The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1876-02-24

I4Nu VI ON LIE ROEpI IOAN--H LLL II Ia '
WHEELING, Feb. Z, 1S76.-Last Tuesday
the Directors of the Wheeling and Lake
Erie Railroad Company met at Alliance
and adjourned to Youngstown, wherethey
held session that evening. The ques-
of gauge has been for some months a
matter of reflection and discussion among
the parties interested, and it was gener-
ally understood that the matter would
be settled at that meeting, and every
body had been diligently examining the
cries, statistics, engineers reports and
the like with reference to wise action.
We had felt and witnessed the effect
of the panic, had seen many old railroads
rotting down and many new one strang-
led. We had observed the combinations
of railroads to keep freights up, and the
combinations of shippers to keep them
down, when these two interests should
in reason, have been one. In the histo-
ry of the
PAST AND PRESENT.
we saw much of the substance of the
shipper and capitalist exhausted to build
the standard gauge and then further ex-
hausted in paying enormous freights and
expenses for maintenance of way. The
seventy thousand mi es of railroad in the
United States are not paying interest on
their Indebtedness to say nothing Of div
idends on their stock.
We had seen the futility of legislation
in aid of cheap transportation, and that
it was dead letter when in conflict with
the immutable laws of demand and sup
ply.
At the threshold of the crash we had
called a substantial halt and thence hus-
banded our local resources, and in the
light of the prostraion of railroad securi-
ties and of that necessity which is the
mother of invention, we earnestly en-
quired what is best? The officers of the
PAINEsvILLE YOUNGSTOWN RAILROAD
had invited our officers and directors and
any of their guests to take round trip of
observation over their line on Wednes-
day and Thursday. At Youngstown we
were met by Miles r. Martin, General
Manager, and F. McAleer, Superintend-
ent of the P. & Y. Railroad, and on
Wednesday morning special train was
placed at our disposal in charge of Mr..
McAleer, an old employee of the B. C o.
road and personally known to Mr. List,
Mr.. Quigg, aud other old citizens of our
city.
Armed with prejudice, inexperieuce,
and ideal notions of a new road and mar
row-gauge, some of our party no doubt
approached the waiting train with vi
sionS of
TIGHT SQUEEZING
and rough and tumble riding.
We inspected the track, the engine, the
wheels, the height, width, length, "heft,"
and general make up of the whole bust
ness with something of the curiosity Of
the boy who first saw old Gen. Taylor,
about whom he had heard so much that
he imagined him living wonder, but
whom he found to be "only a man." Our
sobriety and propriety exceeded that at
Brussels preceding Waterloo, but we
Walked to and fro
In the beautiful snow"
Approached the car gingerly
Oped the door tenderly.
Examined each bolt and seam
Measured both Rftand beam,
Seating capacity
Tested audaciously,
Putting o. and Nice,
Weighing 423
In one seat together,
Where they sat-handsomely.
Thus seated we
STARTED FOR PAINEsvILLE.
Colonel Robinson of Ravenna, Civil
Engineer; General Mckee, Engineer and
Contractor; and Jas. Farmer, the rail-
way veteran of Cleveland were also in
our party, and at Painesville, N. V. Dren-
men, editor of the Ohio Valley Ne,vS, joined
US.
Mr. Farmer is pioneer in theoretical
narrow-gauge, and at large mass meet
ing held in Akron in January, 1872, in
the interest Of the Valley Railway then
prospecting, was the only man with the
grit and wisdom to publicly favor mar
row-gauge. / was at that meeting and
the balance of us, if five or six hundred
may be called balance after subtract
ing one, were from ignorance, prejudice
or other cause, against narroW-gauge.
How or prejudices do govern the obec-
tive case, and how frequently we allow
them to obscure the path of mechanical,
commercial, financial, social and political
reform
The mental and moral habits of men
curve for themselves a narrow groove,
whence light and things of larger growth
are excluded. We hold on to that which
lis old because it is old, We reject that
which seems new to us because it is new,
even when it is founded on the soundest
laws OF science or mechanics-and our
reasoning is analogous to
"0ur old COW she crossed the road
Because she crossed the road SIR
And the reason why she crossed the road
Was because she crossed the road, sir"
Every facility for seeing and testing the
general and special features of narrow
gauge, and gaining information was given
us by Mr. McAleer, Horace Steel. a direc-