1893 - Transportation

Transportation

The Great Northern Railway drives home its final spike January 6 at Scenic, Washington, to link Seattle with the East Coast (see 1884; Hill, 1889). The road has been built without government subsidy (see Northern Pacific, 1901; Burlington Northern, 1970).

The Philadelphia and Reading Railroad goes into receivership February 20 with debts of $125 million; the Northern Pacific, Union Pacific, Erie, and Santa Fe soon follow suit. Foreclosures in this decade will affect 41,000 miles of U.S. railroad track—15 percent of the total.

The Railroad Safety Appliance Act adopted by Congress March 2 makes air brakes and automatic couplers mandatory on U.S. railroad trains (see Westinghouse, Janney, 1868). The air brakes can stop a train quickly and thereby allow locomotive engineers to reach higher rates of speed. Some 1,000 brakemen were killed in 1887 and 20,000 injured; many railroads have found it cheaper to replace brakemen killed or injured at work than to adopt the new technology, but public pressure has forced Congress to act, and the railroads will find the safety appliances actually save them money.

The New York Central's 2-year-old Empire State Express hits a speed of 112 miles per hour May 10. The 999 Locomotive that pulls it has been built for speed and is exhibited at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

The New York, New Haven and Hartford completes its Shore Line route between New York and Boston by leasing the 500-plus miles of the Old Colony Railroad. The Old Colony controls the Boston and Providence, whose 44 miles of track are needed by the New Haven (see 1872; Mellen, 1903).

Railroad builder and U.S. senator Leland Stanford dies at his Palo Alto, California, home June 21 at age 69. He was succeeded as president of the 9,600-mile Southern Pacific system 3 years ago by his erstwhile Central Pacific Railroad partner Collis P. Huntington, now 71.

The Erie Railroad that opened in 1851 is declared bankrupt in July, having gone bankrupt earlier (in 1877) but regained profitability.

Four-stroke combustion engine pioneer Alphonse Beau de Rochas dies at Vincennes March 27 at age 77.

German engineer William Maybach, 46, develops a float-feed carburetor for gasoline engines. He is an associate of Gottlieb Daimler (see 1892).

Detroit machinist Henry Ford, 30, road-tests his first motorcar in April. An employee of the Edison Illuminating Company, Ford has been working on his "gasoline buggy" since last year (see 1896).

Greece's 3.5-mile Corinth Ship Canal opens to link the Gulf of Corinth with the Gulf of Athens.