History of Clinton and Franklin Counties, New York : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 14

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) 1n; Lewis, J.W., & Co., Philadelphia
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & co.
Number of Pages: 922

USA > New York > Clinton County > History of Clinton and Franklin Counties, New York : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 14
USA > New York > Franklin County > History of Clinton and Franklin Counties, New York : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 14

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EARLY STRUGGLES FOR RAILROAD COMMUNICATION SOUTH, AND FINAL SUCCESS.

Ever since the first organization of the town of Platts- burgh, over ninety years ago, one of the greatest drawbacks to its prosperity has been its secluded position with refer- ence to the great Southern and Eastern markets. And this difficulty has been felt not only by Plattsburgh, but also by other localities lying upon the western border of Lake Champlain. During the summer season the facilities for transportation by water are, it is true, unsurpassed,-with the broad, spacious Lake Champlain, navigable for the largest steamers, stretching from Rouse's Point to Whitehall, and connecting from the former point by canal northwardly with the St. Lawrence, and from the latter southerly with the Hudson. But the fact that during nearly one-half of the year these avenues of communication are closed by ice puts a check upon all manufacturing as well as commercial interests ; for manufacturers can ill afford to pile up their products on the wharves, receiving no income for three or four months, while to shut down their works is ruinous both to themselves and their employees.

The shrewd business men of this section began at an early period to cast about in order to discover means of relief, while capitalists began to reach out from the south and east towards the rich stores of lumber and iron with which this country was known to abound.

* Seo history of town of Dannemora.

INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS.

The first iron ore found in this section had been diseov- ered in the first year of the present eentury by George Shaffer, a farmer who resided on the Ausable River, about a mile west of Clintonville. The spot where this ore was discovered was upon the slope of the hill half a mile west of Clintonville, known afterwards as the " Winter Ore Bed,'' -named after Judge Winter, the owner of the lot on which it was found. Some eight or ten years subsequently the Arnold ore bed had been discovered, together with the Palmer, Baker, Cook, and Watson beds and others; the natural consequence of which was that a great iron-manu- faeturing establishment had been built up at Clintonville, while all over the immediate vicinity forges, nail-factories, and blast-furnaces had sprung into existenee as if by magie. The number of forge-fires in operation at some time be- tween 1820 to 1833 on the Saranae and Ausable Rivers was between eighty and one hundred, while no less than five blast-furnaces were running in Clinton County alone. Is it any wonder that the business men of this great iron region should look about them earnestly in all directions for better means of getting their valuable produets to market ? and is it strange that the great capitalists of the South and East should also have been devising means for aeeomplishing the same desirable ends ?

As early as 1833 a company was organized in the Ausable Valley, known as the " Great Ausable Railroad Company." This company had mighty sehemes in view, ineluding a railroad from Port Kent to Keeseville and thenee up the river through the Adirondaek region, partly by railway and partly by canal, to some of the tributaries of the St. Law- rence, the final objective point being that great river itself. In January, 1834, Mr. Beach was appointed ehief engi- neer of this road, with the understanding that the line was to be commenced from Port Kent to Keeseville the following April.

But the wildest and most visionary seheme of all was that by which Eastern capitalists-who were destined to play a very important part in this game, as we shall see-pro- posed to eonneet the great lakes with the Atlantie sea- board. This was in 1837, and the plan by which their object was to be accomplished was by a covered railroad from Boston to Ogdensburgh.

That was the day of strap-rails, sometimes called the " Blaek-Snake Rail," on account of its propensity to peel up from the wooden bed-piece to which it was nailed, and glide up through the bottom of the car, propelled by the car-wheel, which would sometimes take a notion to run under instead of over it. So, in those days, it was no uncommon occurrence for a passenger to find this playful " Black-Snake Rail" erawling up his trowser's leg as he sat in his seat in the ear, or to feel it shooting through him longitudinally, impal- ing him like a fly upon a pin. Now, what was the faneied neeessity of a covered railway it is hard to conjecture, but it is presumed that it was thought to be preposterous to think of running a railroad into this frozen snowy region. But whatever might have been the reason, the plan was broached, the author having been John MeDuffie, a civil engineer, of Bradford, Vt. He sums up his arguments in favor of the plan, from firstly to fifteenthly and lastly, and says, eightlily, " That the great Lake Ontario lics so deep in

the earth that it does not freeze over in the winter,-the sur- face of which is only two hundred and thirty-one feet above the level of the ocean, and its bottom more than two hun- dred and fifty feet below the ocean's surface,-and by a covered railway from its outlet at Ogdensburgh to Boston, goods ean pass from Boston into that lake throughout the year" ! Then, in regard to the eost and some other minor considerations, he shows, ninthly, " That less money than it cost to build the Erie Canal will build a covered rail- way the whole distance;" and that "the chimney of the steam-ear ean be easily altered or amended, so as to prevent any danger to the eovering from the fire neeessary to move the engine."

Then, again, " Less than three millions will build the whole railway, and the ineome of it in three years will cover it the whole distance."

And onee more, "That by a covered railway from Bos- ton to Ogdensburgh, Boston secures the trade of that great open lake through the winter, while the Hudson River, the Erie Canal, and the river St. Lawrence are frozen over and asleep under their winter blankets."

Then, thirteenthly, he shows, "That in transporting the railway-cars aeross Lake Champlain in the winter on the iee, when the steamboat cannot run, horse-power will an- swer the purpose ; or by steamboats with iee-eutters an open channel may be kept through the ice,-the distance being only about ten miles."

Fourteenthly : " That the eattle of a thousand hills, and the flour, pork, and butter of millions of farmers, ean be transported from the great West to the ocean by this rail- way better than by any other communication at present known to man ;" and that you ean pass from Boston by this " railway to Lake Champlain at Burlington, and thenee by Montreal and Grand River to the Northern Ocean, in less time than from the city of New York or any other port in the United States."

Then he sets forth the advantages of transporting goods from the West by this route rather than sending them down the Mississippi to spoil in a warm elimate. These and many other good and strong reasons he urges in favor of the plan, and finally he points triumphantly to the grand eut through the Green Mountain range, " between Mans- field Mountain and Camel's Rump," worn down hundreds of feet through the solid roeks, as the marks show, high up on the mountain sides, by the Onion River ; and also the gap through the White Mountain range, between Stin- son's and Cardigan Mountains, through which Baker's River flows, " making an opening through both for a eom- munieation either for a eanal or railroad to pass from the great American Mediterranean of the West to the Atlantie Oecan of the East. Those who will not believe in the completing of the railroad after seeing all this, must be left in their unbelief."

And then he says, prophetically, " I pass to those who will not only believe but advance the money to build the railway and receive the great reward, not only for their own benefit but for the benefit of millions yet unborn."

Finally, he would " show them how the trade of this Champion Railway will eut off the head of the St. Law- rence River, and enter the great lakes like a giant, taking

HISTORY OF CLINTON AND FRANKLIN COUNTIES, NEW YORK.

the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers by the foretop and the commerce of the North and West, and far West, together with thousands of ships on the lakes with their cargoes to Ogdensburgh, from thence, by thousands of tons daily, to pass on the great national highway to Boston; and instead of Boston being second to New York it must become one of the greatest emporiums of the world."

THE GREAT NORTHERN RAILWAY.

Now whether this remarkable document had anything to do with what followed we cannot say ; but it is certainly a fact that about that time the project of the " Great North- ern Railway" began to be agitated,-a line which was to connect Lake Ontario with Lake Champlain, and another to extend eastward to Boston. Boston and New England capitalists had sagacity enough to see the great advantage which their own section would derive from such a line, opening to them as it would the undeveloped wealth of Northern New York together with the rich grain-producing countries of the West.

Railroad meetings were held in St. Lawrence, Franklin, and Clinton Counties, and the citizens of Plattsburgh took hold of the matter enthusiastically, hoping that by this means they would be able to secure a direct connection with the Eastern markets ; understanding, as they did from the first, that the eastern terminus of the line would be Plattsburgh.

The New York Legislature was importuned year after year to grant aid in the construction of the much-needed line; railroad conventions, railroad mass-meetings, and rail- road indignation-meetings were held, in which the wrath of impatient enthusiasts was poured out frecly upon the State Legislature for not being willing to give a little lift to so important an enterprise as this, when money had been poured out so freely in internal improvements elsewhere in the State; the question was even carried into politics, the Democratic and Whig parties vying with each other year after ycar, just before election, in their devotion to the scheme, only to ignore it when once in power.

This excitement was kept up, as we have said, for years. In the mean time, too, another strife had been fomenting- a partisan and sectional one-between those who repre- sented the interests of the Ausable and Saranac regions respectively. Years before, the " Great Ausable Railroad Company" had been organized, and now it was claimed that the best railroad route from Ogdensburgh to Lake Champlain was up the Ausable River, through Wilmington Notch, across the plains of North Elba and through the Adirondack region, down the St. Regis or Raquette River to Potsdam, and thence onward to the far West. On the other hand, those who represented the Saranac interest claimed that the best route was from Plattsburgh through West Chazy, and thence off across Flat Rock, Ellenburgh, and Clinton.

The strife between these sections was very bitter indeed. The advocates of the Northern route ridiculed the idea of a railroad dodging about among the Adirondacks; while the other side retorted that there were rich stores of iron ore and timber which the Southern route would open, and also that the scenery here was much more picturesque and

romantic than that bordering on the Northern route. And so the strife went on for ten years and more, waxing very fierce at intervals and then dying down again.

In 1844 there was a tremendous effort made to accom- plish the great work which had so long occupied the atten- tion of Northern New York. The Eastern capitalists had been at work behind the scenes all the while pulling the wires, but the people along the line of the projected road were making most of the noise, and in 1845 the Legislature of the State of New York passed an act incorporating the road.

The following year many railroad meetings were held, and a grand railroad convention on the 10th of July in Malone, at which one thousand delegates were present. The railroad fever was high, stock was subscribed freely, fifty thousand dollars of which was taken in Plattsburgh alonc.

This the Plattsburgh capitalists did, blindly trusting that Plattsburgh would be the point where the road would strike Lake Champlain, this having been the general under- standing from the first.

This belief had been cunningly fostered by the Eastern capitalists, who were the prime movers in the enterprise from the first, but they took care that, in the railroad bill as passed, no point was designated for the eastern terminus on Lake Champlain.

But they contrived by various devices to make Platts- burgh people believe that this would be the favored point. One of those devices may be explained by a glance at the Ogdensburgh road as constructed. It will be observed, by reference to the map, that there is a most remarkable curve in the track between Churubusco and Mooers Forks, the line first running from the former point nearly southeast several miles, in a straight line towards Plattsburgh, then deflecting slightly to the eastward until it reaches Altona Station, where it makes a sharp angle, first towards the north pole and subsequently taking a " bee-line" to Rouse's Point. Now the distance from this angle at Altona to Plattsburgh is very nearly the same as to Rouse's Point,- lines drawn through these three points making nearly an equilateral triangle. The line of that road represents very accurately the manner in which the Bostonians played it upon the people of Plattsburgh, coming straight towards Cumberland Bay until they got the fifty thousand dollars subscription all secure, when away they whisked to the north again, leaving Plattsburgh out in the cold. But for a long time afterwards they made them believe that the junction would be at " Wright's" at this sharp angle, and when it was finally determined that the junction should be Mooers, the whole matter was transparent enough.

It is supposed that the secret of this action of the East- ern managers was a fear that if the main line came to Platts- burgh, and crosscd from Cumberland Head over Grand Isle to Burlington, a line would be built southward on the east shore of the lake, thus diverting a part of the trade in the direction of New York City, which was the very thing they wished the most to avoid.

Then there was a long strife over the Rouse's Point bridge. The New York Legislature year after year refused to grant the privilege of bridging the lake, the trick of the

INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS.

Yankees having been discovered, which was to drain the West for the benefit of Boston at the expense of New York City. Failing to get the bridge bill passed, the company endcavored to get across the outlet of the lake in the Cana- dian Dominion, but this point was refuscd point-blank by the Canadian parliament. Finally, after long effort and much lobbying, the bridge bill was passed in 1849. Then the road was completed, together with the Plattsburgh and Montreal road, from Mooers Junction, and the Eastern capi- talists began to reap the rich rewards of their strategy, see- ing almost a literal fulfillment of the prophecy of the hero of the great covered railway enterprise, that thousands of tons of freight would flow over the new line daily into Bos- ton. The value of that harvest, which the East has been reaping for the last quarter of a century, New York City can compute to its own cost .*

During all the railroad excitement which extended over this period, the project of building a line of railroad on the west side of Lake Champlain scems to never have been seriously entertained. The reason of this is obvious. Lake Champlain had been a favorite route of travel in the sum- mer seasons of thirty years, during which time steamboats had plied its waters almost daily, and the most casual ob- server could hardly help noticing the high, rocky promon- tories which lined the western shore, cutting off, it would seem, the possibility of constructing a railway line here. The advantages of such a road were doubtless apparent to all who considered the matter ; indeed, we find them very clearly foreshadowed as far back as 1833, when a meeting of delegates from Clinton, Essex, and Washington Counties was held at the Phoenix Hotel, in Whitehall, on the 10th of September, for the purpose of " deliberating upon the propricty of petitioning the Legislature for aid in opening a road (not a railroad) on the western margin of Lake Cham- plain, leading from Whitehall to the Canada line." At that meeting the great necessity of such a road was fully discussed, and the facts duly set forth that the principal thoroughfare between the towns on the St. Lawrence and Hudson Rivers lay through a neighboring State by a cir- cuitous route.

* This company was organized in 1846 at Ogdensburgh. The officers were as follows: George Marsh, president; J. Leslie Russell, Hiram Horton, A. C. Brown, Lawrenco Myers, Charles Paine, S. F. Belknap, Isaac Spaulding, Abhot Lawrence, J. Wiley Emmons, Benjamin Reed, T. P. Chandler, and S. S. Lewis, directors; S. S. Walley was treas- urer and James G. Hopkins secretary.

In 1847 the contract for the construction of that portion cast of Malone was let to S. F. Belknap, and the western portion to Chamber- lain, Worral & Co. Work was hegun in 1848 at Ogdenshurgh, and in the fall of that year it was opened to Centreville, in 1849 to Ellen- burgh, in June, 1850, to Chateaugay, Octobor 1, to Malone, and during the same month was completed. The following shows tho length of road in each town in Clinton and Franklin Counties: Moira, 6.64; Bangor, 6.32; Malone, 8.66; Burke, 4.99; Chateaugay, 5.71; Clin- ton, 9.87; Ellenburgh, 3.92; Chazy, 9.49; Mooers, 9.71; Champlain, 8.23.

The road was roincorporated in 1864, undor the namo of the Ogdons- burgh and Lako Champlain Railroad, and the present stock is what was tho second mortgago bonds. The general offices of tho road wore locatod at Malono until 1870, whon thoy wero romoved to Ogdons- burgh. Tho main shops of tho road are located at Malono, and have a capacity of employing one hundred and fifty men. Tho depot at Malone was completed in 1866, at a cost about thirty thousand dollars, and is one of tho finost railway-stations in the State.

The advantages of the proposed road were fully pre- sented, and it was shown how it would afford a direct route, safe, easy, and expeditious, affording facilities for communi- cation at all seasons of the year, thus proving " highly bene- ficent to the interests of the State, and greatly conducive to the convenience and prosperity of the inhabitants of Lake Champlain." At this mecting it was resolved to petition the Legislature for aid, and a committee was appointed with authority to make a survey of the route. Melancton Whecler was chairman of the meeting, and Richard D. Arthur and D. B. McNeil secretaries.

Then again, six years later, in 1839 we find that the com- mittee on military affairs in Congress was instructed to in- quire into the expediency of constructing a military road from Plattsburgh to Whitehall, and no doubt the great ne- cessity was then urged of a thoroughfare connecting these scctions which were so completely cut off from each other so far as land communication was concerned. But doubt- less both the Congressional and private committee came to the conclusion, after looking the ground over, that the im- practicability of the scheme was too apparent to warrant any outlay here. And well they might. For no less than five ranges of mountains terminated upon this same western shore, in rocky bluffs from one hundred to two thousand feet in height, while near the southern extremity of the lake there was known to be a series of swamp-holes as deep as that Slough of Despond which Bunyan saw in his dream. The most southerly of these ranges is the Black Mountain range, terminating in Mount Defiance, the scattering spurs lying to the southward, the feet of many of the rocky bluffs coming down to the very edge of the shore of the lake.

The second range is known as the Kayaderosseras, the terminations of which lie scattered along the shore north of Ticonderoga and culminating in Bulwagga Mountain, the summit of which overlooks Bulwagga Bay at the height of eleven hundred and fifty fect above its surface, while the foot shuts down in almost perpendicular cliff at the very edge of the shore.

The third range passes through the western part of Schroon through the northern part of Moriah, and centre of Westport, cropping out in a rocky bluff three or four miles long north of Port Henry, and ending in Split Rock Mountain, along the basc of which there is no room even for a deer's trail.

The fourth range extends through the central parts of Minerva and North Hudson, the southeast corner of Kecne and Essex, the northwest part of Elizabethtown and centre of Willsboro', and ending in the high bluffs on Willsboro' Bay. This is sometimes called the Bouquet range, and as it includes some of the lofticst mountains in the Adiron- dacks, so the bluffs on the lake have been found to be the hardest obstacles to a railroad, it being here that the famous Red Rock cut is located, and the longest tunnel on the line.

The fifth range extends through Newcomb, Kcene, Jay, Lewis, and Chesterfield, ending in the rocky promontory known as Trembleau Point, at Port Kent. This is the most northerly, and was formerly known as the Adirondack range, although that name is now applied to the whole five. This last contains the most lofty of the Adirondack peaks, including McIntyre, Colden, Haystack, the Gothics,

HISTORY OF CLINTON AND FRANKLIN COUNTIES, NEW YORK.

and Tahawus, none of which are much less than five thou- sand feet high, while the last reaches some two hundred feet above that altitude.

These five ranges lie nearly parallel, covering a width of about forty miles, although greatly distorted, and at some points interlocking each other. Their general direction is from northeast to southwest, and it will at once be seen that a road across this section of " hog-backs" in a diagonal di- rection, or around the abrupt, water-worn bases at their feet, must be a very expensive one.

It is no wonder, then, with all the railroad agitation of these ten years, when Clinton and Essex Counties were looking in all directions for an outlet, that this route was not much discussed. But yet during all this time the fruit was ripening silently and slowly, but surely.

The Whitehall and Washington Railroad had been com- pleted in 1849, connecting Whiteliall with Albany, and thirteen years before (in 1836) a railroad had been built from St. John's to Montreal. In 1836, when the latter road was opened, the Montreal Gazette published the following table of distances and times, showing what great improve- ments had already been accomplished :

Stations.

Miles.

Hours. 11

New York to Albany.

150

Albany to Whitehall

Whitehall to St. John's

141

St. John's to Montreal

Total

383

273

The Gazette thought that the journey could be further shortened, by improvements that might be introduced, to twenty-four hours. But it conjectures if a road could be built from St. John's to Stanstead, and thence to New Haven, there was a possibility that it might be shortened to twenty hours.

So we see that the question was agitating the public mind forty years ago how to shorten the distance between New York and Montreal.

But the first public intimation of a railroad from White- hall to Plattsburgh which we have been able to find was made in the New York Senate, during the session of 1847, after the purpose of the Northern Railroad Company had been discovered to cross the lake north of Plattsburgh. Mr. Beekman,-the son of the man to whom " Beekman's Pat- ent" on Lake Champlain was granted,-who was then in the Senate, was bitterly opposed to allowing this Northern road to terminate north of Plattsburgh. During that ses- sion he presented a bill for the appointment of a commission to locate the road, and among other remarks, made this most significant one, that if the road was located north of Platts- burgh, in all probability in this case a railroad would be built between Plattsburgh and Whitehall. Whether this was thrown out as a threat we cannot tell, but it was at any rate prophetic, as the lapse of almost thirty years has shown. The terminus of the Northern road was located at Rouse's Point, and during the session of 1849 a bill was passed in- corporating the Whitehall and Plattsburgh Railroad.

And now there was another fever of excitement along the western border of Lake Champlain. On the 25th of June a Whitehall and Plattsburgh railroad meeting was held at the Phoenix Hotel, in Plattsburgh, of which Wm.

Swetland was chairman, and Ahaz Hayes, of Ausable, sec- retary. Remarks were made by Benjamin Ketchum, Col. McNiel, and others, and a committee was appointed to cor- respond with other town committees to the southward. All hope was given up of a bridge across to Grand Isle and Burlington, and all eyes were now turned in the direction of Whitehall.

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History of Clinton and Franklin Counties, New York : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 14

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) 1n; Lewis, J.W., & Co., Philadelphia Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & co. Number of Pages: 922

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) 1n; Lewis, J.W., & Co., Philadelphia
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & co.
Number of Pages: 922