The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-08-15
THE sEABOARO DEAL.
The Manufacturers record speaks Cptimisti
cally of the arrangement

In a double loaded editorial the Manu-
facturers' Record speaks optimistlcally Of
the new arrangement. 1t says:
THE magnificent courage and ability OF
John Shelton Williams and j. w. hidden
dorf, which have enabled them during the
last few years to weld lot of disjonted
roads into the compact system known as
the Seaboard Air Line, find, so far as the
South is concerned, a fitting climax in the
deal which makes the Seaboard a part of
the great Rock Island and Frisco sys
tenn. The work of Messrs Williams and
Middendorf has been great power for
the good of the South, and it will be gra
tifying to know that their connection with
the Seaboard, and thus with the railroad
interests of the South, is not changed. In
fact, the combination brings to the Sea
board financial and traffic connections
which must have a very important bear
ing on the upbuilding of the South. With
the wide ramifications III railroad and
financial circles of the Rock Island group
of capitalists a new influence is brought
into Southern development which will ne
cessarly have stimulating effect upon
the trend of capital southwark the in
dustrial upbuilding of this section, and
the movement of Western freight through
Southern ports. With this combination
added to the movement of the Goulds in
the Southwest and tending to the Central
South and the Illinois .Ceptras plans for
getting into the Alabama coal and iron
regions, the South becomes the theater of
the greatest railroad activities of the day
This combination, moreover, is the logical
outcome of plans which were formed when
the Kansas City, Memphis and Birmng-
ham line, now a part OF the Rock Island
and Frisco system, was projected many
years ago. When that road was built
from Kansas City to Birmingham, its
owners looked to Savannah as it's eastern
eIminus, never intending to stop at
Birmingham, but they were in advance of
the times, and the system halted for some
years at Birmingham. 1T has. been re-
garded as almost inevitable that either
through connection with the SeabOard
the two meeting at Birmingham, or else
through an independent line, this road
would have to find an outlet at South At
lantic and Gulf ports in order to handle
its share of the rapidly-expanding West
ern traffic seeking a foreign outlet
through Southern ports. The Seaboard
now becomes, through its interest in the
Washington Southern Railway and
through its connections at Southern ports,
extending from Baltimore to Norfolk,
Wilmington, Savannah, Jacksonville and
FeTnandina, the Southern and Eastern
outlet for the traffic of many thousands
OF miles of road operating through the
most populous and well-developed agri-
cultural and industrial sections of the
great West and Southwest. In developing
the Seaboard to the point where it has
become this essential factor in so great a
combination, Messrs. Williams and Mid
dendorf have rendered to the South an
| invaluable service, and now IN effectlng
such combination they have given to
Southern development the greatest stimu-
lation which it has had in the last decade"