Fireland Rails to Trails, who operates the Huron County part of the NCIT, puts out a newsletter 1-3 times per year. On their website (
http://www.firelandsrailstotrails.org) they have an archive of past newsletters and while reading them I found some neat little articles about the history of the rail line. Here they are:
PART 1 OF 5: THE EARLY DAYS OF THE TOLEDO, NORWALK & CLEVELAND RR“We are happy to announce that the contractors upon our Rail-Road, or a part of them, have arrived, with men, horses, carts, and other implements; so that, in a few days, we may expect to see the entire line from Toledo to the Junction (Grafton) in a state of bustle and progress. Go ahead, say we.” - Norwalk Reflector, September 9, 1851. Imagine life in Huron County in 1851. Most have never even seen products of the industrial revolution and for many, the steam locomotive is the first such mechanized device they would see.
“We have to-day for the first time, had a view, from our office window of the “Iron Horse,” as he snorted and pranced along through the town.” Norwalk Reflector, November 18, 1852.
Our TN&C was part of the original east-west transcontinental between New York and Chicago, and though very significant, its completion at Grafton (“The Junction”) was much less heralded than the joining of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific in Promontory, Utah some 16 years later. The line was constructed to serve as a link between Toledo and the Cleveland, Columbus & Cincinnati Railroad at Grafton, hereby giving the TN&C a direct
connection to Cleveland. At the time, rail itself was not even being produced yet in the U.S. and the first rails came from England. Norwalk would soon grow into a hub for the TN&C’s successors and would feature a large car and locomotive shop complex and the line would see regularly scheduled freight and passenger traffic for over a century. After merging with the Junction Railroad, the line would soon become secondary branch line.
In the next issues we’ll take an in-depth look at how the railroad evolved through different companies, hit its zenith, slowly declined and would someday be reborn as a recreational trail and historic treasure for all to enjoy
PART 2 OF 5: THE CLEVELAND AND TOLEDO RAILROADLARGE TRAINS.-The Freight Trains on the C.&T. Railroad, fer a few days past, have been very large. On several occasions we have noticed two locomotives attached to single trains. We would judge from this, that the Freight business of the Road is large, and increasing. We understand that the passenger business of the Road is also good. ...We always feel, when traveling over this Road, that a certain member of the Editorial fraternity will not be sent to “kingdom come” by any mismanagement or negligence. There is no better managed Road in the State - Norwalk Reflector, 1858.
Such was said of the Cleveland and Toledo Railroad, successor to the original builder of the line, the Toledo, Norwalk & Cleveland Railroad. The TN&C was just two years old when they merged with the Junction Railroad in 1853. The Junction Railroad was building west from the west side of Cleveland to Sandusky and completed a bridge across the Sandusky Bay in 1855. This bridge was soon abandoned as the road’s financial condition worsened. After the Civil War a bridge across the Cuyahoga was completed giving the road direct access to Cleveland without relying on the Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Railroad (later the “Big Four Route”) connection at Grafton. The Sandusky Bay bridge was then reopened. The 1853 timetable shows three passenger trains each way through Norwalk with Monroeville and Clyde being important junctions on the line.The map below shows the original line beginning in Grafton and dates to 1859.
In 1866 the C&T connected their Northern and Southern divisions with eight miles of new track between Oberlin and Elyria. The original line to Grafton was abandoned soon after, traces of which can still be seen just east of Parsons Road in Oberlin. Under C&T management, the road built extensive shops in Norwalk which sat just north of the now closed grocery store and east of Home Lumber on Whittlesey Avenue. The Norwalk Shops were capable of building their own 4-4-0 steam locomotives in entirety and employed hundreds of men. The railroad scene was expanding in the late 1800’s and in 1869 the C&T would become part of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern, extending to Buffalo and Chicago
PART 3 OF 5: THE LAKE SHORE & MICHIGAN SOUTHERNAs you jog along the NCIT you may not be aware of the many beautiful sandstone viaducts and culverts beneath your feet. Viaducts like the one at left near Rt 547, were constructed by the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad after they merged our Cleveland and Toledo Railroad in 1869. The newly expanded Lake Shore extended from Buffalo to Chicago with lines to Detroit and Grand Rapids. While Cleveland and Toledo’s original 1852 wood trestles were being supplanted with sandstone by the LS&MS, it was also the beginning of the end for our line as a main line. The parallel LS&MS route through Sandusky was seeing the bulk of the traffic and the new Collinwood Shops east of Cleveland would become the primary shops, thus eliminating the need for duplicate shops in Norwalk.
The Monroeville depot photo at left dates from the final days of the LS&MS. Around 1877 Cornelius Vanderbilt and his New York Central and Hudson River Railroad gained a majority of stock of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway. The line provided an ideal extension of the New York Central main line from Buffalo west to Chicago, along with the route across southern Ontario (Canada Southern Railway and Michigan Central Railroad). In 1914 the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad merged with the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway to form a new New York Central Railroad. Under New York Central control our line would be forever relegated to branch line status and forever known as “The Norwalk Branch”. More on the NYC in the next issue of Trail News.
PART 4 OF 5: THE NEW YORK CENTRAL SYSTEMThe New York Central years were often regarded as the “Golden Era of Railroading”, however, such was not necessarily the case on our beloved Norwalk Branch. The Norwalk Branch reached its zenith about the time the New York Central took control of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern in 1914. The New York Central grew into a massive, four-track mainline New York to Chicago route with lines extending to Boston, Montreal, Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Charleston. Our Norwalk Branch was just that, a branch, and from 1914 on, the line’s importance steadily declined to a local route to serve on-line customers and provide a bypass in the event of a derailment on the main line which ran through Sandusky.
The Central was known for magnificent streamlined Hudson and powerful Niagara steam locomotives, passenger trains like the Twentieth Century Limited, lightning-striped diesels and the first installation of CTC (Centralized Traffic Control) in 1927 in Fostoria, allowing a remote dispatcher to control signals and train movements from afar. Meanwhile, the Norwalk Branch often saw 2-8-2 Mikado type locomotives pulling small local freights, with passenger service on the branch ending in the late 1950’s. Depots closed soon thereafter. Starting in 1954, NYC President Alfred E. Perlman streamlined the Central, shedding excess trackage and fully dieselizing the railroad. In their quest for dieselization, many steam locomotives, some with less than 10 years of service, were sent to the scrappers. Not a single Hudson nor a Niagara was saved for posterity. However, Perlman transformed the Central empire into a lean and profitable machine. All of this would change in 1968 when they merged with arch-rival Pennsylvania Railroad. “To me it was not a merger; it was a takeover, frankly”, said Perlman.
PART 5 OF 5: PENN CENTRALIn the early 1900’s, railroad mergers were typically end-to-end to expand systems. By the 1960’s, railroads, especially in the northeast, were looking to merge to eliminate duplicate lines and facilities. Beset by heavy passenger losses, antiquated work rules, excess WWII trackage still on the tax rolls, and competition from trucks and highways, the trunk lines (the New York to Chicago railroads) sought out merger partners. Erie teamed up with Lackawanna in 1960. C&O took control of B&O and later added Western Maryland. In 1964, N&W added the Nickel Plate, the Wabash, the AC&Y, and the P&WV.
The two giants, New York Central (NYC) and the Pennsylvania (PRR) suddenly found themselves unattached and decided to merge in 1968 to form the sixth largest corporation in the world: Penn Central. It began profitable but would soon become a disaster. Little thought had been given to the actual merging of operations. PRR was an archaic railroad with miles of excess unneeded trackage and ancient operating methods. NYC was a lean, streamlined machine. NYC’s “Green Team” and PRR’s “Red Team” (named for their boxcar colors ) didn’t have a plan to integrate operations. The Green Team saw the merger as a takeover and soon left for other jobs. PC’s Chairman, PRR’s Stuart Saunders, and PC’s President, NYC’s Alfred Perlman, maintained separate offices in Philadelphia and New York, respectively, and rarely spoke. Shipments, freight cars, and entire trains became lost for days as the early computer systems didn’t mesh. Accounting was an intricate web of lies and the road’s system map was a bowl of spaghetti.
By 1970, the PC was bankrupt and most maintenance was deferred. Weeds choked busy mainlines, tracks washed out, and derailments were common. By 1976, Congress created Conrail which consolidated PC with other bankrupt railroads in the northeast. The Norwalk Branch had a severe washout near North West Street and was not to be included in Conrail. It was abandoned on March 31, 1976 by Penn Central and the property was sold off. Railroads had hit an all time low but would come bounding back as you will see in the next issue. The many branch lines that didn’t survive have given us plenty of trails!
