NEW YORK CENTRAL & HUDSON RIVER RAILROAD / NEW YORK CENTRAL RAILROAD
PENN CENTRAL RAILROAD
CONRAIL

Page 2: Locomotive Histories, Rosters & Images for NYC Manhattan West Side Operations

The company's freight traffic grew to such an extent that the company was forced to find a site inland from the waterfront for a downtown terminal. On this site, at Beach and Varick Streets, was built the St. Johns Park Terminal, after which, in 1868, the tracks south to Chambers Street were removed.

In 1871, the same year the first Grand Central Station was completed at Fourth Avenue and Forty-Second Street, the Spuyten Duyvil & Port Morris Railroad, connecting what had then become the New York Central & Hudson River Railroad with the New York & Harlem Railroad, was opened, and the Central transferred its passenger trains to the new route.

Since that time the West Side line has been used almost exclusively for freight, express and milk business."

   So, there was both joint freight / passenger handling at the Chambers Street Station as well as freight handling along the piers until 1868. Therefore, the St. Johns Park Freight Terminal was not the first freight station on the West side, but the dual purpose Chambers Street Station was. 

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Atlases of New York City - Manhattan - 1857
Plate 8
William Perris Civil Engineer and Surveyor Third Edition 
Publisher: Perris & Browne
Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division
New York Public Library Digital Collection
annotated version © 2024~ freightrrofnyc.info
added 20 May 2024

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   It is imperative to bear in mind at this point in time; the present day passenger line down Fourth Avenue was owned by the New York & Harlem River Railroad, (and was owned by the great Cornelius Vanderbilt), and of which the New York & Harlem was a competitor to the Hudson River Railroad. It is the Hudson River Railroad route shown above and here.

Cornelius Vanderbilt was born in Staten Island, NY; on May 27, 1794, to Cornelius van der Bilt and Phebe Hand. (van der Bilt being the original spelling which was anglicized to Vanderbilt.)    He began working on his father's ferry in New York Harbor as a boy, quitting school at the age of 11. At the age of 16, Vanderbilt decided to start his own ferry service.       Vanderbilt was nothing less than a mover and a shaker. He made a name for himself in commercial shipping and earned the nickname "the Commodore". After coming to dominate the shipping business, he further built his wealth in railroads, and through his guidance, shaped the railroad industry of the Northeast.    It has been said Vanderbilt lacked finesse or couth, and was prone to be vulgar (what was considered vulgar in the 1800's, might be tame for the 21st Century): "Contemporaries, too, often hated or feared Vanderbilt or at least considered him an unmannered brute. While Vanderbilt could be a rascal, combative and cunning, he was much more a builder than a wrecker... being honorable, shrewd, and hard-working." H. Roger Grant, historian

Cornelius Vanderbilt May 27, 1794 – January 4, 1877

  
   Backing up in history just a tad, Cornelius Vanderbilt obtained control of the Hudson River Railroad in 1867.

   And for clarity; let us re-iterate:

   The terminal at Chambers Street was overwhelmed, and it was decided in 1867 that a new dedicated freight terminal be constructed away (but not too far away) from the Chambers Street Station. This freight terminal would be constructed at Beach & Varick Streets - and of which would come to be the widely recognized St. John's Park Freight Terminal .

   Once the St. Johns Park Freight Terminal was completed, the original trackage to Chambers Street was removed in 1868 and the line dedicated to freight use only. Passenger service at this date was routed down Fourth Avenue to the original Madison Square Garden Station located at East 26th Street. 

   On November 1, 1869, Vanderbilt merged the two railroads (those being Hudson River Railroad and the New York Central & Harlem River Railroad), along with Spuyten Duyvil & Port Morris Railroad in the Bronx) to form the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, and with him, the first Grand Central Depot would not be built until 1871 at 42nd Street.

   All this consolidation meant the railroads operated in a single network under one owner. And now with that history outlined, we can now focus our attention entirely to the freight operations of the West Side.
 
   While all that was taking place in New York City; the Transcontinental Railroad was completed through to the West Coast in 1869. Now freight and passengers, both to and from the West Coast, including freight importation from East and Southeast Asian countries, was now able to be transported across the Pacific, across the US and to the East Coast. 

   Because of this direct freight route into and out of Manhattan; and whereas other railroads had to transfer their freight to "lighter barges" (barges with their own crane), covered barges for perishables or carfloats for railroad cars; the Hudson River Railroad and later the New York Central; dominated railroad freight handling on Manhattan Island, and as the New York Central could haul its freight directly into and out of Manhattan via the West Side without transloading.

   This direct route via Spuyten Duyvil swingbridge gave the New York Central access to the "Water Level Route" north along the Hudson River north to Albany, NY; where it could go east to Boston, Massachusetts or cross the Hudson River and go west to Chicago, Illinois; or even farther to the West Coast; north to Canada; or back south to New Jersey and other points south along the Eastern Seaboard. 

    Unlike the other Class 1 railroads that did come to have offline freight terminals in Manhattan: such as the Pennsylvania; Lehigh Valley; Erie; Central Railroad of New Jersey; and the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroads; the New York Central Railroad had direct rail connection to and from Manhattan to the mainland United States rail network.

   Ironically, this physical connection still exists to this day, albeit slightly rerouted to get the trains off the streets (which we will get to in a later chapter), and is now under Amtrak usage for passenger service.

   In 1881, the New York, West Shore & Buffalo Railroad had been planned as one link in a chain of a new transcontinental railroad from New York to San Francisco. This chain was to be comprised of the West Shore; the New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad or "Nickel Plate Road"; the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway, the Northern Pacific Railroad; and the Oregon Navigation Company.

William H. Vanderbilt May 8, 1821 – December 8, 1885

However, William Henry Vanderbilt (son of Cornelius Vanderbilt and known as "Billy", and of whom now owned the New York Central Railroad); purchased the Nickel Plate Road in 1882, in effect breaking the chain and that plan.    From childhood though mid life; William was looked down upon by his father, with Cornelius frequently berated and criticized him, calling his eldest son a "blockhead" and a "blatherskite". Billy longed to demonstrate to his father that he was not, but William never dared stand up to the Commodore, who had a very imposing presence. A case in point and even in adulthood: William once stated to his father, "If you tell me not to smoke, I'll obey you." Cornelius grunted, and William threw away the cigar, and gave up smoking forever. Cornelius was that powerful of a patriarch. A major turning point in their relationship occurred on the family trip to Europe on the steamship "Vanderbilt" in 1860, after which the two became very close and Billy was given a greater role in business matters.    His father carefully oversaw Williams' education in the business world, starting him at age 19 as a clerk in a New York banking house. After joining as an executive of the Staten Island Railway and increasing the revenue, William was elected to the office of president in 1862. In 1869, he was made vice-president of the New York and Harlem River Railroad, further becoming its president in 1877. He took over for his father as president of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern (LS&MS) Railway, the Canada Southern Railway, and the Michigan Central Railroad (MCRR) at the time of the Commodore's death in 1877.    As crude as his father Cornelius was considered amongst his peers, it was William that drew the ire of the everyman. In 1883, reporter John D. Sherman questioned him about why he ran the limited express train, "Do your limited express trains pay, or do you run them for the accommodation of the public?"    Vanderbilt responded with, "Accommodation of the public? The public be damned! We run them because we have to. They do not pay. We have tried again and again to get the different roads to give them up; but they will run them and, of course, as long as they run them we must do the same."

   
   This interview was then published in the Chicago Daily News, but Vanderbilt's words and the context were modified, with particularly heavy emphasis on "The public be damned." Several different accounts of the incident were then disseminated; the accounts vary in terms of who conducted the interview, under what circumstance and what was actually said.

   Vanderbilt received a great deal of negative publicity from the "The public be damned" portion, and so much so that he even went as far to clarify his response with a subsequent interview by the Chicago Times. In that interview he was quoted saying: "Railroads are not run for the public benefit, but to pay. Incidentally, we may benefit humanity, but the aim is to earn a dividend." As you can imagine, these words did not sit well with the public or the media.   

   Paying no heed to how the public viewed him, Vanderbilt's railroad holdings included no less than the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad (CB&Q); the Chicago and Canada Southern Railway; the Detroit and Bay City Railroad; the Hudson River Railroad (not to be confused with the New York Central and Hudson River RR), the Hudson River Bridge, the Joliet and Northern Indiana Railroad, the Michigan Midland and Canada Railroad, the New York Central Sleeping Car Company, the New York and Harlem Rail Road, the Spuyten Duyvil and Port Morris Railroad, and the Staten Island Railroad.

   During this same time frame, the New York Central began constructing the South Pennsylvania Railroad across southern Pennsylvania, of which was deep in the Pennsylvania Railroad's territory. At the same time, the New York Central Railroad then proceeded to drive the New York, West Shore and Buffalo Railroad into bankruptcy via a brutal rate-war, of which the West Shore could not withstand financially.

   The Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR), which was and remained the New York Central's greatest rival right up until 1968; recognized that the West Shore Railroad would make a great addition to its network, and also allowing it to penetrate deep into New York Central territory. So it began to make overtures to acquire it.

   And now a second, but more destructive rate-war between the Pennsylvania and the New York Central commenced; to wit each railroad kept lowering its freight haulage prices to the point they were actually losing money in an effort to undercut the other.

This loss of revenue was an anathema to J. Pierpont Morgan; of whom sat on the board of directors of both the New York Central and the Pennsylvania. Morgan was well respected throughout the business world, and of whom was the top railroad financier in the United States, much less among many other industries. This rate war, which drove down stock and bond prices; was essentially killing Morgan's profits. So, he decided to personally intervene.    In July 1884, Morgan and Vanderbilt agreed to try to negotiate a peace treaty between the Pennsylvania and New York Central Railroads. Morgan invited George B. Roberts and Frank Thompson (president and vice-president of the Pennsylvania Railroad) to meet with the New York Central’s president, Chauncey Depew, on board Morgan’s yacht, Corsair. Morgan picked the executives up at a Jersey City pier, near the Pennsylvania Railroad’s terminal, on a hot July morning. They proceeded north up the Hudson River 50 miles to Garrison, NY; and then turned back south to Sandy Hook, New Jersey; located at the entrance to New York Harbor.    Depew beseeched the Pennsylvania men to end what he called the “ruinous” competition of building parallel lines and endless rate wars. These tactics added nothing to the bottom line of either railroad. A luncheon was served as the Corsair sailed up and down the river. Morgan argued that this sort of competition was not only bad for business; it was adversely affecting the flow of European (especially British) financial capital into American railroads as they continued their expansion across the continent. No agreement, Morgan implied, equated to no further European investment.    While Thompson came around to Morgan’s way of reasoning, Roberts remained adamant against it. Only when Corsair tied back up to the Jersey City pier at 7:00 pm; did Roberts, finally relent and shook hands with Morgan on the dock, stating, “I will agree to your plan and do my part.” While it took almost two more decades for the final agreement to be signed; the West Shore Railroad, would now be owned by the New York Central as a subsidiary, and the construction of the South Pennsylvania Railroad ceased (sections of which were repurposed much later (1940) for use in constructing the Pennsylvania Turnpike.)

John Pierpont Morgan April 17, 1837 – March 31, 1913

   The stock prices of the two railroads rose immediately and naturally, the principals were pleased.

   The New York Central, having purchased the New York, West Shore and Buffalo Railway on November 24, 1885; reorganized its new acquisition as the West Shore Railroad on December 5, and leased it for 475 years from January 1, 1886. (So, in effect the West Shore Railroad West 36th Street Yard was originally the competition; wound up becoming a subsidiary and by proxy an expansion to the West 33rd Street Yards.)

   In 1914, all of Cornelius Vanderbilt's eleven other railroad operating interests: particularly the New York, West Shore & Buffalo with its carfloat terminals in Weehawken, New Jersey; were merged into the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad to form the New York Central Lines.

   With the basic but very convoluted history of the railroads in New York City now outlined, let us get down to the specifics of the West Side of Manhattan Freight Operations.
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As the city population grew, freight traffic grew to keep up with it. And as the city population expanded northward; there arose a conflict.    Trains were now impeding the people and the people were getting run over by trains. This can be somewhat equated to building an airport on the outskirts of the city; and the city grew, it encroached upon the airport, and now its presence has become a nuisance to those closest to it. In most cases, that does not have a fatal outcome - unless of course the plane crashes into some houses, then there is an uproar; and that has happened on several occasions - but no amount of public uproar ever forced an airport to relocate!    When the railroad was first laid out in the mid 1850's, pretty much everything north of 42nd Street was undeveloped farmland or forest. It was unfathomable at the time that the city would grow north of the demarcation line at 42nd Street. This misconception would come back to haunt the City fathers time and time again - when City Hall was constructed at Chambers Street, it employed cheap brownstone for its north face, as it was expected most residents would not venture north of Chambers Street and not see it often.     As the Manhattan grew in both industry and population; that imaginary demarcation of "the city line" - was subsequently moved from Chambers Street to Canal Street, then to 14th Street, then 34th Street, then 42nd Street (which was why Vanderbilt built Grand Central Terminal there) and well after that, people just gave up on trying to define the city line entirely!    As you can see by the table at right, (via Demographia) the population of Manhattan alone, doubled in the thirty years between 1850 (when the railroad on the West Side was first laid out) and 1880; when the problem of people getting hit by the trains began making public appearance in the newspapers. Population doubled once again over the next 20 years.    So, as the city population grew, even the slow moving (no more than 6 miles per hour per the city regulation) freight trains running down the center of the thoroughfare were found to be involved in a rather growing frequency of serious accidents and fatalities involving pedestrians.	year	population (Manhattan)
	1840	313,000
	1850	516,000
	1860	814,000
	1870	942,000
	1880	1,165,000
	1890	1,441,000
	1900	1,850,000
	1910	2,332,000
	1920	2,284,000
	1930	1,867,000
	1940	1,890,000

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So called "Death Avenue"

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   One of my pet peeves, is that I particularly despise the moniker "Death Avenue" - of which Eleventh Avenue (and Tenth Avenue) became to be called as a result. Perhaps this "Death Avenue" moniker is a bit of hyperbole and sensationalist. Unfortunately, it has become so ingrained throughout the historical accountings of the West Side Operations, that referral to simply "Eleventh Avenue" or "Tenth Avenue" does not carry the same effect. 

   The 1800's and early 1900's - and with them the coming of the Industrial Age - were an inherently dangerous period of time in itself. People were maimed and killed by lots of things in daily life; coal mines, steel mills, lumber mills, steam boilers, bridge building, tunnel boring, mechanized farm equipment, etc. Everyday life then was more of a hazard. Pedestrians were also run over by horsedrawn wagons on a daily basis or trampled by horses. Riders were thrown. 

   In short, injuries and fatalities came from all sorts of machinery and industrial accidents, and not just this particular train or its routing. A big deal has been made about the 540 people were known to have been fatally injured by train movements through 1905 by the operations of street running freight trains in Manhattan. 

   But you see, trolleys caused deaths on the streets too. These trolleys, so essential to the movement of people to and from work and school, were no different. They ran people over too. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle ran a full page feature page on December 30, 1894 blasting the deaths of so many from trolleys. But no one individual or any holder of city office enacted or tried to enact legislation that forbade the use of trolleys or made them move to another street or part of the city. The trolleys were a public service, you see...

   And when the automobile was developed, were mass produced and became available to the private owner, automobiles caused death. So many injuries and deaths were occurring as a result of autos, that the New York Daily News began a clock-like "Hands of death." The latest one in 1923 showed 889 people killed by "the automobile". In 1931, deaths as a result from automobiles reached 1,448. But, only a few people and politicians actually advocated banning the automobile from streets. Speed limits, perhaps; but not an outright ban. More people died from the automobile in the first 30 years of the 1900's, than in all the 80 years the freight trains operated on the West Side since 1851.

   But it was the "big, bad freight railroad" that bore the brunt of the blame and was an easy target. And while people needed the trolleys to go to and from work and school, go about their daily lives and what have you; they were an essential public service. Most transit companies of the era were considered "locally" owned. The perception was (and remains) the freight trains weren't. At best, they might have been incorporated in the State of New York, but their corporate offices may have been out of state.

   And even though the New York Central Railroad's headquarters were located right in New York City by Grand Central Terminal; they, like the other railroads were perceived to be owned by a faceless corporation.

   The railroads always have and always will bear unjust ire and blame by the public, even to this day:
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• A tractor trailer driver gets stuck on a crossing that is well marked with signs as a "high center crossing" and a train hits it? Why didn't the train stop?
  (Why wasn't the truck driver better trained or more attentive?)
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• Trespassers got run over while walking on tracks? Why didn't the train blow it horn? Why doesn't the railroad build fences?
  (It did and it does.)
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• A movie crew (with props no less) tries to film a movie scene on a railroad bridge (with no trespassing signs!) and without permission from the railroad and train comes along and kills a member of the crew?
  (Sue the railroad for wrongful death!)
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• A train derails? It must because of shoddy maintenance or faulty equipment.
  (But no matter how well something is maintained or how new, things break. People vandalize infrastructure.)
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• A train derails carrying hazardous materials. 
  (Hazardous materials through my town!?!?! Absolutely not! Reroute the train to somewhere else. Rip out the railroad lines!)
  

• Anhydrous ammonia: A fertilizer used in agriculture.
• Chlorine: Used for purifying water and producing other chemicals like household bleach..
• Sulfuric acid: A corrosive liquid used in petroleum refining and fertilizer production.
• Vinyl chloride: A gas used to make plastics, including PVC pipes and conduits
• Hydrochloric Acid: used in electroplating
• Sodium Hydroxide (Lye): used in paper manufacturing and manufacture of soap and detergents.
• Crude oil: refined into hundreds of products from bitumen used in asphalt for roofing and paving, to motor fuels to, cleaners, plastics.
  

   The computer or smart device you read this on, the products you purchase and consume, use various chemicals which are needed to make plastics; as well as acids, and heavy metals in its construction. Acids are used to etch metals for electrical contacts. Plastics are used in food sales and storage: meats are sold wrapped in plastic for hygienic reason. This list is endless.
  
   So in short; accidents, are the inevitable consequences of living in a modern, first world, technologically advanced urban society. This bothers you? Go back to living in a cave, hunting for your food daily with a stone or a spear. Hell, even archeologists have even found primitive man injured by those hunting implements! Point being, injury and death goes hand in hand with living. 

   And in the case of the New York Central back in the 1800's; when that railroad was owned by a very outspoken ultra-millionaire, like it was by William H. Vanderbilt living in a mansion of Fifth Avenue; well, they made for an easy target by the media. (Not much has changed, has it?) The railroads were, and remain to this day; to be perceived as a big faceless uncaring corporations.

   Despite this, that is not to say solutions and remedies were not attempted. One of the solutions to this problem, was to have a man on horseback escort the trains during transit on public thoroughfares. Which brings us to our next chapter.
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   The "Tenth Avenue cowboys" entered upon their existence on December 4, 1850 as the result of a city ordinance which read:

"that the Hudson River Railroad Company . . . are permitted to propel their cars from Chambers Street to Thirty-first Street, by their locomotive, or 'Dumb Engines,' upon the condition that the same shall not be run at a greater speed than six miles an hour; and also, that they shall employ a proper person to precede the trains on horse back, to give the necessary warning in a suitable manner of their approach, and be under such further direction as the Common Council may from time to time prescribe."

   Mind you, this is just one paragraph of a multiple page agreement regarding the rights of the Hudson River Railroad to use streets and avenues in Manhattan to convey freight AND passenger trains to Chambers Street Depot. The unabridged text may be read by clicking on the excerpt of legislation above. It contains some very interesting information to say the least regarding which route the railroad had to follow, distances between cars, and other details lost over time. 

   This horse rider was to lead the locomotive movement and warn pedestrians to yield to the oncoming train. An escort if you will. These horse riders became known as a "West Side Cowboy", or a "Dummy Boy" (after the steam dummy). They were also known as the Tenth Avenue (or Eleventh Avenue) Cowboy. And when first established, this rider escorted both passenger trains to Chambers Street AND freight trains.

   You will note in a lot of images; these riders appear quite young. They were - back in those days when a lad was old enough to ride a horse, he was old enough to work. It was not until 1938 that the Fair Labor Standards Act was passed, prohibiting most children under age 16 from working (with exception to agriculture and domestic labor). So a lot of young men, no older than their early teens; were seen at work and this position was no exception. 

two image above and one below Bain News Service  / George Grantham Bain collection Library of Congress added 05 April 2024	unknown provenance

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   The following film, converted to digital format, shows several of the West Side Cowboys at work escorting the trains. The following digital video from the blog "LivinTheHighLine" article titled "The West Side Cowboy and the High Line", (www.livinthehighline.com/the-original-urban-cowboy/).

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   The New York Central & Hudson River RR had been operating the trackage in the streets under a perpetual franchise, renewed every 25 years. In 1905 it was proposed, and in 1906, the New York State Legislature passed a bill introduced by Senator Martin Saxe which gave the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company a year in which to negotiate a settlement with the old Board of Rapid Transit Commissioners; and in default of which; the City was to begin condemnation proceedings. But nothing came of it.

   Later, the City brought proceedings against the railroad, with the result that in 1910 the Court of Appeals rendered a decision holding that the City of New York had no right to interfere with the company, but that, as it had succeeded in showing that the presence of the New York Central operations on Eleventh Avenue were a danger to the citizens and a detriment to the neighborhood. Therefore, the State could, under its general police power, take steps to force the railroad company to find a new site for its tracks at its own expense.

   This included the railroad placing its tracks in a six track tunnel and which the railroad would retain its franchise on two of the six tracks, with the city renting the other four tracks to the railroad. Not to mention, the engineering issues in constructing a six track wide tunnel under active city streets! A two track subway tunnel, maybe... But six tracks? But surprisingly, the railroad was in favor of this very costly project of approximately $50,000,000 dollars - which equates to $1,775,000,000 (that's 1.775 billion) in 2024 dollars and allowing for inflation.

   This did nothing to solve the problem. In 1908, Calvin Tompkins (the Commissioner of Docks for the City of New York) proposed the following: an elevated freight line from West 72nd street to St. John's Park, and a "union" freight terminal with transfer bridges at 30th Street; union meaning to be operated by all the railroads seeking presence, and paid for by rental charges. This proposal too, went nowhere.

   Thereupon the Legislature of 1911, by chapter 777, directed the NYC&HR RR Company to file before October 1 of that year; plans to show how it would remove its tracks, and authorized the Board of Estimate and Apportionment to enter into negotiations with the railroad to effect this. The situation then, in short was this: the City is trying to get the railroad off of its public streets; and the railroad company is trying to improve its freight terminal facilities. The question was, how can these two ends be attained and the interests of each conserved in fairness to those of the other?

   So, the new plan was thus: tracks to be placed in a roofed cut, designed to carry a motor parkway above, from Spuyten Duyvil to West 72nd Street, and then an elevated steel girder structure from 72nd to St. John's Park. But it was also stipulated that the trains be drawn only by electric locomotive after 1915, which the entire project was to be completed by 1917. 

   The railroad and the city were getting close, but no cigar. Back to the table they went in 1916. Now it was proposed (from north to south): a tunnel under Spuyten Duyvil Creek (Harlem River) to a six track roofed cut to West 60th Street, then a four track elevated from West 60th Street to a point just south of St. John's Park, and an extension to Cortlandt Street carried on a viaduct above West Street and the bulkhead line. The railroad also took the moment to suggest enlarging their existing freight yards, and while they were at it; a provision for passenger service to the West Side to help alleviate the load from Grand Central Terminal. Total estimated cost? $65,000,000 dollars ($2,010,000,000 in 2024 dollars). Both parties agreed.

   Not so fast! In June 1917, the State Legislature in Albany first nullified that agreement, and second; required all future plans be submitted for review by an "impartial committee" and approval by the Public Service Commission.

   And in April, the United States entered World War I and changed the priorities for several years. But, while both minor dithering between the City and the Railroad commenced, and some major dithering in Europe; the freight demands of Manhattan was growing at an exponential rate.

   Thus began a decade of negotiations, plans, counter-plans, court hearings and compromises; before an actual shovelful of dirt was moved. The specific details are contained within the following three references (the first two of which are open source):

Documents of the Assembly of the State of New York - 1917 (commencing on page 252)

Report of the Commission to Investigate the Surface Railroad Situation in the City of New York - 1918

The Port of New York, Volume 1 and Volume 2, by Carl W. Condit - 1981

   In April 1920, Alfred H. Smith put the case quite succinctly in an address at the Merchants Association of New York City:  

"Manhattan Island lives on a hand to mouth existence. because of the dearth of warehouses and storage facilities and of modern equipment for handling freight. The unnecessary costs and losses yearly are prodigious; [and] none but a rich and growing city could have borne the burden."

   In other words, because of the warehouses and storage facilities on the island, the City feeds and clothes itself from outside supplies. Remove the railroad, and you remove the warehouses and industries and income for thousands of people who work at these facilities. Remove that and the city withers. This statement followed another in which the endless delays of the City and State of New York was criticized and the United States Railroad Administration refusing to grant increases in freight rates, comparable to those in wages. It was in short, a statement made to the effect of "shit or get off the pot."

   In 1923; the State reviewed the proposals and the New York Central Railroad now proposed the following: a new line of 11 miles in length consisting of the following: a new swing bridge at Spuyten Duyvil (eliminating the expensive tunneling) a roofed cut through Riverside Park, expansion of the existing freight yards, a viaduct from West 72nd Street to a completely new freight terminal located south of Spring Street and the razing of the old St. John Park's Terminal.

   And by 1923, the State of New York was now demanding electric operation of all trains within the City limits of New York by January 1, 1926 - the Kaufman Act. This is covered in detail in the chapter on the main page of this website: Kaufman Act

   Multiple railroads operating freight terminals in the City of New York vehemently objected to the Kaufman Act, and the most outspoken of all was the New York Central; as most of their trackage was in the streets. The use of a ground level electric third rail was not feasible (unless you wanted to electrocute some residents on a daily basis - the cure was more deadly than the disease); overhead trolley wire had already been forbidden in the City; and electric battery locomotives were not sufficiently advanced to consider. Think about this: here we are in 2024, 100 years later, and battery locomotives still are not reliable enough to warrant widespread use or acceptance in a freight railroad capacity!

   The railroads fought tooth and nail to overturn the Kaufman Act, and for good reason: electrification would be prohibitively expensive, and for one other reason we will get to in a moment.

   This delay in enactment of the Kaufman Act bore some tasty fruit of an unexpected flavor. This was because in the five years of court battles and injunctions over the Kaufman Act and "electrification", a new breed of locomotive was nearing successful and widespread use: the Diesel-electric. A Diesel oil compression ignition engine would turn a generator, and would provide its own power. Up until this point the diesel-electric was not suited for long haul use because of durability of the engine and the required power. Direct drive internal combustion locomotives lacked finesse. Diesel electrics had only just become satisfactory for yard and switching service over the previous year; and in the form of Central Railroad of New Jersey #1000, a switch engine built by American Locomotive (body), General Electric (electrical systems) and prime mover built my Ingersoll Rand. The locomotive was in daily use at their Bronx Terminal. But the technology still had not quite reached maturity or reliability for "over the road" heavy freight use..

   Fortunately, the chief engineer of the Public Service Commission: William C. Lancaster recognized this new form of motive power:

"The Diesel electric locomotive... has none of the objectionable features of the steam locomotive; it is substantially noiseless and its movement are virtually the same as those of the electric locomotive of the same capacity.  It has one other feature... which has an advantage over the overhead system of contact or the third rail. in the case of the latter, there are frequent momentary discontinuances which draw arcs causing vivid flashes. These are a source of annoyance and would be objectionable to those living along Riverside Drive. The results where the contact shoe jumps from one conductor to another and such intervals would be frequent in the third rail system."

   In 1924, a prototype General Electric - Ingersoll Rand model X3-1 locomotive, better known by its construction number: #8835; was fitted with an inline six cylinder (10" x 12" cylinders) diesel engine constructed by Ingersoll-Rand utilizing the Price-Rathbun design and solid injectors. This engine in turn powering an electrical generator designed by General Electric. This in turn supplied electricity to traction motors with voltage and current being regulated using controls designed a few year prior by Hermann Lemp of General Electric. The carbody was a left over, laying around at General Electric's Erie, PA facility.

. #8835 would be "unveiled" on February 28, 1924 to the representatives of the railroads showing interest in a diesel locomotive: Baltimore & Ohio, Pennsylvania, Boston & Maine, New York Central, Reading & Lehigh Valley. While the men were impressed, they remained unconvinced of the design which had not seen day to day service.

   So, beginning in June 1924, and for the next thirteen months, the unit went through rigorous (and to some extent, abusive) testing on ten different railroads and three industries (to which the locomotive had been leased on a trial basis). #8835 would come to spend 2½ months operating on the West Side of Manhattan along Tenth and Eleventh Avenues for the New York Central Railroad:

Ingersoll-Rand / General Electric Demonstrator #8835 - sometime between June 9 and August 23, 1924 
Tenth Avenue, Manhattan, NY
from Diesel Spotters Guide, Jerry Pinkepank / Kalmbach Publishing

hours of service	dates of service	remarks
833	6/9/1924 to 8/23/1924	Placed in yard switching service (New York City West Side Yards) on July 19th for a daily recording of performance data. In one test phase, this unit was operated for 24 hours per day (almost continuously), handling 3 shifts daily from 7/24 to 8/7. Inspection of the locomotive could only occur during crew changes. On 8/14 a "Tonnage Test" was conducted: #8835 pulled "93 loaded freight cars on level track" for 36 minutes. 1, 2 Note: The Ingersoll-Rand record does not indicate what these loads consisted of or total tonnage pulled.

   At midpoint of its testing on the 'Central; this locomotive was placed into a "tug-of-war"  test with one of the a Shay type locomotives of New York Central working the West Side Line; in which 8835 won that battle due to smoother torque of the electric drive and greater coefficient of friction; and a little overzealousness on the part of the Shay's engineer, who got the Shay's wheel's slipping. Needless to say, the Central's men were very impressed.

   So, following the success of that experimental, New York Central felt confident with the technology.

   The pieces were finally in place. The City of New York and the New York Central Railroad had finally reached an agreement. They hammered out some now minor details and on July 5, 1929; Mayor Jimmy Walker, R. D. Starbuck, a vice president of the New York Central; and E. F. Stephenson, the railroads secretary signed the documents. The agreement called for construction to start immediately, a timetable as follows:

• electrification north of West 72nd Street and diesel electric motive power for operation south of that; to be installed by 1931. 
• train movements on city streets to be eliminated by June 30, 1934.
• the double trackage in the street was to be relocated to a viaduct between West 34th Street and St John's Park, 
• a walled subgrade cut north of West 34th Street, 
• the two major yards at West 30th Street and West 60th Street Yard and the three smaller yards at West 17th Street, West 41st Street and West 145th Street were to be expanded to 4,000 car capacity; 
• the existing surface St. John's Park Terminal to be razed and new elevated terminal constructed at Spring Street. 

   The New York Central Railroad literally was giving the City more than the City was asking for.

   The cost of this ambitious project had now reached $175,000,000 in 1929 dollars ($3,200,000,000 in adjusted 2024 dollars), freight traffic on line was averaging about 1,700 cars daily. All work on this project took place under the supervision of the railroad's chief engineer, J. W. Pfau.

   Contractors for the first phase were James Turner Co. and George A. Fuller Co.,  with the steel contractors being American Bridge Co.; McClintic Marshall Co. and the Fort Pitt Bridge Works. Structural design of Riverside Park was the work of Madigan - Hyland Company. General contractor for the construction of the new elevated St. John's Park Freight terminal was the James Stewart Co.

   Second phase contractors were the Thomas Crimmins Contracting Co., George J. Atwell Foundation Corp, the P. T. Cox Contracting Co. and Corbetta Construction Co.

   According to the agreement, the State of New York was to pay one quarter of the cost of this grade separation / realignment project, the New York Central Railroad was to pay three quarters:



   But, the State of New York balked, stating it did not have the funds to cover their full 25% portion. With surprising congeniality and good faith, the New York Central Railroad offered to cover the states' portion and defer reimbursement arrangements and repayment to a later date. Not surprisingly, I cannot locate any documentation alluding that the State finally paying its due share of apportionment.

   The order was signed on December 19, 1924; and the New York Central RR began construction immediately.

   So yes; when you consider why present day freight railroads have a "hard-on" against additional regulations and / or having to relinquish or relocate property and assets, perhaps some of you will bear in mind and recall this and decades long situation and history.

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Milk cans were usually embossed with the name of the farm "Elgin" (of the Catskills), or the cooperative that the farm belonged to
Dairyman's League (DairyLea) or the dairy company:
Crowley, Sheffield, Queensboro, etc

Painted numbers were used to track the can and either painted letters or embossed tags for the railroad which carried it and the milepost that can was dropped off and received from.

U&D - 51 (Ulster & Delaware MP51 - Kelly Corners)

O&W - New York Ontario & Western Rwy

NYC - New York Central, etc.

Ergo, this can is marked NYC, for New York Central.

West 21st Street and Tenth Avenue (looking west) - July 7, 1931
Church of Guardian Angels. In less than two years, the High Line will be built behind the church.
New York Public Library Digital Archives
P. L. Sperr photo
added 19 August 2025

Tenth Avenue & West 17th Street (looking northwest) - April 2, 1929
United States Trucking Corp.
New York Public Library Digital Archives
P. L. Sperr photo
added 19 August 2025

Tenth Avenue & West 17th Street (looking east-southeast) - July 16, 1932
New York Public Library Digital Archives
P. L. Sperr photo
added 19 August 2025

   It is worth mentioning that the Meat Packing District's webpage on Manhattan Refrigeration is in error. It states:

    "Artificial refrigeration and refrigerated trucking fueled the growth of the meatpacking business to an industrial and national scale. In the Meatpacking District, this was best exemplified by the Manhattan Refrigeration Company, which began operating in the neighborhood in 1898. The company built a massive complex that eventually included 9 buildings bounded by Horatio, Washington, West, and Gansevoort Streets. The complex was fueled by a central power station that delivered cooled air through underground refrigeration conduits to cold storage warehouses within an 18-block radius.

   These refrigerated buildings were not chilled by "cooled air" through street conduits, it was chilled salt water or brine that was pumped through the conduits. It was only inside of these buildings, that the chilled brine was passed through an evaporator where it chilled the air in that particular room or set of rooms.

   Basic thermodynamics clearly states chilled liquids will retain temperature better than chilled gases over distance. Chilled air (a gas) is not efficient for traveling distances as chilled liquids (salt water). A brine system uses a chilled liquid (salt water / brine) as a secondary refrigerant to transfer thermal energy from a target area (the freezer rooms) to a primary refrigeration system. The brine circulates in a closed loop to provide reliable cooling, especially for industrial applications that require temperatures below freezing.

   Thermodynamic principles: The brine cooling system operates on the principles of the vapor-compression refrigeration cycle, but with an intermediate step involving the brine.

Vapor compression cycle:	A primary refrigerant (in those days, ammonia) undergoes a phase change from liquid to vapor to absorb heat, and from vapor back to liquid to release it. This cycle is powered by a compressor.
Heat exchange:	The primary refrigerant (ammonia), at its coldest point, is used to cool the brine in a heat exchanger called an evaporator.
Secondary heat transfer:	The chilled brine is then pumped through a separate loop to the space or process that needs to be cooled.
Heat absorption by brine:	As the brine circulates, it absorbs heat from the target area, increasing its temperature.
Brine returns to evaporator:	The warmer brine returns to the evaporator to be re-chilled by the primary refrigerant, and the cycle repeats.

   Additionally, several City of New York documents state the Manhattan Refrigeration Co. (as well as others) paid a yearly fee for the placement of conduits to both draw salt water from the North (Hudson) River, was well as to pump chilled saltwater to the various buildings under the streets, and the New Washington Street Market.

   Many ice rinks use this system, where chilled brines is pumped through pipes cast in a concrete base, and where water is placed on top, to freeze.

   This may be trivial, but accuracy in history is paramount to a historian.

 
Real facts - not rail fiction: The accurate start dates of High Line service and the end date of street running.