The Catawissa Railroad was a railroad that operated in

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...

between 1860 and 1953. For most of its lifespan it was leased by the

Reading Company The Reading Company ( ) was a Philadelphia-headquartered railroad that provided passenger and freight transport in eastern Pennsylvania and neighboring states from 1924 until its acquisition by Conrail in 1976. Commonly called the Reading Railro ...

, and was subsequently merged into the Reading.

History

The original company was chartered as the Little Schuylkill and Susquehanna Railroad in 1831. It planned to build a rail line between

Tamanend Tamanend ("the Affable"; ), historically also known as Taminent, Tammany, Saint Tammany or King Tammany, was the Chief of Chiefs and Chief of the Turtle Clan of the Lenni-Lenape nation in the Delaware Valley signing the founding peace treaty w ...

(also called Little Schuylkill Junction; west of Tamaqua) and Milton. The principals in the company included Christian Brobst and Joseph Paxton of Catawissa. Construction began c. 1835, but the banking

panic of 1837 The Panic of 1837 was a financial crisis in the United States that began a major depression (economics), depression which lasted until the mid-1840s. Profits, prices, and wages dropped, westward expansion was stalled, unemployment rose, and pes ...

restricted investments needed to continue work on the railroad. In 1849 the company reorganized, to attract new investors, and became the Catawissa, Williamsport and Erie Railroad (CW&E). In the early 1850s construction resumed, and in 1854 the railroad reached Milton, where it connected with the Sunbury and Erie Railroad (renamed the Philadelphia and Erie in 1861). At Tamanend the railroad connected with the Little Schuylkill Navigation Railroad, which ran along the

Little Schuylkill River The Little Schuylkill River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed April 1, 2011 tributary of the Schuylkill River in Northeastern Pennsylvania. It rises south of McAdoo H ...

to Tamaqua and Port Clinton, where it connected to the Reading Company. CW&E

passenger train A passenger train is a train used to transport people along a railroad line, as opposed to a freight train that carries goods. These trains may consist of unpowered passenger railroad cars (also known as coaches or carriages) push-pull train, ...

operations between Catawissa and Tamaqua began in July 1854. A bridge across the

Susquehanna River The Susquehanna River ( ; Unami language, Lenape: ) is a major river located in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, crossing three lower Northeastern United States, Northeast states (New York, Pennsylvani ...

to Rupert was completed in 1855. The route traversed some difficult terrain, and included three tunnels, and eight bridges and trestles. Express train service from

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

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and

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began on 7 May 1855, using the CW&E, as well as the Reading and Little Schuylkill Navigation lines. The CW&E went bankrupt in 1859, and reorganized as the Catawissa Railroad (CRR) in 1860. In 1865 the Western Central Railroad and the

Atlantic and Great Western Railroad The Atlantic and Great Western Railroad began as three separate railroads: the Erie and New York City Railroad based in Jamestown, New York; the Meadville Railroad based in Meadville, Pennsylvania (renamed A&GW in April 1858); and the Franklin ...

attempted to lease the Catawissa RR. The leases were challenged by the Philadelphia & Erie in litigation, and eventually they were upheld by the

Pennsylvania Supreme Court The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Unified Judicial System. It began in 1684 as the Provincial Court, and casual references to it as the "Supreme Court" of Pennsylvania were made offici ...

. However, the A&GW declared bankruptcy in 1867, and the CRR then proceeded to operate the line by itself. As of 1868 the company owned 21

locomotives A locomotive is a rail vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. Traditionally, locomotives pulled trains from the front. However, push–pull operation has become common, and in the pursuit for longer and heavier freight train ...

and 269

cars A car, or an automobile, is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of cars state that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people rather than cargo. There are around one billio ...

. The company built an engine house and machine shop in Catawissa, on land donated by the town, in 1861. Other support buildings were added to the 12-acre site through 1901. A

passenger station A train station, railroad station, or railway station is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight, or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track, and a station building providing such ...

was erected in 1878. In 1871 the Catawissa Railroad extended its main line from Milton to Williamsport. The Reading Company leased the Catawissa lines in 1872. In 1893 the CRR lines were consolidated with the Reading's Shamokin Branch. The CRR was formally merged with the Reading Company in 1953. The Reading abandoned various sections of the Catawissa Branch later in the 1950s, through the 1960s. In 1976 the Reading was acquired by

Conrail Conrail , formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do busine ...

, which abandoned the remaining portions of the Catawissa Branch.

Bridges

The railroad's bridge over Dark Run was high and long. The bridge at Mainville, the only one in Columbia County, was high and long.

References

{{commons category, Catawissa Railroad Defunct Pennsylvania railroads Predecessors of the Reading Company Railway companies established in 1860 Railway companies disestablished in 1953

History

Bridges

See also

References