 1915 . A total of 25 locomotives of the locomotives designated as L-1 and L-2 were procured. The locomotives of the class M-2 (2'C) (C2 ') put into service in 1940/1941 did not meet the expectations placed on them, so that they were soon put into push service.
The locomotives with the 2'D2 'class T-1 wheel arrangement already available at the Reading Company were procured for the Alphabet Route. The locomotives procured in 1947 were given the designation J-1 and were called Potomacs, in contrast to the other companies that called them Northern or Niagara.
19 Pacifics (2'C1 ') were procured for passenger traffic in 1909 and 1911. They were named K-1 and K-2. The first ten were sold to the Seaboard Air Line Railway in 1943 . The others were taken out of service in 1954. Four K-2 series locomotives were oil-fired.
The Western Maryland also used several Shay locomotives to be able to drive the steep connecting routes to the coal mines. Locomotive No. 6, acquired in 1945, was the last Shay built near Lima and the heaviest Shay with three bogies.
Diesel locomotives
The first diesel locomotives were procured in 1941. These were Baldwin VO660 and VO1000, as well as ALCO S-1 and S-2. At the beginning of the 1950s, an extensive new procurement program began to switch to diesel traction. A total of 42 of the then standard EMD F7 locomotives and 14 ALCO RS-2s were procured. This was later followed by locomotives of the EMD series, GP7 and GP9 . Between 1963 and 1971 locomotives of the types EMD SD 35 and SD 40 as well as GP 35 and GP 40 were procured for heavy freight train service. The Western Maryland was also known for having 2 EMD BL-2s in use. The vehicle fleet remained almost constant until the takeover by B&O in 1983, only a few types of splinters from ALCO and Baldwin locomotives had been scrapped or sold.
literature
- George H. Drury: The Historical Guide to North American Railroads 2nd Ed. Kalmbach Publishing Co., Waukesha, WI 2000, ISBN 0-89024-356-5
- George H. Drury: The Guide to North American Steam Locomotives Kalmbach Publishing Co., Waukesha, WI 2004, ISBN 0-89024-206-2
- Don Phillips: Going out as it came in - quietly . In: Trains . 5/80, Kalmbach Publishing Co., pp. 44-49, ISSN 0041-0934
