The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-12-16

ed to one of the highest places on the great Plant System-General Manager of the entire system.
 The old Same Road.
 shrewd railroad men all over the county had begun to realize the impor- tance of Montgomery as strategic point. Over in Americus, Ga, a gem tleman by the name of Hiram Hawkins had secured a charter from the States of Alabama and Georgia for a railroad to run from Montgomery to Americus. Ga. and eventually through to Savan- nah. The road was called the "Savan- nah, Americus and Montgomery" and never will the days of the old sam road be forgotten. The first office in Montgomery was in a low, ramshackle frame building on the north side of Commerce street, between Tallapoosa and Bibb streets. John Demipg, for- merly of Evergreen, was the local agent of the road with Colonel A. Pope, general freight and passenger agent. and Cecil Gabbett, general manager. The first train got into Montgomery on the seventeenth day of Juna, 1891, one year after the Alabama Midland bad entered Montgomery and been absorb ed by MT. Plants gigantic combination.
 The Sam" had by that time bought lot of real estate in Montgomery, purchasing a big lot of land known as the old "Clisby Park in the northwes- tern part of the city and using 1t for yards and terminals. On the corner of Jefferson and North Lawrence streets was a magnificent ante-bellum home which with the land belonging to it. the "Sam" bought intending to use 1t for offices and other terminals, just as the Plant System had bought the paIa- tial home from Captain W. H. Graves .n UN1IVo Jefferson street place was z then the property of O. c. Nelson, Who sold 1t for $50, ,0o0--$30, 900 cash and two notes on the First National Bank for SIC, 900 each.
 The road afterwards vent into in- solvency and was never able to take Tp the notes which the bank has held with mortgage on the old place ever since, selling the place just a few weeks ago to local mercantile firm for $2s,O00 getting $S,000 interest on the notes given in 1889.
 In the year 1898 the old Sam" changed hands and name, Jokn Skelton Williams and a party of Eastern capi- talists getting hold of if and changing RaLroad' and becoming Q few years afterwards one of the links of the Sea- board Air Line system,
 Beginning of M. and o.
 About the time that Colonel Haw- kins was getting the charter for the "Sam," a company was formed and charters secured in Alabama. Mississip- pi and other places for a railroad call- ed the Montgomery. Tuscaloosa and Memphis The Hanover Construction Company, with J. W. Woolfolk Pres- ident and R L.. Farrow Chief Engineer, were to build the road, and construc- tion work was commenced at a lively pace in 1888.
 The original Montgomery. Tuscaloosa and Memphis Railroad Company fell into the financial slough. and a few years afterwards was bought by tht Mobile and Ohio Railroad. Col. E T.. Russell of Mobile was President of tile Mobile and Ohio and his object was to get line of his own rails from the main line of his road at Artesia. Mss. to Montgomery This would give Hm direct connection from St. Louis to Florida, conecting at Montgomery With the Alabama Midland Just at thIs time the entire face of the earth was undergoing a transformation in the western part of Montgomery. The late Dr. Seelye had a number of years be-
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