The Washington herald., 1915-01-23
HISTORY BUILDERS
A Railroad Prediction of the Last
Century.
Written Expressly for The Washington HeTald)
By DIR. e. J. EDWARDS.

By DIR. e. J. EDWARDS.
Commodore Vanderbilt was always
greatly interested in a popular feature
OF American railroad development, and
1t was one which he had carefully
studied" said the late Charles c. Clarke
who was an intimate friend Of Commo-
dore Vanderbilt, and even more intimate
with his son, William H. Vanderbilt, to
me at a time when there was some
thought of establishing a through rail-
road line from the Atlantic to the Pacific
under single control.
THE time is far distant, in my opinion, -
continued Mr.. Clarke, when the dream
of the Vanderbilts, or Jay Gould, or that
of c. 2. Huntington for a continuous uni
fed railroad line from the Atlantic to
the Pacific will be realized, but 1 believe
that by and by, perhaps thirty or forty
years hence, a line Of that kind will be
established.
THE commodore noticed two or three
years before he began railroad activities
that the universal tendency OF railroad
development in the United States was
across the country from east to west, or
vice versa. That, he once told me, was
so from the beginning. He said that men
of capital of Boston recognized that when
they undertook to build a railroad frpm
Boston to Albany. an east and west line.
AleAdHutI bEO"i, OF baltlmOre, FOUNDER
OF the great international banking house,
pointed out only a year or two after
Stephenson invented his locomotive en-
gine that the future of Baltimore de-
pended upon running railroad from that
city across the mountains TO the Ohio
valley. The Erie Railroad was UNDER
taken long after the Baltimore and Ohio
was completed because 1t was realized
that it order to protect New York City
1t was necessary to run a railroad line
directly from the Hudson to 4 harbor
upon the Great Lakes.
John NJ. Forbes, of Boston, realized
that the development OF the United
States, so far as it was dependent upon
railroad construction, compelled the
building of railroads along parallels OF
latitude. Therefore, he completed the
Michigan Central and he began imme-
diately the construction of a railroad
from Chicago to the Missouri River,
which was the germ Of what became the
Burlington system. There is only one
important north and south railroad in
the United States and that is TIE Illinois
Central and its allies.
The commodore reasoned, therefore,
that for him, at least, if he were to carry
out his plans it was necessary that he
extend his railroad system from tie east
first to Chicago and then, in Whatever
way seemed feasible, farther west. That
explains why he became inteI estsd in the
Chicago and Northwestern. He once told
me that this building of the east and
west line was inevitable because the
products Of the farms OF the greac west
had to be moved from the harvest fields
to the markets, and these we're upon the
Atlantic coast. The commodore believed
that at some day there would he devel-
Oped two or three great railroad systems
whose lines would run north anI south.
He did not live long enough tn See his
prediction fulfilled, but l have. AMI l
think 1t is more likely, that a line under
one management and ownership stretch
ing from the Canadian boundary 10 the
Gulf of Mexico will be Quilt within a
few years than that a line Under une
management and ownership will stretch
from the Atlantic to the Pacific until
years have passed.
Copyright, 1915. By (. J. Edwards. An rights
saTTed.l
Monday Dr. Edwards will tell