Radio Script #754

Little Talks on Common Things

February 4, 1968

Two weeks ago I told you about the coming to Waterville of its first railroad, the Androscoggin and Kennebec. That Waterville people were prominent in the company is shown by the list of the road’s first officers and directors. The president was Waterville’s then most prominent citizen, Timothy Boutelle. Two other directors were Jediah Morrill and Reuben Dunn. Another was John Ware, who then lived at Athens, but would soon move to Waterville. Still another was a Waterville man who had moved to Bangor, Wyman S.B. Moor, the only Waterville citizen previous to Edmund Muskie to sit in the U.S. Senate.

As we approach the forming of the Maine Central R.R. in 1862, we must consider other lines besides the A & K that eventually merged into the new system. As we said last week, the Portland and Kennebec had been chartered earlier than the A & K. Its purpose was to construct a railroad “through the towns of North Yarmouth, Freeport, Brunswick and Topsham to Gardiner Village, and thence to Hallowell Village and on to Augusta Village on the west side of the Kennebec.”

Another clause in the charter conferred upon the Portland & Kennebec the right “to connect from the City of Portland with any other railroad leading to Boston, in the most direct and feasible manner”. In 1848 a railroad already connected Portland with Bath. The determination was then to continue up the west side of the Kennebec from Brunswick to Augusta, but that was not accomplished until 1852, three years after the A & K. by its back route, reached Waterville.

There was one important difference between the A & K and the P & K railroads. They were of two different gauges. John Poor had built his Atlantic and St. Lawrence on the broad gauge of 5 feet 6 inches; the P & K built the same width as the Portsmouth and Portland, 4 feet 8t inches which a quarter of a century later would become standard gauge for all American railroads except for the tiny narrow-gauge two-footers.

Very early there was talk about railroad connection through Portland to Bangor. The question was, would it be an extension of the wide-gauge A & K from Waterville or the narrower Portland & Kennebec from Augusta. A charter secured in 1845 left the route rather vague. That charter said: “to build a railroad from some point between the south line of Gardiner and the north line of Waterville to the city of Bangor. such railroad to be constructed in the general direction of Bangor on such routes the di rectors shall determine”. Concerning the possible bridging of the Kennebec the charter said: “If any bridge shall be constructed across the Kennebec River south of the north part of Ticonic Bay at Waterville, it shall have no more than one pier and shall have as much height above the water as the present Ticonic Bridge, so as not to interfere with the free navigation of boats and rafts.”

Meanwhile a charter had been secured to build a line from Augusta to Skowhegan, passing through Waterville. That line was named the Somerset and Kennebec. A bitter fight ensued concerning both control and gauge of the road to Bangor. Under the guiding genius of the dynamic John Poor, who already envisioned his gigantic project of the European and North American, to connect Boston with St. John and Halifax, the owners of the A & K won the battle. They actually did it by hectically laying track from Waterville to Kendalls Mills (Fairfield Village), thus preempting the right of way over which any other road to Bangor must travel.

An agreement was reached with the Somerset and Kennebec that the latter could cross the tracks of the A & K between Waterville and Fairfield and extend the narrower S & K road up the Kennebec to Skowhegan and even beyond, provided the S & K would give up all intent to build to Bangor. That agreement opened the way for making the Penobscot and Kennebec. physically but not legally, an extension of the A & K — a railroad 5 feet 6 inches wide. and that was the way it was built through to Bangor in 1855.

All that was not accomplished without bitter controversy, Portland and Bangor interests fought for control of the directorship of the P & K. In the fall of 1852 John Adams of Portland brought suit against Moses Appleton of Bangor for possession of the company records in Appleton’s hands as clerk. Two opposing boards of directors tried to take office. one elected at a meeting in Portland, the other at a meeting held on the same day in Bangor. The suit was tried before four justices of the Maine Supreme Court. Adams’ petition was denied and the Portland election was declared illegal. That enabled the Bangor group, in collusion with the A & K to received bids on October 23, 1852, to lay tracks from Waterville to Kendalls Mills.

When the railroad finally reached Bangor on September 1, 1855, relations between the P & K and the A & K were already so close that operation of the new line was leased to the A & K. In April 1856 authorization was obtained from the legislature for the A & K to absorb the P & K into one system. That was the beginning of mergers that within six years would form the Maine Central R.R.

Since the P & K and the Somerset and Kennebec were not only rivals for travel and freight to Portland, but were of different gauges, their rivalry naturally came to a head where they met at a point between the villages of Waterville and Fairfield called Somerset Junction. At that point took place what became known as the Battle of the Gauges, and the place itself became known as Moor’s Battery, after Wyman S.B. Moor, a leading director of the P & K, who declared he would blast the Some & K to pieces before he would let it control the traffic.

The legislative act of 1856, authorizing consolidation of the A & K and the P & K. contained a passage that became known as the notorious and controversial ninth section. It said: “To any person at any station of either the P & K or the Soma & K applying for passage to Portland or beyond, a ticket shall be sold at the same rate of fare on either railroad and the holder shall have the choice of either route between Somerset Junction and Portland in either direction.”

As no method was provided in the act for determining division of the fare, each company could charge the other full rates between Portland and the Junction.

Since many more passengers came from Bangor and the stations between there and Waterville than came down from Skowhegan, there ensured prolonged controversy. Some of the competition involved schedules. During 1857, by running at very high speed, the A & K trains were able to reach Fairfield from Portland and leave for Bangor before the arrival of the S & K trains from Augusta. Also the A & K maintained a stage liner from Augusta to Belgrade, to make contact with its trains at that place.

In retaliation the Som. & K persuaded the legislature to pass an act in 1858, requiring the train that should arrive first at the junction near Fairfield to wait twenty minutes for the train on the other road. The A & K protested that the new law violated its charter rights. The Railroad Commissioners proceeded to fix schedules as provided by the new law, and they secured a warrant for the arrest of Edwin Noyes, the Waterville man who was Superintendent of the A & K. That road appealed to the court and won its suit when the Maine Supreme Court declared the controversial ninth section illegal and forced its repeal by the next legislature.

It became obvious that the only answer to continued controversy was merger. It began with consolidation of the A & K and the P & K, two corporations that not only had roads of similar gauge, but were already on the most friendly terms. In August, 1862 the directors of the roads, at separate meetings, agreed to merge, consolidating the companies into a new corporation called the Maine Central R.R. Duly organized in October, 1862, the Maine Central issued more than a million dollars of capital stock, share for share, for the stock of the two roads.

That merger did not solve the difficulties that caused continued controversy. It was the narrower gauge line, the Portland and Kennebec, that still had direct connection with the railroad lines to Boston. The cars of the Maine Central were too wide to travel beyond Portland, and passengers for Boston on M.C. trains had to transfer at Portland. That matter of different gauge was a constant cause of irritation.

Thirty-five years of American railroading had not demonstrated the superiority of one gauge over another, although the 4 foot 8t inch gauge had become increasingly popular. Maine railroad interests deemed it essential that a standard gauge should be adopted in this state before more lines were built. Agreement was finally reached to make the 4 foot 8t inch gauge standard for Maine, and in 1870 the old 5 foot 6 inch tracks of the A & K and P & K, that had become the Maine Central were changed to the narrower width. The story of how that change was made between Waterville and Bangor is told in the diary of George Flood of Waterville who had charge of that job for the Maine Central. The Flood diary is now preserved at the Waterville Historical Society.

Unity of operation had become quite as important as unity of gauge. Consolidation of the major Maine railroads was imperative. The first step came in the spring of 1870 when the Maine Central obtained a long lease of the Portland and Kennebec and its auxiliary line, the Soma & K.

In the followng year the Maine Central obtained control of the Androscoggin R.R. to Farmington, and the Belfast & Moosehead Lake R.R. that connected with the M.C. at Burnham. As the years went by the Maine Central took over the European and North American from Bangor to Vanceboro, the Knox and Lincoln from Woolwich to Rockland including operations of the railroad ferry between Woolwich and Bath, the line from Newport to Dover-Foxcroft, the Somerset R.R. from Oakland to Bingham, the Portland and Ogdensburg through the White Mountains to St. Johnsbury, Vt. and the long line through Washington County to Ellsworth and Calais.

It was an exciting time while it lasted, that battle of rates and gauges of proxy deals and stock jugglings, of political lobbying and financial conniving. But its very viciousness and the harm it did all parties concerned resulted in the benefit of a single railroad system for Maine, the all-embracing Maine Central. It is one instance in history that defies the common belief that competition is the life of trade. It was competition that nearly wrecked the progress of Maine’s early railroads, and it was only consolidation that saved them.

Year: 1968