The Deepwater Railway was an intrastate short line railroad located in

West Virginia West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the ...

in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

which operated from 1898 to 1907.

William N. Page William Nelson Page (January 6, 1854 – March 7, 1932) was an American civil engineer and industrialist. He was active in the Virginias following the U.S. Civil War. Page was widely known as a metallurgy, metallurgical expert by other indust ...

, a

civil engineer A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing i ...

and

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values t ...

, had begun a small logging railroad in Fayette County in 1896, sometimes called the Loup Creek and Deepwater Railway. It extended from an interchange at Deepwater with the

Chesapeake and Ohio Railway The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway was a Class I railroad formed in 1869 in Virginia from several smaller Virginia railroads begun in the 19th century. Led by industrialist Collis P. Huntington, it reached from Virginia's capital city of Richmond ...

(C&O) on the south bank of the navigable

Kanawha River The Kanawha River ( ) is a tributary of the Ohio River, approximately 97 mi (156 km) long, in the U.S. state of West Virginia. The largest inland waterway in West Virginia, its valley has been a significant industrial region of the st ...

up a steep grade into the mountainous terrain southward, following the winding Loup Creek to reach a sawmill at Robson which was owned by the Loup Creek Estate. It was operated by the C&O under a verbal agreement. In 1898, the Deepwater Railway was incorporated, and an extension was planned to reach nearby coal deposits at Page. In 1902, assisted by silent partner,

millionaire A millionaire is an individual whose net worth or wealth is equal to or exceeds one million units of currency. Depending on the currency, a certain level of prestige is associated with being a millionaire. In countries that use the short s ...

industrialist A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...

Henry H. Rogers of

Standard Oil Standard Oil Company, Inc., was an American oil production, transportation, refining, and marketing company that operated from 1870 to 1911. At its height, Standard Oil was the largest petroleum company in the world, and its success made its co- ...

fame, Page expanded his plans, first to extend further in West Virginia to Matoaka. In 1907, the Deepwater Railway was acquired by its sister Tidewater Railway to form the

Virginian Railway The Virginian Railway was a Class I railroad located in Virginia and West Virginia in the United States. The VGN was created to transport high quality "smokeless" bituminous coal from southern West Virginia to port at Hampton Roads. History ...

Reference

{{DEFAULTSORT:Deepwater Railway Defunct West Virginia railroads Predecessors of the Virginian Railway Railway companies established in 1898 Railway companies disestablished in 1907

See also

Reference