2 BOOKS Delaware & Hudson Canal and Gravity Railroad Pennsylvania Coal Company 

Contact me any time...

• We can be contacted at any time through eBay messages if you have any questions, comments or product requests. We will respond to you within 24 hours and do our best to help you out! We encourage our customers to contact us with any questions or concerns! We'd like to be sure you are completely satisfied with your purchase.

Some more details...

The Delaware and Hudson Railway (D&H) (reporting mark DH) is a railroad that operates in the Northeastern United States. In 1991, after more than 150 years as an independent railroad, the D&H was purchased by the Canadian Pacific Railway (CP). CP operated D&H under its subsidiary Soo Line Corporation which also operates Soo Line Railroad.

D&H's name originates from the 1823 New York state corporation charter listing "The President, Managers and Company of the Delaware & Hudson Canal Co." authorizing an establishment of "water communication" between the Delaware River and the Hudson River. Nicknamed "The Bridge Line to New England and Canada," D&H connected New York with Montreal, Quebec and New England. D&H has also been known as "North America's oldest continually operated transportation company."

The Delaware and Hudson Canal Company originates from the 1823 New York corporation charter listing the unusual name of "The President, Managers and Company of the Delaware & Hudson Canal Co." authorizing an establishment of "water communication" between the Delaware River and the Hudson River.

Ground was broken on July 13, 1825, and the canal was opened to navigation in October 1828. It began at Rondout Creek at the location known as Creeklocks, between Kingston (where the creek fed into the Hudson River) and Rosendale. From there, it proceeded southwest alongside Rondout Creek to Ellenville, continuing through the valley of Sandburg Creek, Homowack Kill, Basha Kill, and Neversink River to Port Jervis on the Delaware River. From there, the canal ran northwest on the New York side of the Delaware River, crossing into Pennsylvania on Roebling's Delaware Aqueduct at Lackawaxen and running on the north bank of the Lackawaxen River to Honesdale.

To get the anthracite from the Wurts' mine in the Moosic Mountains near Carbondale to the canal at Honesdale, the canal company built the Delaware and Hudson Gravity Railroad. The state of Pennsylvania authorized its construction on April 8, 1826. On August 8, 1829, the D&H's first locomotive, the Stourbridge Lion, made history as the first locomotive to run on rails in the United States. Westward extensions of the railroad opened access to new mines at Archbald in 1843, Valley Junction in 1858, Providence in 1860, and Scranton in 1863. Passenger service began west of Carbondale in 1860.

The canal was a successful enterprise for many of its early years, but the company's management realized that railroads were the future of transportation, and began investing in stock and trackage. In 1898, the canal carried its last loads of coal and was drained and sold. The next year, the company dropped the "Canal" from its name. The remaining fragments of the canal were designated a National Historic Landmark in 1968.

As railroads grew in popularity, the canal company recognized the importance of replacing the canal with a railroad. The first step of this was the Jefferson Railroad, a line from Carbondale north towards New York, chartered in 1864, built by the Erie Railroad in 1869 and opened in 1872. This was a branch of the Erie, running south from the main line at Lanesboro to Carbondale. Also built as part of this line was a continuation from the other side of the D&H's gravity railroad at Honesdale southeast to the Erie's Pennsylvania Coal Company railroad at Hawley. The Jefferson Railroad (and through it the Erie) obtained trackage rights over the D&H between its two sections, and the D&H obtained trackage rights to Lanesboro.[10]

The other part of the main line was the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad, which the D&H leased on February 24, 1870. The Delaware and Hudson already had a history of working with the Albany and Susquehanna, agreeing in 1866 to jointly build an extension to Nineveh and subsequently ship coal across the entire line. The two companies then entered into an arrangement whereby the Delaware and Hudson perpetually leased the Albany and Susquehanna for $490,000 per year.[11] The connecting Lackawanna and Susquehanna Railroad, chartered in 1867 and opened in 1872, was also absorbed. The Albany and Susquehanna provided a line from Albany southwest to Binghamton, while the Lackawanna and Susquehanna split from that line at Nineveh, running south to the Jefferson Railroad at Lanesboro. Also leased in 1870 was the Schenectady and Susquehanna Railroad, connecting the Albany and Susquehanna at Duanesburg to Schenectady, opened in 1872[10] (reorganized as the Schenectady and Duanesburg Railroad in 1873).

On March 1, 1871, the D&H leased the Rensselaer and Saratoga Railroad Company, which, along with its leased lines, provided a network stretching north from Albany and Schenectady to Saratoga Springs, and continuing northeast to Rutland, Vermont, as well as an eastern route to Rutland via trackage rights over the Troy and Boston Railroad west of Eagle Bridge. The D&H also obtained a quarter interest in the Troy Union Railroad from this lease.

On March 1, 1873, the D&H got the New York and Canada Railroad chartered as a merger of the Whitehall and Plattsburgh Railroad and Montreal and Plattsburgh Railroad, which had been owned by the Rutland Railroad. This provided an extension, completed in 1875, north from Whitehall to the border with Quebec; a branch opened in 1876 to Rouses Point. Lines of the Grand Trunk Railway continued each of the two branches north to Montreal.

The D&H obtained trackage rights over the Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad in 1886, extending the main line southwest from Scranton to Wilkes-Barre. On July 11, 1889, the D&H bought the Adirondack Railway, a long branch line heading north from Saratoga Springs along the Hudson River.

The canal was last used on November 5, 1891, and the gravity railroad closed January 3, 1899. On April 28, 1899, the name was changed to the Delaware and Hudson Company to reflect the lack of a canal, which was sold in June of that year. Between Port Jackson and Ellenville, the right-of-way for the canal was used by the Ellenville and Kingston Railroad, a branch of the New York, Ontario and Western Railway, chartered in 1901 and opened in 1902.