1908 - S. & W. Will Add 10,000 Men

[NW Mailing List]

Roanoke Times - March 14, 1908

  S. & W. WILL ADD 10,000 MEN

Road Will be Completed This Year While Labor is Cheap, if Possible

Contractors asked to hurry work

Means Employment of Additional Laboreres

Means expenditure of $12,000,000 this year

   McArthur Brothers, railroad contractors, of this city, have a 
letter from the management of the South and Western railroad, asking 
just how soon the contract which this company holds with the road can 
be completed, and it is declared that 10,000 more laborers, all told, 
will be put to work on the new line at once.
   The South and Western railroad, owned by a syndicate headed by 
George L. Carter and backed by Thomas F. Ryan, is to operate in 
Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and North Carolina, and a large part of 
the contract is held by McArthur Brothers, of Roanoke, which also 
built the Virginia railroad, now almost completed.
   The object of the company is to take advantage of the cheap labor 
offered at this time, double the number of laborers at work on the 
road, and rush the work to completion during the present lull in 
general business.
   It is further declared that the syndicate hopes to complete the 
road and have it in operation before the first of next year, and in 
doing this and expenditure of $12,000,000 must be made within this 
time. This will not include purchases of equipment. The total cost of 
the road will be about $50,000,000.
   The situation along other railroads is daily becoming improved. 
The Norfolk and Western has already found traffic over its various 
lines to have greatly increased, and the fact that lake vessels in 
the northwest are urgently in need of fuel, it is said, will further 
augment shipments over all Virginia lines from the coal fields.
   When the coal shipping season closed in November there was a 
shortage of some millions of tons in the tonnage needed in the 
northwest. The winter season has been severe and the consumption on a 
large scale has continued until on February 1st, there was only about 
a millions tons available. February was an unusually severe month and 
the reports from the coal docks of the northwest show the fuel supply 
has disappeared rapidly. For this reason the resumption of coal 
shipments is to be started without delay.
   Operators say many ore vessels which came down with their final 
cargoes of ore last fall held them in their holds during the winter, 
and are now being unloaded. The railroads are being called upon to 
bring this ore to the furnaces and are encouraging the movement of 
coals, to give them a back haul.

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- Ron Davis, Roger Link