Railroad history

Overview

This page is intended to gather research on the early history of the railroads in Greer. All content added should be sourced or cited.

Greer’s Station

• Columbia Daily Phoenix, Saturday, September 27, 1873 [1]
  • Air-Line Railroad notice posted that a schedule change would take place the next day, Sunday Sept. 28, 1873
  • This change would have a passenger train leaving Charlotte at 8:36 pm to arrive in Atlanta at 12:48 the next day; a return train would leave Atlanta at 5:30pm to arrive at Charlotte at 7:39am.
  • The trains would pass each other at “Greer’s station” [note the lower-case “s” — this was apparently not thought of as the proper noun of a town, yet, understandable as the station had not even completed construction yet]
  • There would also be one mixed “accommodation and freight” train leaving Charlotte at 4:51am to arrive in Atlanta at 6:46 (the return was not listed).
  • This is the first recorded trip of a train across Greer tracks: late Sunday night, September 28, 1873.

Southern Railway (and predecessors)

Air Line Railroad Company of South Carolina

• Federal Decisions, Cases Argued and Determined in the Supreme Court, 1885, page 96: [2]
• The Georgia legislature on March 5, 1856 authorized the Georgia Air Line Railroad Company to build a railroad from Atlanta to the SC state line in the direction of the Anderson, SC courthouse.
• The Air Line Railroad was created by an act of the South Carolina General Assembly December 20, 1856, to connect the Georgia line to the Anderson, SC courthouse and then continue on to "some point of connection with the Charlotte and South Carolina Railroad, in the direction of Charlotte, North Carolina."
• [Commentary: it appears that the Civil War halted progress on both. We've heard that no track was laid by either company.]
• The North Carolina legislature on August 3, 1868 authorized the Air Line Company in South Carolina to extend up to Charlotte.
• Also in 1868, simultaneously the Georgia and South Carolina legislatures worked to authorize each railroad to merge with other railroads; Georgia approved on September 7, and South Carolina approved on September 18.
• On June 20, 1870, the two railroads officially merged into one corporation, the Atlanta & Richmond Air Line Railway Company.
• The controlling party in the merger was the Richmond and Danville Railroad, according to: Cox, Jim. Rails across Dixie: A History of Passenger Trains in the American South. Mcfarland, 2016.

Atlanta & Richmond Air-Line Railway

• https://www.carolana.com/NC/Transportation/railroads/nc_rrs_atlanta_richmond_air_line.html
  • Acronym: A&RAL
  • Chartered 1870, line operational 1873, service ended 1874 (see below)
  • Started: Atlanta; ended: Richmond
  • The Atlanta & Richmond Air Line Railway was organized in North Carolina in 1870, combining the Georgia Air Line Railroad Company and the Air Line Railroad Company of South Carolina [3]. It was controlled by the Richmond and Danville Railroad. The R&D planned to build a line from Charlotte, NC to Atlanta, GA but could not do so under its own name due to limitations in its charter.
    • + 1870 the merger of the Air Line Railroad of South Carolina and the Georgia Air Line Railroad (GA company).
  • The first 53 miles out of Atlanta were finished by 1871. In 1872, the R&D extended its credit to guarantee the last stages of construction.
  • By April 9, 1872, 12 miles were operational between Charlotte and the Catawba River.
  • The first passenger train went from Charlotte to Spartanburg on March 31, 1873.
  • The entire line was completed in September of 1873.
  • The first recorded trip of a train across Greer tracks: late Sunday night, September 28, 1873.
  • The A&R ran ads for the “Piedmont Route” from Charlotte to New Orleans in the Charlotte Observer starting Dec. 11, 1873. It advertised 6 hours quicker to Atlanta than any other route.
  • The company entered receivership in November of 1874 and was sold under foreclosure in December of 1876. The new bondholders reorganized the line as the Atlanta and Charlotte Air Line Railway [4] in February of 1877.
    • + 1877 reorganized as Atlanta & Charlotte Air Line Railway. Still owned by Richmond & Danville Railroad.
    • *1874 bankrupt.

Atlanta & Charlotte Air-Line Railway

• The A&R was reorganized in 1877 as the Atlanta & Charlotte Air Line Railway.
• On the 26th of March, 1881, the road was leased to the Richmond & Danville Railroad Company for 99 years from April 1, 1881, at a rental of $462,500 annually.
• On June 18, 1894, the R&D was sold in foreclosure; all of its properties, including the A&C, were conveyed to the new Southern Railway.

Richmond and Danville Railroad

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richmond_and_Danville_Railroad
  • “Greer’s” and “Greers” appears on multiple R&D maps in the late 1800s. See: https://www.loc.gov/resource/g3706p.rr005450/
  • 60% of stock purchased by the Southern Railway Security Company in 1871.
  • In 1880, control of the R&D was acquired by William P. Clyde and interests that controlled the Richmond, York River and Chesapeake Rail Road Company.
  • In or about 1886, the Richmond and West Point Terminal Railway and Warehouse Company acquired a majority of R&D Company stock.
  • Piedmont Air-Line was a set of passenger routes in the Richmond and Danville Railroad. According to a Sept. 1885 timetable in the Stanford archive, these routes passed through but did not stop in Greer.
  • In 1882, the R&D, along with the North Carolina Railroad, Northwestern North Carolina Railroad, Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad, Atlanta and Charlotte Air-Line Railway and the Columbia and Greenville Railroad lines were being operated as the Piedmont Air-Line System advertised as the shortest line between New York, New Orleans and Texas.

Richmond & Danville  >>>  Southern Railway System (1894-1982)

On June 18, 1894, the R&D was sold in foreclosure. Its property was surrendered to Southern Railway Company for operation on July 1, 1894, even though the deeds of conveyance were not completed and filed until later. Reorganized by J.P. Morgan and his New York banking firm of Drexel, Morgan and Company, the R&D was merged with five other railroads to form the new Southern Railway.

The R&D property was formally conveyed to Southern Railway Company by deeds dated January 9, 1896, and August 30, 1897. The Southern Railway Company, incorporated in Virginia on the same date, June 18, 1894, controlled over 4,000 miles (6,400 km) of line at its inception. Samuel Spencer became Southern's first president.

Norfolk Southern (1982-present)

Norfolk Southern Corporation, a holding corporation, acquired control of Norfolk and Western Railway Company and Southern Railway Company and their affiliates and subsidiaries on June 1, 1982, after approval by the Interstate Commerce Commission. Effective December 31, 1990, Southern Railway Company changed its name to Norfolk Southern Railway Company.

Piedmont & Northern Railway

https://www.carolana.com/NC/Transportation/railroads/nc_rrs_piedmont_northern.html

• reporting mark PN
• the Anderson Traction Company, created on June 22, 1904, to build and operate within the city of Anderson. Eventually the railroad expanded to complete construction of an extension to Belton by 1910. The railroad was acquired by James B. Duke of Duke Power around the same time.
• The North Carolina division of the P&N started with the Piedmont Traction Company, also owned by Duke, and completed its route between Charlotte and Gastonia, North Carolina on July 3, 1912.
• Both sections were electrified to 1,500 volts DC with power supplied from mainly hydroelectric sources. Additionally both segments were built to steam road standards with minimal street running.
• On March 20, 1909, the Greenville, Spartanburg and Anderson Railway was chartered and presided over by Duke. The company used the Anderson Traction Company rails terminating at Belton as a starting point for northward construction to Greenville and construction toward Greenwood to the south, with both cities connected in November 1912. An extension from Greenville to Spartanburg was completed in April 1914.
• Constructed in 1913, Charles Christian Hook of Charlotte, North Carolina, designed the Greer depot as a combination passenger station and freight warehouse for the Piedmont & Northern Railway, later used by the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, Seaboard System Railroad and finally CSX Transportation, before facing potential demolition in 1984.
• The Piedmont & Northern was created in 1914 to consolidate both the Greenville, Spartanburg & Anderson in South Carolina and the Piedmont Traction Company in North Carolina.
• On numerous occasions the company sought to link the two disconnected segments and expand to Durham, North Carolina, however, the plans never materialized due to stiff resistance from the Southern Railway, which the P&N paralleled in both states.
• At mile 18.3 in Greer, the P&N had an interchange with the Southern Railway.
• The P&N, though involved in extensive passenger operations, was primarily a heavy freight carrier. The most important commodity transported was coal and coke, but also of significance were cotton (including cotton waste) and paper.
• Initially the railroad was electrified at 1500 volts DC; however, much of the electrification was abandoned when dieselisation was completed in 1954.
• Unlike similar interurban systems the Piedmont & Northern survived the Great Depression and was later absorbed into the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad in 1969.
• The Greer depot became an SCL station, marked as such with signage.
• Through subsequent mergers, became the CSX Transportation of today in 1986.
• https://www.goupstate.com/article/NC/20060118/News/605185974/SJ
  • The P & N, developed by James B. Duke between 1910 and 1916, was a bridge between the Clinchfield in Spartanburg and the Seaboard Air Line in Greenville.
  • Coming to Greer in 1913, the P & N was primarily a freight road hauling coal, cotton and other agricultural products. At its peak in the 1920s, the road served approximately 135 cotton mills, establishing the oft used saying, “A mill to the mile.”
  • The 1930s saw the P & N weathering the financial storms rather well. However, the automobile, which P & N helped deliver to the Upstate, brought reduced ridership. Service on the Belmont, N.C, and Anderson branches was dropped, but the state of South Carolina mandated that a minimum number of passenger trains be operated.
  • The P & N slashed passenger fares from 3 cents a mile to 1 cent a mile. Ridership increased 10-fold and the road found itself purchasing used equipment from the Pennsylvania and Long Island Railroads to keep up with the demand.
  • World War II gasoline rationing and military equipment movements bolstered revenues and the Piedmont and Northern became an important player in the American railroads’ role in the Allied cause.
  • Passenger service ceased in 1951; the directors of the company saw the forthcoming railroad merger movement. Talks began with the Seaboard Air Line in the early 1960s but were delayed pending that road’s merger with the Atlantic Coast Line.
  • In 1968 the ICC allowed the Piedmont and Northern to merge into the newly created Seaboard Coast Line. The last P & N train operated in 1968 and from then on, the seven-mile Taylors-to-east-Greer trackage saw Seaboard Coast Line, Seaboard System and eventually CSX Transportation hauling mostly coal over the right of way that was opened in 1913.

• https://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/news/local/greer/2020/01/10/greer-sc-landmark-set-1-million-redevelopment-restoration-project-event-venue-meeting-space/4418307002/
  • The depot was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.
  • According to the register,  the depot was designed by Charles Christian Hook of Charlotte, North Carolina, and was constructed 1913 to serve as a combination passenger station and freight warehouse for the Piedmont and Northern Railway.
  • From the time the depot was built through 1983, the depot served the railroad, with the upstairs serving as City Hall and Council Chambers from 1913 to about 1937, and as storage for city records until the 1950s, according to Hawkins.
  • The depot then fell into vacancy and disrepair. Seaboard wanted to raze the structure, according to Hawkins. Instead, the Greenville County Redevelopment Authority purchased the building from Seaboard on behalf of the city of Greer. Station One Partnership purchased the building from GCRA in 1986 and redeveloped it into a subdivided retail/commercial space. Hawkins and his wife, Cheryl, are the owners of Letchworth Properties LLC. Their company purchased the depot in 2017.
  • Last surviving railroad depot of the five original two-story depots built for the Piedmont and Northern Railway.

Miscellaneous

• Southern Express Company (not yet researched)

• Southern Railway Security Company: March 22, 1871-1881
  • Note: I don’t know if SRSC was involved in the Greer railroad story or not.
    • https://www.jstor.org/stable/23515196 and full text at: https://digital.ncdcr.gov/digital/collection/p16062coll9/id/4174/
      • Pennsylvania corporation which purchased and held securities of a large number of Southern railroads in the 1870s.
      • “The object and purpose of this organization is to secure the control of such Southern rail-roads as may be essential to the formation of through lines between New-York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington City, and the principal cities of the South, by ownership of the capital stock of said companies, by leases, and by contract relations.”
      • Instrumental in developing the North/South railroad infrastructure which remains today.
      • In the South the Southern Railway Security Company was commonly referred to as “Tom Scott,” after prominent official (and president, after 1874) Thomas A. Scott.
      • The Railroad Gazette of January 20, 1872, referred to the company as “a corporation whose headquarters are in Pittsburgh, which is going about the South seeking what (in the way of rail-roads) it may devour, acting apparently for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company in that section as the ‘Pennsylvania Company’ does in the West.”
      • Prior to 1873 panic: building the system of railroads. After: liquidation.
      • A pure holding company, taking no part in railroad operations (and one of the very first railroad holding companies, long before that became common and 30 years before the famous Northern Securities Company).
      • Evidence of noteworthy transition of Northern investment in antebellum railroads.

Passenger traffic

• “One Cent a Mile Rate:

At the meeting of the Southern Passenger Association held at Charleston on Tuesday the petition of the State fair committee requesting special rates over various lines received careful and considerate attention. After a little discussion it was decided to grant the rates asked for by the committee, which, it was understood, are about two cents a mile for the round trip for a radius of 250 miles.”

• The News and Herald (Winnsboro, S.C.), August 22, 1895

Depot agent Tom Hill shot

• Condition of Agent Hill:
• Spartanburg Journal, Thursday: The latest reports from T. M. Hill, depot agent at Greers, are that he will recover from the wounds inflicted by a would-be robber at the Greer's depot on Tuesday night of last week. It is reported from Greers today that he is much better and that his condition is hopeful. There has been much interest in his case and people generally are rejoiced at any good news. The people of Wellford, the former home of Mr. Hill, have shown the keenest and most practical interest in his case.”
• Yorkville enquirer (Yorkville, S.C.), October 26, 1901 “As is usually the case, Tom Hill don't look like a hero. He is one of those small, wiry men whose worth is never known until a great test comes, one of the prosaic looking giants of romance.”
• The Manning Times (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.), November 6, 1901