The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-12-16
THE STORY OF. THE
 MONTGOMERY RAILROADS
BY w. W. soREws. JR.

pretty little triangular park
 which had been given to
 the city of Montgomery by the
 late Dr. James Douglass. It was the
 only park in Montgomery in Those days
 and was a breathing place and favorite playground for children sas well as grownups. The Plant System needed it,
 however. for tracks and It had 10 go before the steady march of improva-
 ment which was rolling over that part of town like restless flood, many old
 landmarks being swept away. Again
 railroad matters got Into the courts. favorite place for the railroads in those
 days. and chain of litigation follow ed over the old Douglass Park matter.
 Finally the Plant people and Major Dunham had their way and Douglass Park. shade trees and grassy lawn.
 followed the band waEon-acknowled- Red the supremacy of the steam show el--and soon was graded down to a level with Moulton street. The old Cowles home now stood proudly on island. cuts thirty and forty feet deep had been made on the east on the west
 and in front of 1t. and it occupied an emlnence between twenty and thirty feet in height
 All this time the Mobile and Ohio was building the road that 1t had bought from the old Montgomery Tuscaloosa and Memphis. It was completed then
 nearly all the way from Tuscaloosa to where the road was to cross the Alabama river about seven miles below Montgomery. From Montgomery. the track was about completed to this side of the river. and there they stuck for
 a ear or so. waiting on the bridge. The plans and specifications for that bridge were to make it one Of the most mod
 edn affairs of the kind in the South Major MerriWether was Chief Engi- | n nd the Edgemore Bridge Company had the contract for building the bridge. It was finished in the year 1S97 and a better bridge even now. 1t would be
 hard to find. than the one that the present Mobile and Ohio gets into Mont
 gomery over
 The intention originally was for the
 Mobile and Ohio to use the old Seelye right of way as a means of getting ln- to Montgomery. but they finally built their own tracks and the trolley line
 was left undisturbed, bemg now a part of the Montgomery Traction Compa- ny. They were destined to find lots
 of trouble before they got into Mont
 gomerY. both the Louisville and Nash vile and Western Railroads. all one family then, were looking with jeal- ouS eyes at the efforts ot the young
 ster to get to Montgomery and into
 territory which they then controlled Clay Street Context.
 The key to the whole situation was
 right at the foot of Clay street where
 the Mobile and Montgomery, Western Selma division-and Alabama Midland tracks converged and entered the mouth of the cut laeding to the union sta tion. The Western claimed that pro
 posed track of the Mobile and Ohio
 would be on it's right Of way. and this
 was the beginning of the celebrated.
 Rattle of Clay Street" The Mobile and Ohio was trying to put in a cross
 ing and get into the tracks leading
 to the railroad cut and the union de-
 pot The Western and Louisville and Nashville did not intend to let them do it without a fight and the Alabama Mid land or Plant System was quiescent, though really in sympathy with the Mobile and Ohio. The first gun of the
 war was fired. Sunday afternoon. May
 10. 1897. At o'clock that afternoon the Western force backed several boxes on the track in front or where J. N