1908 - S. & W. Railroad Sold to C. C. & O.

[NW Mailing List]

The first chapter of my book "Coalwood" goes into the business dealings of 
George L. Carter and Thomas Fortune Ryan and their association on the C.C. & 
O.  In the early 1900s Thomas Fortune Ryan was one of the richest men in 
America.  In 1918 he was on the first list that Forbes Magazine published of 
richest men in America.  Ryan was No. 13 with an estimated worth of $70 
million.  At one point Ryan noted of Carter that he was the cleverest 
businessman he had ever met.  When Carter died in 1936 The Washington Post 
described Carter as "one of the last of the great empire builders."

J. Norment Powell was a long time associate of Carter.  Powell was 
vice-president of Carter's West Virginia Southwestern  Railway that beame 
the N&W's Clear Fork Branch.  Powell was president of the Caretta Railway 
Company when the N&W took it over as the Caretta Branch.

One of the interesting things that you encounter when researching books is 
all of the tangential information that you come across that are interesting 
stories within themselves.  Ryan is one of those stories and Caples is 
another.  George L. Carter is worthy of an entire biography except he and is 
son destroyed as many personal records as they could find.  What you do find 
are newspaper articles like the one below that offer some insight to the 
financial dealings of the early businessmen and their railroad associations.

"Coalwood" is available through the NWHS comissary.

Alex Schust


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From: "NW Mailing List" <nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org>
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Sent: Sunday, March 23, 2008 11:34 PM
Subject: 1908 - S. & W. Railroad Sold to C. C. & O.



> Roanoke Times - March 24, 1908

>

> S. & W. RAILROAD SOLD TO C. C. & O.

>

> $15,000,000 Property Changes Hands at Stockholders Meeting Yesterday

>

> BUT THOMAS F. RYAN OWNS BOTH CONCERNS

>

> Much Interest Here in Report, Now Confirmed, That South & Western Will be

> Rapidly Pushed to Completion - Transfer of Properties Yesterday Was the

> Merest Formality

>

>   News was received last night that at the first annual meeting of the

> stockholders of the Carolina, Clinchfield and Ohio railroad, held in

> Bristol yesterday, and presided over by President George L. Carter, the

> purchase of the South and Western railroad, a $50,000,000 project, backed

> by Thomas F. Ryan, of New York, was approved. The transfer was formal, 

> both

> companies being owned by the Thomas F. Ryan and George L. Carter 

> interests.

>   J. Norment [best guess on spelling, hard to read] Powell held the

> proxies of the Ryan interests, and votes in the meeting, approving all 

> that

> had been done in the matter of purchasing the South and Western.

>   It is understood that something like $27,000,000 has already been spent

> on construction and that the road when completed and equipped will cost

> upwards of $50,000,000. The road will be completed and put into operation

> next year, when the Clinchfield Coal Corporation, a $30,000,000

> corporation, of which Carter is at the head, will begin the development of

> the coal property in Southwest Virginia. The meeting adjourned one week.

>   An engineering corps is in the field surveying a direct north and south

> route from Bostic to Spartanburg, S. C. Additional forces will also be put

> on the work from Marion to Bostic, its formerly contemplated connection

> with the Seaboard Air Line. It is now believed, however that the Carolina,

> Clinchfield and Ohio will construct its own road in a directly southerly

> course from Bostic via Spartanburg, on down and parallel with Broad river,

> through Columbia to Charleston, S. C. Its northeastern terminus is to be

> Elkhorn, Ky., where connection will be made with the Chesapeake and Ohio

> and other connections for Cincinnati and Chicago.

>   In other works, the Carolina, Clinchfield and Ohio is to be the

> southwestern and of the old Three C's (Chicago, Cincinnati and 

> Charleston),

> and, as its name indicates, is to extend through the two Carolinas and the

> vast coalfields of the Clinch mountain range of Southwest Virginia and

> southeastern Kentucky. In this latter territory "The Clinchfield

> Corporation" (composed of virtually the same capitalists) own over 

> one-half

> millions acres of rich bituminous coal lands.

>

> To "Get Busy"

>

>   The Carolina, Clinchfield and Ohio railroad, will, it is authoritatively 

> stated, get very busy in the immediate future with the work of completion 

> of its construction from Marion to Altapass, its present terminal point on 

> top of the Blue Ridge for its Tennessee sectional part, extending from 

> Johnson City south-westward.

>   The distance from Altapass to Marion is thirty-six miles. The Marion 

> half of eighteen miles has been graded, and the steel rails laid thereon. 

> The splendid steel bridge over the Catawba river, two miles out of Marion, 

> has been sufficiently completed to admit of the crossing thereon of 

> construction trains. On the Altapass half of eighteen miles are sixteen 

> tunnels, varying in length from one-tenth to one-half mile, all very heavy 

> work, and it is upon this work that largely augmented forces will be 

> placed.

>   Railway men of Roanoke are much interested in the transfer of the 

> properties, and the news printed in The Times some days ago to the effect 

> that work on the South and Western would be pushed to completion with all 

> possible speed, is verified.

>

> -----------------------------------

>

> - Ron Davis, Roger Link

>

>

>

>

>

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