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James Madison University Libraries Special Collections
820 Madison DriveSamuel T. Elswick, Tony Madson, Julia Merkel and Tiffany Cole
The copyright interests in this collection have been transferred to the James Madison University Special Collection Library. Privacy protected information may be revealed during use of this collection. Researchers agree to make no notes or other recordation of privacy protected information if found within this collection, and further agree not to publish or disclose such information for any purpose. Researchers agree to alert Special Collections staff if potentially privacy protected information is found within this collection. For more information, contact the Special Collections Library Reference Desk (library-special@jmu.edu).
Collection is open to research. Researchers must register and agree to copyright and privacy laws before using this collection. Please contact Research Services staff before visiting the James Madison University Special Collections Library to use this collection.
Records represent the day to day business operation of the Chesapeake Western Railway Company through 1982. After a fire that year, records were left in the CW building on Chesapeake Drive in Harrisonburg, Virginia, and remained in that facility until 1997.
[identification of item], [box #, folder #], Chesapeake Western Railway Company Records, 1916-1982, SC 0154, Special Collections, Carrier Library, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, Va.
D.A. Brown, II Superintendent, VA Division of Norfolk Southern in Roanoke gave permission in April 1997 for JMU professors Raymond Hiser and Clarence Geier from the History and Anthropology Departments respectively to salvage records from the CW building on Chesapeake Drive in Harrisonburg, Virginia which suffered a five-alarm fire at the site on July 28, 1982. After the fire, operating records remained in the building in disarray on the floor and suffered damage by fire or water or both. Following their initial cleaning and inventory by students in History and Anthropology, the materials were transferred to Carrier Library in February 1998. In September 2018, the Chesapeake Beach Railway Museum in Chesapeake Beach, Maryland, donated one bound book: "Returns to Valuation Orders 7, 8, and 16."
Due to the unwieldy nature of virtually off the bound ledgers, pages were removed from their covers and parceled into folders as both an aid to researchers and as a practical means to consolidate space. The condition of some boards was also questionable with evidence of mold and pest damage. In order to streamline the process of applying collection numbers, Special Collections staff completed a large-scale renumbering campaign in the spring of 2017. This collection was previously cataloged as SC 4010.
The origins of the Chesapeake Western Railway Company date back at least to 1871, when the Washington, Cincinnati & St. Louis Railroad was chartered in Virginia as a narrow-gauge railroad to run from Washington, D.C., through Elkton, Harrisonburg, and Bridgewater, Virginia to Cincinnati, Ohio. Virginians bought stock in the coporation, including many people in Rockingham County; rights of way were purchased and railbed grading began. Like similar ventures of the time, the goals of the company never bore fruit, and work halted in 1874.
In 1892, a group of promoters including Jedediah Hotchkiss incorporated to build a railway to carry coal from West Virginia mines to Gloucester Point, Virginia. Initially called the Chesapeake, Shendun, and Western Railroad, the name was quickly changed to Chesapeake & Western Railroad. Using part of the old WC&StL right-of-way, and with $150,000 from the city of Harrisonburg to ensure that the railroad would pass through it, a 26-mile single-track, standard-gauge line was completed from Elkton to Bridgewater and began operating on March 23, 1896. In the next few years, substantial C&W stock was purchased by New York investor Thomas Stokes, who hoped to develop the coal mines in western Rockingham County but became mired in financial difficulties. His brother, W.E.D Stokes, purchased control of the C&W and also organized a new railroad, the Tidewater and West Virginia, in 1900. The Tidewater changed its name in 1901 to the Chesapeake Western Railway, leased the CW line for 99 years, and in 1902 completed 13 miles of rail from Bridgewater to the new town of Stokesville in North River Gap. Trains carried passengers as well as freight between Elkton and Stokesville. Plans were drawn up to continue the line into West Virginia but were not implemented.
For just over a decade, Stokesville boomed as timber, tanbark, and to a much more limited extent, coal, in the area were exploited. Stokes operated the CW with offices in Harrisonburg until his death in 1926. His estate continued to operate the railway until 1938. In 1928, the line from Mount Solon to North River Gap was abandoned for financial reasons. In 1933, the nine miles from Bridgewater to Mount Solon were also dropped. When the Stokes' heirs put the CW up for sale in 1938, Don W. Thomas, a former Norfolk & Western Railroad employee who had been the general manager of the CW since 1926, fought a bid from Japanese scrap metal buyers and bought the line. In 1943, Thomas also bought the Baltimore & Ohio's Valley Road of Virginia line which rean between Harrisonburg and Lexington. The line south of Staunton was taken up and sold for scrap, but the road between Harrisonburg and Staunton was improved and became an important link in the CW system because of the connection with the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad at Staunton. The CW linked with the Norfolk & Western at Elkton.
In 1954, the Norfolk & Western Railroad purchased CW, but the name was retained and was operated as a separate corporation. By about 1980, however, little or no rolling stock carried the CW logo any longer. Norfolk & Western and the Southern Railway Company merged as Norfolk Southern Corporation on June 1, 1982. Not long after that merger, a five-alarm fire burned the CW office located at Chesapeake Drive in Harrisonburg on July 28, 1982, and company offices and operations were eventually absorbed by the NS. Five miles of track east of Bridgewater were removed in 1988. The CW under the control of NS serves as the Harrisonburg area's poultry feed supplier passing through the campus of James Madison University daily.
The Chesapeake Western Railway Company Records, 1916-1982, consist of 24.36 cubic feet of business records pertaining to the employees, assets, and business transactions of the company. The collection is topically arranged in seven series with the largest series first; then further arranged chronologically . Series consist of Personnel Records, Reports, Account Books, Correspondence, Blueprints and Schematics, Publications, and Miscellaneous Documents.
The collection is arranged in seven series with the largest first; then arranged further chronologically:
Personnel Records, 1929-1982 Reports, 1953-1981 Account Books, 1916-1974 Correspondence, 1976-1979 Miscellaneous Documents, 1928-1976 Publications, 1963-1977 Blueprints and Schematics, 1951-1979Series 1: Personnel Records, 1929-1982, includes payrolls and time sheets with names of employees, occupations, hours, rates, payments, and dates of employment. Also included in this series are Railroad Retirement Board forms primarily from 1930 to 1973, containing employee biographical and genealogical information.
Series 2: Reports, 1953-1981, primarily is comprised of Dispatcher and Conductor reports, with information about specific trains, routes, departure times, distances and engine numbers. Dispatchers' Record of Movement of Trains, 1973-1979, and Time Return and Delay Reports, 1975-1981, list information such as: engineers' names, train departure times, type of service, etc. Conductor Car Records and tonnage Reports include engine number, weight of trains, cargo, as well as identification of conductors and engineers on each train. Entries for Shipping logs, 1970-1977; Traffic Analyses and other shipping records, 1973-1981, are followed by Per Diem/Mileage and Transfer Books, 1953-1970, which appear to be freight and transfer records written in abbreviated code and organized alphabetically by company name.
Series 3: Account Books, 1916-1974, contains: Interline Freight Balances; Car Services Balances; Amounts Due From and To Foreign Companies on Interline Freight Accounts; Operating Expenses and REvenues and other information including shops, engine house, bridges, agents, conductors, donations, etc.; Per Diem Reclaim Records, 1952-1973; Income Statements, 1968-1971; Records of Vouchers Released, 1955-1967; Freight Car Hires, 1943-1975, summarizing car hire, passenger and freight car mileage; and Miscellaneous accounts, 1934-1951, containing detailed information of topics organized chronologically and categorically under the following headings: Operating Revenues, Freight Revenues, Rent from Locomotives, Miscellaneous Income, Maintenance, Transportation Improvements, and Statements for Depreciation for railway structures. Balance in Interline Freight Accounts, 1932-1935, lists date, items, folio number, and debits with yearly balances, organized alphabetically by account name. Car Services Balance Books, 1944-1971, record balance and payment information for interline car service accounts. Record of Amounts Due From and To Foreign Companies on Interline Freight Accounts Journals, 1930-1944, comprise both operating expenses and revenues as well as other information.
Label on front cover of bound volume reads: Returns to Valuation Orders 7, 8, and 16, Chesapeake & Western Railroad Co., Chesapeake Western Railway, Cheswick and Harmar Railroad Co., Clarendon & Pittsford Railroad Co., Connellsville & Monongahela Railway Co.
Series 4: Correspondence, 1976-1979, is comprised of a variety of topics which include land leases, shipments, track upgrades, expense reports, and business agreements in chronological order.
Series 5: Miscellaneous Documents, 1928-1982, is comprised of eclectic pieces--many relating to previous series that would be lost among more substantial predecessors. Headings under Miscellaneous include: Financial notes and documents, many handwritten, 1935-1938 and undated; a conductor's balance sheet from September 1935; Operating expenses, undated; Per Diem Reclaim Mileage Records and Record of Amounts Due From and To Foreign Companies on Interline Freight Accounts, September 1935; Reports of Interline Passenger Traffic, August 1935 [one of which contains a note in the "Remarks" column stating "CCC" perhaps indicating a one way trip to Bridgewater Station for members of the Civilian Conservation Corps.]; Documents and invoices for parts and repair, indemnity releases, etc., 1955-1976; Forms from printing companies, 1928-1968; Records of purchase for forms from local printers; Receipt books, Carload Traffic Received, Automobile Expenses Records, Forecast Statement, N&W strike letter, 3.5 acre lease letter to Virginia Electric and Power Company, 1975-1980; Staunton Textile Corporation and Celanese Corporation, 1934-1955; Miscellaneous Correspondence, freight bills, account information, etc. and Exxon records, 1974-1976.
Series 6: Publications, 1963-1977, include copies of Bullinger's Postal and Shipper's Guide for the US and Canada , 1963, which lists shipping rates, distances, etc. and Standard Transportation Commodity Code Tariff No. 1-E , November 15, 1977.
Series 7: Blueprints and Schematics, 1951-1979, contains the oversize materials: a blueprint of the railway line from 1951 and diagrams of electircal gates and signal wiring, 1961-1979.