THE COMING OF THE NEW YORK CENTRAL
Out of the vast wreckage of great hopes and broken ambitions there slowly
arose the smoke of a great wrath. Watertown, in particular, smoldered in
her anger. Her position was a most uncomfortable one. Her pride had not
only been touched but sorely tried. She felt, and truly, that she had
helped to shake the bushes while the New York Central got all the plums.
It hurt. Her traditional rivals pointed their fingers of fine scorn toward
her. Ogdensburgh chuckled with glee. Oswego chortled.
Yet out of her uncomfortable position she was yet to gain much. She was in
a position not only to demand but to receive. And because of the inherent
power of that position the ranking officers of the New York Central made
every effort to placate her. For one of the very few times, if not indeed
the only time in his life, Cornelius Vanderbilt--then the ranking head of
the family--made public appearance upon the stage of her Opera House,
before a great throng of her citizens, who crowded that ample place and
sat and stood there with anger in their hearts, but with justice in their
minds. They had not appreciated being made dupes. And yet they stood there
willing to give the newcomers the square deal. Which spoke whole volumes
for their upbringing.
That was a memorable night in the history of Watertown; the evening of
March 24, 1891. The meeting at the City Opera House had been hastily
arranged. The telegraph wires only that morning had announced the coming
of Mr. Vanderbilt, accompanied by Mr. Chauncey M. Depew, his personal
friend and adviser and at that time President of the New York Central &
Hudson River, as well as a small group of other railroad officers. The
party had left New York the preceding evening. All that day it held
meetings in the North Country--at Carthage, at Gouverneur, at Potsdam and
at Ogdensburgh. To a large extent these meetings were, however, somewhat
perfunctory. The real event of that memorable day was the evening meeting
at Watertown. In announcing the affair, but a few hours before, the editor
of the _Times_ (we suspect Mr. William D. McKinstry's own brilliant hand
in the penning of these paragraphs) had said:
"Of course Mr. Depew will be the spokesman of the party. Having had his
dinner, which will be at his own expense, he will be in a good mood to
meet our citizens, and will, of course, have many pleasant things to say.
But we hope he will come no joke on our citizens. With us, this railroad
business is no joking matter. It affects us closely; it comes right into
our homes, affects our comfort of living and the prosperity of our
business enterprises. It puts more or less coal in our fires to warm our
homes, according to the price we have to pay for it, and it makes a
difference with how we are to be fed and clothed. This new railroad
monopoly has the power, if it chooses, to make us the most happy,
contented and prosperous people, or the most dejected and discontented....
It is a great power to have and it calls for the utmost consideration in
its use...."
So was laid the platform for the evening meeting; fairly and squarely. To
it the New York Central officers responded, fairly and squarely. Even the
genial Doctor Depew, to whom a speech without a funny story was as a
circus without an elephant, respected the real seriousness of the issue.
At the beginning he told some funny stories--of course. He alluded
playfully to the fact that the citizens of Watertown had met them without
a band--referring inferentially to the first official visit of Charles
Parsons as President of the Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburgh, upon which
occasion the City Band had been engaged and the whole affair given the
appearance of a _fete_. Mr. Depew alluded half jestingly to the demise of
the Mohawk & St. Lawrence and then turned seriously to the real kernel of
the situation--the inevitable tendency of American railroads toward
consolidation into larger single operating units.
The merger of the Utica & Black River into the Rome, Watertown &
Ogdensburgh five years before had been in obedience to such a natural law.
The R. W. & O. system, reaching only Northern New York, disconnected and
not united to the great railroad properties of the country which spread
all over the face of the United States, had, partly by reason of its
isolation, failed to properly develop the territory that it had set out to
serve. It had been hedged in by barriers that it could not surmount.
It was a good speech, filled not only with good intention, but with a deal
of economic hard sense. The crowded Opera House listened to it with
courtesy, with attention and with applause. But always with a feeling that
the deeds of the new management and not their mere words or promises would
be the atonement for the indignity that had been heaped upon the town.
And the next evening the _Times_ again said editorially:
[Illustration: SNOW FIGHTERS A Scene in the Richland Yard on Almost Any
Zero Day in the Dead of a North Country Winter.]
"... Mr. Depew appeared last evening and made the apology which is
reported in full in our local columns. He did it nicely. He called it
frescoing. Whitewashing is the common name for it when the job is done by
less artistic hands. But, by whatever name, it was pleasantly received by
an audience which packed the Opera House and a good feeling was created.
Mr. Depew ... did not go into any detailed statement of what the new
management of the R. W. & O. proposed to do except to make the general
statement that they had come to stay; that our interests were mutual; that
in building up the prosperity of this section they would be adding to
their own prosperity and that they would be one with us in every way. In
carrying out this assurance everything else must follow, and therefore it
is sufficient and satisfactory to our citizens. They will give the
management a good, fair chance to carry out this assurance and wait
confidently for acts to take the place of words ..."
* * * * *
That the new management had some real desire to assuage the extremely
irritated local situation became evident within the next few days. The
members of the Vanderbilt party had had many quiet consultations with the
leading men of Watertown and the North Country generally; had noted with
great patience and care the many, many transport grievances of the entire
territory. And proceeded wherever it was possible to remedy these, at
once.
As a first earnest of its desires it tore down the high, unpainted,
hemlock fence around the Watertown passenger station. That high-board
fence had been an eyesore. It had been far worse than that however. It had
been a slap in the face to the average Watertownian who for years past had
regarded it as part of his inherent right and privilege to go down to the
depot whenever and as often as he pleased, not alone to greet friends or
to see them off, but also for the sheer joy of seeing the cars come in and
depart. Upon the occasion of the state firemen's convention in the
preceding August, the R. W. & O. management caused the ugly fence to be
builded--as a temporary measure. But the firemen's convention gone and a
matter of joyous memory, the fence remained. One might only enter within
upon showing one's ticket.
Now, no matter how common and sensible a practice that might be elsewhere,
in this broad world, Watertown resented it, as an invasion of personal
privilege. It protested to the R. W. & O. management over at Oswego. Its
protests were laughed at. The fence remained. The New York Central tore it
down ... within a fortnight after it had acquired the road.
* * * * *
I have mentioned this episode in some detail because it is so typical of
the fashion that so many railroad managements, and with so much to gain,
go blindly ahead neglecting utterly the one great thing essential toward
the gaining of their larger ends--public sympathy and public support.
Charles Parsons, with everything to gain from Northern New York, scoffed
at these great aids, so easily purchased. Vastly bigger than Sloan in most
ways, he, nevertheless, shared the contempt of the old genius of the
Lackawanna for public opinion. The Vanderbilts rarely have made this
mistake with their railroads. I think that it can be put down as one of
the great open secrets of their success.
Similarly Parsons had offended Watertown by his treatment of its newly
born street railway. It had been planned to extend in a single straight
line from the northeastern corner of the city, just beyond Sewall's Island
through High, and State, and Court, and Main Streets to the westerly
limits of the town, and thence down the populous valley of the Black
River through Brownville to the little manufacturing village of Dexter,
eight miles distant. In this course it needed to cross the steam railroad
tracks four times at grade--all of these within the city limits.
The old R. W. & O had stoutly fought these crossings; using one specious
argument after another. The new management of the property said that the
crossings could go down as soon as the street railway company could have
them manufactured. It kept its word. The street railway went ahead--and
thrived; and the steam railroad lost little by its slight competition
between Watertown and Brownville.
One other very popular form of grievance still remained--I shall take up
the question of the freight and passenger rates at another time--the
persistent refusal of the Parsons' administration to install through
all-the-year sleeping-car service between Watertown and New York. The
Vanderbilts installed that service, also one between Oswego and New York
within three weeks of their acquisition of the road. These have remained
ever since with the single exception of a short period during the Chicago
World's Fair, when the extreme shortage of sleeping-cars induced the
headquarters of the New York Central temporarily to withdraw the
Watertown cars. A protest from the Northern New York metropolis brought
them back--within seven days' time.
The new management did more. It instituted Sunday trains upon the line;
also as an all-the-year feature, a travel necessity for which the North
Country had cried for years, vainly. It placed parlor-cars upon the
principal trains. It shortened the running-time of all of these. It showed
in almost every conceivable fashion a real desire to propitiate its
public. And for that desire much of the Mohawk & St. Lawrence fiasco was
eventually forgiven it.
* * * * *
One other problem--and a passing large one--confronted it; the question of
taking proper care of the official personnel of the Rome road. That is
always a difficult and delicate question in a merger of large
properties.... The Parsons family was taken care of--although in the
entire transaction it had taken pretty good care of itself. Arrangements
were made to carry its members upon the New York Central pay-rolls for a
season, even though they were quickly off and into new enterprises--the
New York & New England and South Carolina Railroad--but never again was
there to be such a killing as they had had in the Rome, Watertown &
Ogdensburgh. Such an opportunity does not arise once in a lifetime; not
once in a thousand lifetimes.
The rest of the official roster was to be continued, for the next two or
three months at any rate. With great astuteness the Vanderbilts planned to
upset the operation of the road, to the least possible degree. It was to
keep its name and its individuality as far as was possible. As a matter of
operating convenience it was arranged to abolish the auditing offices at
Oswego and to have the R. W. & O. agents and conductors make their reports
direct to the New York Central headquarters in the Grand Central Station,
in New York City. Similarly orders went forth from those headquarters to
drop the old name, "Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburgh" from the locomotive
tenders and the sides of the passenger-cars. A rather bitter blow that
was. With all of its hatred against the property at one time and another,
the North Country cherished a real affection for the name. In deference,
to which sentiment, the Vanderbilts still clung to it for a number of
years; in their advertising and printed matter of every sort. It was
necessary, in their opinion, to emblazon "New York Central" upon their
newly acquired rolling-stock in order to permit a greater flexibility in
its interchange with that they already held. They had not owned the R. W.
& O. a fortnight before its eternal shortage of motive-power had been
relieved, by the assignment to it of engines No. 316 and No. 414 of the N.
Y. C. & H. R. R. And it should not be forgotten that one large reason for
all of these orders was the large affection of the Vanderbilt family for
the name and the fame of the New York Central. Both have loomed large in
their eyes.
* * * * *
The old Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburgh, quickly reorganized in that
March-time of 1891, had then as its chief officers the following men:
_President_, CHARLES PARSONS, New York
_First Vice-President_, CLARENCE S. DAY, New York
_Second Vice-President_, CHARLES PARSONS, JR., New York
_Third Vice-President_, H. WALTER WEBB, New York
_Secretary and Treasurer_, J. A. LAWYER, New York
_Freight Traffic Manager_, L. A. EMERSON, New York
_Gen. Pass. Agent_, THEODORE E. BUTTERFIELD, Oswego
_General Manager_, E. S. BOWEN, Oswego
_Supt. of Transportation_, W. W. CURRIER, Oswego
_Master Mechanic_, GEORGE H. HASELTON, Oswego
_Superintendents_
W. S. Jones, Watertown
H. W. Hammond, Carthage
I. H. McEwen, Oswego
Mr. Webb, who also was the Third Vice-President of the New York Central &
Hudson River, was now, of course, the real guiding head of the property.
Well schooled in the Vanderbilt methods of railroad operation, it was his
task to begin their introduction into the newly acquired railroad. How
well he succeeded can easily be adjudged by the results that were
attained. They need no comment by the historian.
To this group of men was given the operation of 643 miles of busy
single-track railroad. Prior to the acquisition of the R. W. & O., the New
York Central & Hudson River, itself, had only contained some 1420 miles of
line, including those which it held on leasehold. The Rome road then had
given it upwards of two thousand miles of route line--not to be confused
with mere miles of trackage, which would run to a far greater total. The
capital stock of the R. W. & O. as shown on its balance-sheet for the year
ending June 30, 1890, was $6,230,100, of which $238,243 was still in the
company's treasury. Its funded debt came to $12,672,090 (this latter
included income bonds, also in the company's treasury). In addition to
which there was a profit and loss account of $762,298. Parsons had builded
up a real railroad. Always himself short of ready cash he had acquired a
habit of dealing in millions--in a day when a million dollars still
represented a good deal of money.
* * * * *
The real problem of the new management of the Rome road lay, however, in
an immediate readjustment of its rates; particularly its freight rates.
The hemlock fence around the Watertown depot, the persecution of the
little street railway system of that community, the irritating defects of
the passenger service, were in the eyes of the commercial factors of the
North Country as nothing compared with the railroad freight tariffs that
it was called upon to pay. Charles Parsons, as I have said already, had
had no hesitation whatsoever in putting the burden of his income
necessities upon his non-competitive territory in order that he might be
in a position to slash rates right and left wherever and whenever he was
forced to compete.
New York Central control promised a modification of this situation. To a
certain extent it accomplished it. Some of the rates were slashed from
twenty-five to fifty per cent, and Mr. Parsons lived long enough to see
more equitable systems of freight-carrying charges established on the old
line. It was only a short time after the New York Central had acquired the
Rome road before the huge Solvay Process Company had located themselves on
the western limits of Syracuse. Their location there was due primarily to
the salt-beds but they also needed great quantities of limestone daily for
their products. This the R. W. & O. furnished by means of an attractive
low rate. And, after a little time, there was a solid train each day from
Chaumont on the old Cape branch to Syracuse, laden exclusively with
limestone rock. At other times there would be solid trains of paper, and
in the season, of such rare specialties as strawberries from the Richland
section and turkeys from St. Lawrence county for the New York City
markets. And despite the well-famed superiority of the North Country in
cheese making, its rich dairy areas were invaded by the milk-supply
companies of the swift-growing metropolis.
All made business--and lots of it--for the new owners of the North
Country's old road. They could afford to forget Parsons' dream of a
through route along the northerly border of the country--single-track and
filled with hard curvature and grades--to the seaboard docks of Portland,
Maine. The intensive development of the Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburgh was
their opportunity; and this opportunity they promptly seized. And
accomplished. Even the once despised Lake Ontario Shore Railroad came at
last into its own. Along its rails upgrew the greatest orchard industry in
the United States. And even as powerful and as resourceful a railroad as
the New York Central, at times, is hard put to find sufficient equipment
for the proper handling of the vast quantities of apples, pears and
peaches that to-day are grown upon the gentle south shore of Ontario.
The Vanderbilts paid a high price for the R. W. & O. And then it was a
bargain. Not only was competition practically forestalled forever in one
of the richest industrial and agricultural areas in the entire United
States--by an odd coincidence the actual acquisition of the R. W. & O. was
followed a few months later by the enactment of a state law forbidding one
railroad acquiring a parallel or competing line--but the menace of the
powerful and strategic Canadian Pacific ever reaching the city of New York
was practically removed. A high price, and yet a low one. Which marks the
beginning and the end of railroad strategy.
* * * * *
For some time now we have lost track of Mr. Austin Corbin and his
ambitious plan of the Camden, Watertown & Northern. Upon the explosion of
the Mohawk & St. Lawrence bubble a good many keen Watertown men who were
bent, heart and soul, upon providing their community with competitive
railroad service turned earnestly toward the Corbin scheme. The most of
the $60,000 that had been hastily subscribed in the town toward providing
the Mohawk & St. Lawrence with a free right-of-way and depot grounds
through it, was turned over to Mr. Corbin. Edward M. Gates, who was very
active in the matter, went further. He wired Mr. H. Walter Webb, who, as
Third Vice-President of the New York Central, and personal representative
of the Vanderbilts, had made a personal subscription of $30,000 to the
Watertown fund, if he, too, would agree to turning his subscription to the
Camden, Watertown & Northern. There is no record of a reply from Mr. Webb
on this proposition.
Gradually Corbin grew lukewarm upon his Camden, Watertown & Northern plan.
Truth to tell, he had lost his largest opportunity on the day that Charles
Parsons had landed the Vanderbilts with the Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburgh.
They had needed that road. They had never thought that they needed the
Elmira, Cortland & Northern, not even at the time that Corbin offered it
to them at the assumption of its mortgage-bonds and its fixed charges.
Eventually he succeeded in getting the Lehigh Valley, which at just that
time was cherishing a fond idea that it might succeed in seriously cutting
into the New York Central's traffic between the seaboard and Central and
Northern New York, to buy the E. C. & N. Thereafter the Corbin project
disappeared. From time to time it has been revived, as a possible
extension of the Lehigh Valley, north from its present unsatisfactory
terminal at Camden to Watertown or even beyond. It is hardly likely now
that that extension will ever be builded. For one thing, the day of
building competing railroads is over, and for another, the E. C. & N. is
far too unsatisfactory a railroad dog to which to tie an efficient tail.
The Ontario & Western would have been a far more advantageous opportunity.
* * * * *
Out of all the tumult and excitement of that strenuous winter of 1890-91
the net result then to Northern New York was no new railroads. No, permit
me to correct that statement. One new railroad was builded, and an
important enterprise it was. A brother of H. Walter Webb's, Dr. Seward
Webb, who had married into the Vanderbilt family, was instrumental in
acquiring from Henry S. Ives, of New York, and some of his associates, the
little narrow-gauge Herkimer, Newport & Poland Railroad, stretching some
twenty miles northward from Herkimer in the Mohawk valley and upon the
main line of the New York Central. With the road renamed, the Mohawk &
Malone, Dr. Webb conceived the idea of building it through the North Woods
to the Canada line. Where the long ago promoters of the Sackett's Harbor
& Saratoga had failed, he succeeded after a fashion. He moved the
contractors' duffle from the terminal of the nascent Mohawk & St.
Lawrence, at Utica, down to Herkimer, and began by first changing the H.
N. & P. into a standard-gauge railroad. This done he proceeded with its
extension, up the valley of the Canada Creek to Remsen, where it touched
the Utica line of the R. W. & O. (the main line of the former Utica &
Black River).
This done, and arrangements made for handling the through trains of the
Mohawk & Malone over the R. W. & O. for the twenty-two miles between Utica
and Remsen, Dr. Webb struck his new road off through the depths of the
untrodden forests for nearly 150 miles. At first it was said that it was
his aim to meet and terminate his line at Tupper Lake, which had been
reached by the one-time Northern Adirondack from Moira, on the Ogdensburgh
& Lake Champlain. Dr. Webb did meet this line, also the tenuous branch of
the Delaware & Hudson, extending westward from Plattsburg, and then down
to Saranac Lake and Lake Placid. But he passed by all of these. His scheme
was a far more ambitious one. He had determined to build a railroad from
Utica to Montreal, and build a railroad from Utica to Montreal he did.
Before he was done the New York Central had its own rails from its main
line almost into the very heart of the Canadian metropolis. And while this
route was a little longer in mileage between New York City and Montreal
than the direct routes along both shores of Lake Champlain, it possessed
large strategic value for the western end of the New York Central & Hudson
River. And it was entirely a Vanderbilt line. As such it probably was
worth all it cost; and it was not a cheap road to build.
This line was then the one tangible result of the most agitated railroad
experience that the people of New York state ever faced--with the possible
exception of the West Shore fiasco. The other plans--you still can find
them by the dozens carefully filed in the clerk's office of the Northern
New York counties--all came to nought. The folk of the North Country
ceased their dreamings; settled down to the intensive development of their
rarely rich territory. And sought to make its existing transport
facilities equal to their every need.