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A Rare Map Promoting the Construction of an Important Early Railroad Line
Fine large map of the proposed route of the Erie & New York Railroad across the southern part of New York, extending from New York City and Western Long Island to Lake Erie, printed by Canmeyer & Clarke in New York City and engraved by D.B. Harrison.
This remarkable map was almost certainly separately issued, and prepared for the benefit of investors considering an investment in the railroad. It may have been published concurrently with the Report of the Special Committee of Both Boards, in respect of the New-York and Erie Rail Road in February of 1835, which was to be accompanied by a separately published map printed in 100 copies, but the only reference to this work does not give a title for the map.
The map shows the earliest surveyed route of the railroad, pre-dating the decision by the Chief Engineer, Benjamin Wright, to run 2 portions of the line through parts of Pennsylvania (near Port Jervis and west of Oswego, near the Susquehannah River), which would prove controversial and result in a $10,000 per year payment to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Benjamin Wright, who made the survey for the Erie Canal, was entrusted with the survey for the Railroad. The survey was conducted from May, 1833, to January, 1834. Engineer Wright began his survey at the Hudson, about twenty-four miles north of New York City, and drove grade stakes over the route through Deer Park Gap to the valley of the Delaware, north to Deposit, and, after crossing the divide, progressed along the valley of the Susquehanna and its tributaries to Hornellsville, where he struck the valley of the Genesee; then to the valley of the Allegheny, which he followed to Dunkirk on the Lake.
The route, as surveyed by Mr. Wright, contemplated a line of 483 miles, and he estimated the cost of building at $4.762,260, including everything necessary to make it ready to receive the rolling stock.
In 1835, the President of the line resigned and was succeeded by James E. King, member of a great banking house of New York City. The first act of the new President was to ask for aid from the state, which was promptly refused. But in the spring over $2,000,000 more of stock was subscribed, of which about $120,000 was paid in. With this sum the Directors agreed to commence building the road.
President King decided that the best place to begin work was on a difficult section of the survey near Deposit, and accordingly bids were asked for forty miles of grading between Deposit and Calicoon Creek. The bids for the forty miles aggregated $313,572, and the Company had just $196,409. Nevertheless the contracts were signed, and on the morning of November 7, 1835, work commenced.
When the Legislature of 1836 met, the Erie directors were promptly on hand with a petition for aid. However as the public had lost faith in the management, the bill introduced for that purpose was passed only after much opposition and amendment. It provided for a subscription by the state to $2,000,000 of stock, to be paid in installments in proportion to the amount of work done on the road; and, in order to obtain the full $2,000,000 the Company was required to expend over $4,600,000. To raise this sum was regarded as an impossibility, for the Company was already in debt and those who had previously subscribed for stock refused to pay another assessment, while the investing public held aloof and refused to believe that the management of the road was acting in good faith. Again the great enterprise was at a standstill, while its friends canvassed the country for funds. President King visited England to interest investors there, but he returned in the spring with the feeling that the road would never be built.
Meanwhile, in January, 1838, a bill passed the Legislature that made matters appear somewhat brighter. By its provisions the state was authorized to loan the New York & Erie Company $100,000 for every $100,000 of stock that was subscribed and paid in. It also provided that the eastern terminus of the road should be at Tappan Slote (now known as Piermont), on the Hudson, and the western at Dunkirk, on Lake Erie.
With the money raised under these provisions contracts were let for building the necessary bridges and for grading ten miles of roadbed beginning on the Hudson at Tappan Slote, and for ten miles from Dunkirk eastward. Work progressed rapidly on these sections, and by the end of the year the eastern section was completed. A large pier was built at the end of the grade at Tappan Slote, and contracts were let for extending the road west to the town of Middletown, in Orange County.
So hampered were the Directors by the lack of money, that each contractor who entered into an agreement with the Company for any specified work, was forced to accept a portion of his pay in stock of the Company.
During the years 1839 and 1840 the grading continued in sections all along the line. That in the Susquehanna and Allegheny valleys was made by driving piles in the ground. The engineers of the road had decided that a roadway so constructed would be cheaper and much more durable than an embankment, and in 1840 eight steam pile-drivers were put at the work. It was money thrown away, as the piles driven were never used. Before the road was completed in these sections the piles were decayed and a roadbed of earth and stone was built to receive the track.
So well had the work progressed since the last aid from the Legislature that in 1840 certain sections were ready to receive the rails, and Major T. S. Brown was sent to England to contract for the strips of iron on which the locomotives were to run.
New York & Erie Railroad
When the Erie Canal was built across upstate New York between Albany and Buffalo, DeWitt Clinton, governor of New York, promised the people of the Southern part of the state some kind of avenue of commerce by way of appeasement. William Redfield proposed a direct route from the mouth of the Hudson to the Great Lakes, but it was Eleazar Lord who was instrumental in the chartering of the New York & Erie Railroad by the New York state legislature in April 1832.
Among the conditions of the charter were that the railroad lie wholly within New York and that it not connect with any railroads in New Jersey or Pennsylvania without permission of the legislature. A track gauge of 6 feet ensured that even if it did connect, its cars and locomotives wouldn't stray onto foreign rails. The terminals were fixed: The town of Dunkirk offered land for a terminal on Lake Erie, and Lord lived at Piermont, on the Hudson River just north of the New Jersey state line. The New York & Harlem was willing to extend a line north to a point opposite Piermont, which would have given the New York & Erie an entrance to Manhattan, but the new road refused the offer.
The surveyed route included two detours into Pennsylvania, one because the Delaware & Hudson Canal had already occupied the New York side of the Delaware River above Port Jervis, and the other to follow the Susquehanna River to maintain an easy grade.
Ground was broken on November 7, 1835, near Deposit, N. Y. Shortly afterwards fire destroyed much of New York and wiped out the fortunes of many of the road's supporters; then a business panic struck the nation.
Construction got under way in 1838, and the first train ran in 1841. Much of the railroad was built on low trestlework rather than directly on the ground; the resulting construction and maintenance costs drove the railroad into bankruptcy soon after it opened. Construction continued, however. The line that had been built east a few miles from Dunkirk was taken up to provide rails for the extension from Goshen, N. Y., to Middletown. Standard-gauging the line was proposed while it would still be relatively inexpensive to do so, but the road chose to stay with its broad gauge.
The New York & Erie reached Port Jervis, N.Y., on the Delaware River 74 miles from Piermont, on December 31, 1847; just a year later it was into Binghamton. The whole road from Piermont to Dunkirk was opened in May 1851, with an inspection trip for dignitaries including U. S. President Millard Fillmore and Secretary of State Daniel Webster.
Rarity
We locate no other examples offered for sale at auction or in dealer catalogs. OCLC locates only 3 copies of the map (Library of Congress, University of Michigan/Clements, New York State Library).