The Midland Pennsylvania Railroad, begun in 1910, with plans to connect Millersburg, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, with Ashland, Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania, turned out to be a colossal failure. In addition to the two terminal points of the railroad, stations were planned in Killinger, Berrysburg, Gratz, Springville, Valley View, Weishample and Mable. Great plans were formulated for the growth of commerce and farming. Much of the hype was presented in a Harrisburg Telegraph article in 1911. That article is transcribed here in several parts, beginning today.
From the article that appeared in the Harrisburg Telegraph, 16 March 1911:
Transformation and Remarkable Development of Lykens Valley Because of Assured Railroad Facilities, Throwing Open to Commerce a Rich and Fertile Territory
Story of a Great Enterprise that Came About Through a Chance Remark; Capital, Brains and Energy United to Push the Project to Successful Completion; Prominent Men Back of the Undertaking
New Line From Millersburg to Ashland Is Being Rushed
TRAINS WILL RUN BY EARLY FALL
Boards of Trade Organized to Help Along Development Plans
MORE INDUSTRIES ALREADY STARTED
Enormous Deposit of Coal and Other Minerals in the Valley
by Robert F. Gorman
This is the story of a chance remark that has led to the building of a railroad and the development of a farming and industrial community, the possibilities of which had lain dormant since the days of the early settlers.
Some four years ago, Harry Smith, President of the Gratz Fair Association and Manager of a baseball team in that town, chatting with Lewis Reed, then proprietor of a hotel at Hegins, observed that better baseball games could be provided for the people of the Lykens Valley, in which both the towns named are situated, if the communities in the valley were connected by railroad.
Smith and Reed then talked the matter over more seriously and agreed between themselves that the time was ripe for a railroad through that portion of Dauphin and Schuylkill counties traversed by the Lykens Valley, which, for the benefit of those who may not be so well acquainted with their local geography as the should be, it may be stated is one of the richest sections of Dauphin County and extending over into Schuylkill County, both from a mineral and agricultural standpoint. It is rich in coal, lumber, clays and graphites and its farmers have in large measure prospered beyond what might be expected of a community absolutely lacking transportation facilities save those afforded by lumbering farm wagons over miles of none too good roads. Since the days of the settlement of the valley the shriek of a locomotive whistle has not been heard between Millersburg and the Dauphin County end of the valley, touched by the Pennsylvania Railroad, and Ashland, at the Schuylkill end, touched by the Reading and Lehigh Valley. Through all that nearly fifty miles of territory are scattered the thriving towns of Killinger, Berrysburg, Gratz, Springville, Valley View, Hegins, Weishample, Mabel and Gordon, most as far removed from the great Eastern marts of trade, all of them struggling along, and as though surrounded by an impregnable wall.
With these conditions deeply impressed upon the minds of the average resident, it did not require much persuasion on the part of Smith and Reed to induce the Odd Fellow and the Patriotic Sons of America to pass a series of regulation pledging themselves to do what they could toward securing a railroad for the valley. N. D. Yoder, of the Hegins Committee on Railroad, met by appointment Walter E. Harrington, of Pottsville, then President of the Pottsville Traction Company, and talked the matter over with him.
Harrington went over the ground carefully and was profoundly impressed with the immediate profitable-ness of a railroad that he immediately decided to interest sufficient capital in the enterprise to insure its success. Smith at one end of the valley and Yoder at the other took up the matter in earnest and though their efforts a meeting of representative citizens was held at Pottsville, which was also attended by a number of well-known Philadelphia capitalists.
Company Decided Upon
At this meeting it was decided to organize the Lykens Valley Construction Company, which would finance the building of a railroad through the Lykens Valley from Millersburg to Ashland. At a later meeting of some capitalists the Midland Pennsylvania Railroad Company was organized.
The residents of the valley are naturally thrifty but the prospects of a railroad running by their homes instilled new life into them and they began to work with renewed vigor, The Lykens Valley Construction Company secured the contract for the building of the railroad and arranged for the physical work to be done by the Pinkerton Construction Company, of Philadelphia, and on 1 October 1910, ground for the new enterprise was broken at Killinger, This occasion was marked by a holiday in the valley and hundreds of people attended the exercises. To Miss Matilda Shadle, of Gratz, is giving the honor of lifting a small section of sod which meant the beginning of a railroad. The honor was accorded the young woman because she secured the most new members of the Board of Trade in the membership campaign. In starting the work, a silver spade was used and this was presented to Miss Shadle on 11 January of this year [1911].
Finley Acker Interested
On 4 July 1910, a meeting of the citizens of the valley was held at Gratz and it was this meeting which resulted in the organizing of the Lykens Valley Board of Trade. Finley Acker, a Philadelphia capitalist and one of the organizers of the railroad company, made a most able address to the large assemblage in which he told of the valuable resources of the valley which had heretofore been undeveloped because of the lack of railroad facilities. He urged the organization of a Board of Trade, so that every man in the Lykens territory between the two ranges of the Blue Ridge Mountains could co-operate and help to make the valley a great commercial center.
At the same meeting the board was organized and by-laws and constitution were adopted. Since that time, quite a number of other Boards of Trade have been organized, known as local boards. Every town and village in the calley now has a Board of Trade, and three of the members of each local board are acvtie members of the Lykens Valley Board, which is now commonly known as the General Board. A meeting of each of the local boards and the General Board is held each month, the former in their respective towns and the latter in some town decided upon at the previous meeting. The General Board recommends improvements to the town in which it meets and the local board executes the recommendations. In this way every person affiliated with the Lykens Valley board of Trade is able to work in a harmonious manner and great things are being accomplished. The orchards, vineyards. manufactories, stock farms and railroad accommodations, all backed by the men who have invested heavily in the railroad, promise to make Lykens Valley like one town within a few years and the kind of baseball of which Smith dreamed has been almost lost sight of in the great developments contemplated, for which the railroad will come new creameries , a new shoe factory, a new printing plant, new lumber operations, new slate and stone quarries, new coal mines, new orchards and the preparation of a large number of model farms for those who are seeking opportunities to hearken to the call of “back to the farm.” And these are not idle dreams of mere possibilities. Already most of these enterprises have passed the formative stage and are business realities. Right at the doors of Harrisburg a manufacturing and agricultural development is so quickly being accomplished that up to the present only an occasional hint has come to the notice of the public that anything out of the ordinary is being done.
Next: Midland Pennsylvania Railroad Company Prospectus, 1911.
__________________________________
New article from Newspapers.com.
Corrections and additional information should be added as comments to this post.