BEAVER MEADOW
RAILROAD AND COAL COMPANY
Excerpt,
pp 400-403
The Beaver Meadow Railroad And
Coal Company was incorporated April 7th, 1830.
At this time the Hon. S. D. Ingham was President, and John Ecky Secretary. With
the early history of this enterprise the writer of this was but little acquainted,
but has been informed that Canvas White, father of C. S. White, was first
employed as chief engineer of the road, under whom A. Pardee, Esq., the present
large coal landholder and operator, was engaged as an assistant. Mr. White's
connection with the Company was of short duration, and he was succeeded by a Mr.
Hopkins, who remained with the Company in the capacity of chief engineer for
about one year, when he gave way to Mr. Pardee, who had previously been engaged
in making surveys and locating the road, and under whom it was finally located,
graded, and completed. The writer has been told that at one time, while the
road was being graded, a difficulty grew up between this Company and the Lehigh
Coal and Navigation Company, about the location of the road, and that Mr.
Ingham, the President of the Beaver Meadow Company, and Mr. Josiah White, the
President of the Lehigh Company, went so far as to arm their men with muskets,
and that at one time it was feared that they would have a. regular battle. The
matter was, however, peaceably arranged. The location and grade of the road changed
at a cost, to the Beaver Meadow Company, of many thousand dollars. The road was
finally opened for the transportation of coal in the autumn of 1836, when two locomotives,
the ÒS. D. Ingham" and ÒElias Ely," were put on the road, which at
that time extended from the mines of the Beaver Meadow Railroad and Coal
Company to Parryville, a distance of twenty-five miles, In April 1837, another locomotive
engine was added, namely, the ÒQuakake," and in August of the same year
all additional one called the" Beaver." The shops of the Company for
repairing locomotives, cars, mine machinery, &c., were originally located at Beaver Meadow (a
very handsomely located town along the Lehigh and Susquehanna Turnpike, about
one mile and a half from the Beaver Meadow mines, and four miles from the
present town of Hazleton. The elevation of this town, Beaver Meadow, above
tide-water is sixteen hundred feet, as ascertained by actual measurement), but,
owing to reasons which were deemed of sufficient importance to justify their
removal, they were, some time in the summer of 1839, removed to Weatherly, a
distance of some five miles down the road, where they have continued.
The disastrous flood of January, 1841,
carried away all the bridges on this road from Weatherly to Parryville, when it
was decided by the Company to temporarily abandon that part of their road from
Macch Chunk to Parryville, and to erect suitable facilities at Mauch Chunk for
the shipment of coal. It may be added, that what was then considered suitable
facilities for the shipping of coal in good order, would not now be considered good
enough to clean coal for the use of a locomotive, or a blacksmith shop fire;
all the bridges on the Quakake Creek, five or six in number, had to be rebuilt,
and a very important one across the Lehigh River, at the Turnhole, together
with a quantity of trestling at Mauch Chunk (or rather at Lousy Bay, on the opposite side of the Lehigh from Mauch Chunk, as
it was then called), for the shipping accommodations.) Mr. A. H. Vancleave, who
was then Superintendent for the Company, with an energy which will ever be remembered
by those who witnessed it, proceeded to rebuild what the flood had destroyed.
Giving his attention particularly to the rebuilding of the Turnhole bridge.
This bridge was designed by F. C. Louthorp, and was a single span of 200 feet,
arch and truss. The abutment on the north side of this bridge is unexampled as a
piece of substantial masonry anywhere in this region, and the superstructure, after
a trial of 18 years, yet stands to attest its superior workmanship and material
of which it was constructed.
Some time in the month of August,
1841, the shipment of coal was resumed over this road. About this time, or
before, Mr. Ingham was succeeded in the Presidency by a Mr. Budd; Mr. Pearsall
followed Mr. Budd, and in turn was followed by Mr. Dulless, and he by Mr.
Rowland, and finally, in 1849, W. W. Longstreth, Esq., the present efficient
presiding officer was instituted; upon his accession to the Presidency, it was
directly determined to relay the road (which had previously been a light wooden
rail with flat bar iron), with heavy T iron. This wise determination was
promptly carried out during the winter of 1849 and spring of 1850, and
completed in May or June of that year. In September of this year occurred
another remarkable flood, carrying away all the bridges on the Black Creek and
Quakake, destroying the car shops, &c. &c., at Weatherly, and sweeping
away nearly one-half of the superstructure, and a large portion of the
permanent way of the road between Weatherly and Penn Haven, which was at that
time a double track, one wood and one iron. The repairs consequent upon this
disastrous freshet were not completed in time to resume shipments by canal in
1850, but the road was ready to commence with the opening of the navigation in
the spring of 1851. The great loss sustained by the Company by the freshet
spoken of in the carrying away of so many bridges, and so much of the road bed,
together with the loss of almost the entire shipping season, was like a wet
blanket thrown around the stockholders of the Company, and, but for the
confidence reposed in their first officer, it is doubtful whether the
stockholders could again have been induced to furnish the necessary amount to
repair the very heavy damages thus sustained.
From this time until the present
day, no serious interruption to the trade has occurred. In 1854, it was decided
to avoid the two inclined planes with which the road had formerly been worked.
Accordingly, a piece of road, extending from Weatherly in the direction of
Hazleton, one mile and three-quarters in length, was purchased of the Hazleton
Coal Company, and the continuation of this piece of road to its point of
junction with the Beaver Meadow road, was graded in 1854 and 1855, the track
was laid early in the latter year, and on the 14th of August the planes were
finally abandoned. The grade above Weatherly is 145 feet per mile for a
distance of one mile and three-quarters, and 135 feet per mile for a distance
of some 4000 feet further. In the meantime, the road along the Lehigh, from
Mauch Chunk to Penn Haven, a second track had been graded and laid at a very
heavy cost to the Company, and some time in the month of July or August, 1857,
the old Turnhole bridge, before spoken of, was abandoned, to avoid two very
heavy curves (the hardest ones on the road), and a new iron double-track
bridge, with a very heavy rock cut, at the
north end of the bridge was erected by John W. Murphy, Esq., of Philadelphia.
The business of the road has been
gradually increasing years after year, so that from being the means of getting
a small quantity of caol to the market for the Beaver Meadow Company in 1837,
it has become an outlet for numerous operations, amounting in the aggregate to not less than 700,000 tons
of coal in 1859.
How the stock of this company has
appreciated one can see by referring to a Philadelphia price current, when it
is still found to stand higher than any other security of a like kind in the
State of Pennsylvania.
In connection with the statement
That ÒS. D. Ingham was President, and John Ecky Secretary,Ó it should have been
added that Capt. George Jenkins was Superintendent of Transportation, and
Colonel William Lilly Shipping Clerk; Morris Hall, Treasurer; James D. Gallop
(well known on the Upper Lehigh), Road Master.
Hopkin Thomas, now boss machinist
at Catasauqua, was master mechanic. It is the impression of the writer that the
locomotive ÒBeaverÓ was one of the first four-wheel connected engines built in
the State. In the years 1838 and 1839, Hopkin Thomas built, at the shops of the
Company at Beaver Meadows, a six-wheeled connected engine, the first of the
kind constructed in the country. This locomotive, the ÒNonpareilÓ, was supposed
to be at the time what her name implied, and those living along the line of
this road, who can look back at her as she appeared twenty years ago, and then at
some of the locomotives now in use, can well note the contrast.
Following the notice of Mr. W. W.
LongstrethÕs connection with the Beaver Meadow Company, as President, we should
have mentioned that A. G. Brodhead, Jr., was soon after appointed Superintendent,
the duties of which position he has continued to discharge for nearly ten
years, with credit to himself and entire satisfaction to the Company.
On the 25th of August, 1858, the
Quakake Railroad, connecting the Beaver Meadow with the Catawissa, Williamsport,
and Erie Railroad, was completed. This road is thirteen miles in length,
passing through a very beautiful valley, and is stocked and run by the
Catawissa, Williamsport, and Erie Railroad Company. The business of this road
has been gradually increasing, and when the coal basin near the western
terminus, called the Taumen End, shall be opened, it will largely increase the
business of this road, and be a very considerable auxiliary to the Beaver
Meadow and Lehigh Valley roads. This road connects with the Beaver Meadow one
mile and a quarter below the town of Weatherly, and with the Catawissa three
miles south of the Summit Station on that road.
At the point where this road
connects with the Catawissa a road has been located, and considerable work done
on it, leading Into the great Mahanoy coal field, which coal can be reached by
four or five miles of road, not very expensive to make, which, if pushed
forward and completed, would open up this vast coal field several years sooner
than it can be by a projected road from Tamaqua to this basin.
The work on the road leading from the Junction of the Quakake
with the Catwissa into the Mahanoy has been abandoned for the present, but it is
believed it will be resumed in the spring of 1860, and pushed forward to
completion. This would throw a large trade over the Beaver Meadow, Lehigh
Valley, the New Jersey Central, North Pennsylvania, and Belvidere Delaware
railroads, and bring this coal into the New York market at lower rates than
coal from many points in the Schuylkill region can be furnished.
The following table will show the amount of coal carried
over the road since its completion :
1837 33,617
tons 1849 324,048
tons
1838 54,647 Ò 1850(flood) 155,403 Ò
1839 79,971 Ò 1851 383,748 Ò
1840 123,325 Ò 1852 243,112 Ò
1841
(flood) 64,641 Ò 1853 278,939 Ò
1842 108,171 Ò 1853 367,093 Ò
1843 125,456 Ò 1855 438,092 Ò
1844 143,363 Ó 1856 552,111 Ò
1845 149,000 Ò 1857 618,793 Ò
1846 194,380 Ò 1858 628,227 Ò
1847 247,500 Ò 1859 746,313 Ò
1848 266,188 Ò
About
The Hopkin Thomas Project
Rev. April 2010