Radio Script #1146

Little Talks on Common Things
January 1, 1978

During its nearly thirty years on the air, this program has given a lot of attention to Maine’s ten narrow gauge railroad lines, all of them long since abandoned. Some attention also has been given to the broad gauge roads, and many a broadcast has mentioned the Maine Central.

Today I want to give you a more systematic account of what came to be Maine’s largest railroad the big Maine Central system. It was chartered as early as 1856, with the possibility of doing some building of a new road, extending four existing lines, but more definitely with a view to consolidating the existing roads into one system. Six years elapsed before the Maine Central was actually organized by the merger of the Androscoggin and Kennebec, south from Waterville to Danville Junction to connect with the already operating Atlantic and St. Lawrence, later called the Grand Trunk, the Penobscot and Kennebec from Waterville to Bangor, and the Kennebec and Portland from Port land to Augusta.

The line from Portland to Bangor using Atlantic and St. Lawrence tracks between Portland and Danville Junction had been built to the wide gauge of 5 feet, 6 inches, while the Kennebec and Portland line to Augusta was 4 feet, 8 1/2 inches, the gauge that later became standard for all American railroads. The origin of standard gauge is an interesting item that I have told earlier, but it will bear repeating. Four feet, eight and a half inches was the length of the axle between wheels of the Roman Chariot. When the Romans occupied Britain in the first century before Christ, they built the solid Roman roads, traces of which remain to this day. The ruts cut by the chariot wheels and other similar width Roman vehicles in those old roads made it convenient for wagon makers of England to build wagons and carriages of the same width so that the wheels would fit easily into the old ruts. How natural, therefore, for British railroads to use the same width, and with controversy, 4 feet, 8-1/2 inches, became, standard for British railroads.

John Poor, promoter of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence, was convinced that a wider gauge was preferable. He was sure it would enable the use of larger freight cars and would enable trains to run more smoothly with less swaying. So his road from Portland to Montreal had a gauge of 5 feet, 6 inches. Since the Androscoggin and Kennebec was built to connect with the Atlantic and St. Lawrence at Danville Junction, it was logically built that same excessively wide gauge. After the building of the Somerset and Kennebec, the same 4 feet 8-1/2 inches gauge as the Kennebec and Portland, the two gauges met at Waterville, and for several years both passengers and freight bound from Augusta to Bangor, or vice versa, had to be transferred at Waterville, both an expense and a nuisance.

One of the early actions of the Maine Central management was to change the wider gauge to a standard 4 feet 8 1/2 inches, thus enabling cars to run between Bangor and Portland either via Lewiston or via Augusta. At the Maine Central’s first annual meeting in 1863, William Goodenow, the president, explained how the company’s operation got started. By terms of the consolidation agreed to a year earlier the company controlled the railroad from Danville Junction to Bangor. Mr. Goodenow said it extended for 110 miles and had 21 stations, three engine houses, three turntables and a repair stop at Watervilie.

By 1870 the Maine Central had also brought under its control the Androscoggin RR from Leeds Junction to Farmington. In 1871 it began to acquire other roads in fairly rapid succession. Among them were the Belfast and Moosehead Lake, the Dexter and Newport, the Portland and Ogdensburg, the Knox and Lincoln, the Portland and Rumford Falls, and largest of all the European and North American. Altogether 37 different Maine railroad companies finally consolidated into the Maine Central system.

Some of these older lines deserve special mention. Personally, I am partial to the Portland and Ogdensburg, which became the Mountain Division of the Maine Central, because that was the first railroad I ever knew except for the little two-foot narrow gauge that connected with it at Bridgton Junction. That railway was organized in 1867 by the brothers John and Samuel Anderson of Portland, but they were unable until 1875 to complete construction, from Portland to the Connecticut River. It was a huge engineering task to build that railroad through Crawford Notch and the White Mountains. Above Bartlett the elevation, in the short distance of 14 miles, increased by 1320 feet, with one steep grade rising 115 feet to the mile. Some of the highest and longest railroad trestles in the east were built to get that railroad through the Notch. The

Mountain Division extended from Portland to St. Johnsbury, Vermont. In 1888 the Maine Central leased it for 999 years, and acquired full ownership as late as 1955. Especially interesting is the story of the European and North American. The idea of a railroad to connect New England with St. John, N.B. was the brainchild of John Poor, the man who built the Atlantic and St. Lawrence, to give the grain lands of the west and other products of the Great Lakes region access to an ice free port on the Atlantic. His great achievement was in having that port located at Portland, not Boston. Poor was convinced that a railroad link between the Maritime Provinces of Canada and the northeast coapt of the U.S. would be highly beneficial. The road would enable shipment of goods from New York and other manufacturing centers to St. John, where they could be loaded on ships for Europe. St. John was so much nearer the European ports than was any port in U.S. that considerable time would be saved on a transatlantic voyage.

Chartered in 1850, the E and NA took 18 years before its first short stretch was opened between Bangor and Olamon. It reached Mattawamkeag the next year and ,got to Vanceboro in 1871. The total distance in Maine was 114 miles. In the same year the Canadian segment from Vanceboro to St John was opened. A celebration of opening was held in Vanceboro, attended by President U.S. Grant and by the Governor General of Canada.,

The Maine Central leased the European and North American as early as 1882, but did not acquire full title until 1955. For some time the Canadian Pacific had held the right to run its train over E and NA tracks between Mattawamkeag and Vanceboro. No longer ago than 1974, the Maine Central sold that section to the Canadian Pacific.

Before the U.S. entered World War I, the E & NA Railroad became involved in international controversy. Canadian troops were being transported over the 56 miles of its Canadian Pacific leased tracks in Maine. That was in violation of U.S. neutrality as proclaimed by President Woodrow Wilson. Germany’s protests went unheeded, and a German army lieutenant in regular uniform, not disguised as a civilian spy, placed a charge of dynamite under the Maine Central bridge at Vanceboro and was about to touch it off when he was apprehended by the Washington County Sheriff.

One part of Maine Central system originated in the enterprise of a vigorous promoter of Maine industry, Hugh Chisholm. So vast, indeed, were his interests in Oxford and Androscoggin Counties, that his domain was called the Chisholm Empire. Chisholm was chief owner of the pulp and paper mill at Rumford and became the first president of the International Paper Co. He was one of few railroad promoters who personally owned his railroad, the Portland and Rumford Falls.

At first, Chisholm envisioned a line that would extend from Portland to Quebec via Rumford and the Rangeley Lakes. Incorporating short lines already constructed south of Rumford, Chisholm did complete the line as far north a Kennebago with most of its traffic centering in the industrial area at Rumford. The big flood of 1936 caused abandonment of the extension between Rumford ,and Kennebago, long after the Maine Central leased the Chisholm line, and the MC bought the remainder in 1946.

Maine’s two eastern-most cities, Calais and Eastport were a long time getting rail service to Bangor. There is something ironical about this, because it was Calais that saw Maine’s first railroad. The Calais Railway Co. had been chartered in 1832 and in 1838 built a two mile long horse railroad between Calais and Milltown. It later got a locomotive. By 1890, when interest was aroused in getting a railroad into Washington County, the little line had been abandoned.

In 1893 was chartered the Washington County Railroad Co., to build a line connecting Calais with Ellsworth, which by that time the Maine Central had already reached. Thus, incredible as it seems, I was six years old before there was any railroad stretching a cross Washington County, for the line was not completed until 1898. Although coming under Maine Central control in 1904, it was separately operated until 1911, when it was absorbed into the larger system.

In 1882, after the Maine Central leased the European and North American, it had total mileage of 470 miles. By 1917 that had expanded to 1358 miles. It is fitting that we close this broaacast with a tribute to the man who started the great era of Maine railroads, the remarkable promoter, John Poor. At the age of 26 in 1834 this fellow, a native of Andover, Maine, and then a young lawyer in Bangor, went to Boston to see the arrival of the first train from Worcester. That led to his plans for a railroad system in Maine, and he started a movement to finance construction of a railroad from Portland to the Canadian border near Island Falls, Vermont, where it would connect with a line built by Canadian interests on to Montreal.

But Poor soon encountered opposition. More than 300 wealthy Boston merchants combined to get the proposed road into Boston, not Portland. A meeting was called to be held in Montreal to cement the Boston agreement with the Canadians. Poor heard of it only a few days in advance, and set out by sleigh for Montreal in the teeth of a fierce New England blizzard on Feb. 4, 1845, arranging for relays of horses every few miles. After a perilous journey, he managed to get through just in time. His eloquence was persuasive, and the Canadians voted for the Portland plan. On July 4, 1846, a huge crowd witnessed the laying of the first rail of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence.

Before he died, John Poor had fostered the Androscoggin and Kennebec to Waterville, and the Penobscot and Kennebec from Waterville to Bangor. The automobile has given all railroads a hard time and no passenger trains now operate on Maine Central lines, but the old railroad still carries a lot of freight.

Year: 1978