| The Mighty O&W, A 1950's perspective of the Ontario & Western |
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| The O&W reached from New York City to the Great Lakes |
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Welcome to our New York, Ontario & Western Railroad WebSite
Here's a preview of some of the exciting projects we have put together for you: Sample Our feature article: "History of the O&W" . See some of the places that the O&W went to were Scranton , Oneida , and Sylvan Beach . Some other articles we have included on the O&W are disposition of O&W Diesels ; chasing the O&W ; could the O&W have survived? and what remains of the O&W . O&W Milk Business . We have included some general interest articles, that apply to the O&W such as head end equipment , snow on the railroad and New England Gateway, The New "Alphabet Route" . Don't miss contributions from our readers , an upcoming abandonment , the Ontario & Western in Sylvan Beach , other links and our reference section . |
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| Just Around the Corner by Bertrande H. Snell |
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Bertrande H. Snell, author of the following article, a native of Parish,
Oswego County, N.Y., was a telegrapher all his working life.
For many years he was employed by the New York Central Railroad, and for
33 years was a telegrapher for Western Union in Syracuse.
Bertrande Snell commenced his writing career with the Syracuse Syracuse Post-Standard in 1945 and continued it until shortly before his death in 1949. His columns were primarily of a reminiscent or historical nature, which included railroad stories. If you like his column, we have more. |
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Post-Standard, April 13, 1947
Just Around the Corner by Bertrande Snell Stories of the old railroad days are heartwarming and serve well as a rainbow bridge to fond memories travel - but here's a little tale which is so new that it hardly can be called history, since it happened only last month - March 26, 1947, to be exact. Ed Dayton has been station agent at Mexico for many years. In fact, his total of continuous service on the Hojack adds up to 39 years. At present, there is no night man at the Mexico station, and Ed's tour of duty is supposed to end at 5 p.m. after which time the station is unattended until 8 a.m. On the night of March 26, Ed tapped out "good night" as usual at 5 p.m., but it was storming furiously and the big rotary snowplow was on the way east from Oswego, ahead of 483, the night passenger train to Richland, so the train dispatcher asked Ed to come back at 6 p.m. to clear the passenger train which was due there about that hour. The snowplow arrived at Pulaski, leaving a clear track for 483, which arrived at Mexico at 5:20. Engineer George Lamb and Conductor Andrews came to the office and asked for clearance cards so they could proceed. "She's bad," said Engineer Lamb, "bad as any I've seen this winter - and that's going some. Them cuts'll be fillin' up fast behind the plow and if we don't get outa here quick, mebbe we won't be goin' anywhere tonight." "That's right," agreed Conductor Andrews. "Come on, Ed, ain't that plow cleared Pulaski yet?" A this moment Ed got the "clear" signal from the Pulaski operator, so he handed the trainmen their clearance cards which gave them a "highball" to Pulaski. As they started for the station door, the local telephone rang insistently and Ed answered. It was his mother, at home, who had received a call from Mrs. Wood, living near the North Street railroad crossing at the east end of the village. "There's an auto on the crossing," she announced breathlessly, "it's been stalled there quite a while and they can't move it - you better do something, quick." Well, the first thing Ed did was to leg it out of the station and catch Engineman Lamb just s he was climbing into his cab. Then they notified the conductor and all went back into the station. Ed called the train dispatcher at Oswego and explained the situation. After a little delay, the dispatcher issued orders to the train crew to ease the train down through the cut, stop at the crossing and see if they couldn't help get the auto off the track. The crossing is about a half-mile east of the station and when they got there they found the vehicle directly across the track and by this tim, so completely snowed in as to render any shoveling futile. The driver, Harry Nicholson, had sent to a neighboring farm for a team to endeavor to pull the car from its precarious position; so, leaving a flagman at the spot, the train backed to the station and waited. In the meantime, Station Agent Dayton was making frantic phone calls to the homes of section men, village officials and others, but nobody answered the calls. "I don't blame them," says Ed, "for it was a terrible night out; the snow was driving down in a heavy white blanket and the wind was howling like 40 banshees." As hey sat in the office, waiting for word from the flagman, Engineman Lamb remarked: "Here it is spring an' the storm's about as bad as any we've had since '04, the time everything was tied up tight from Salina to Watertown. I was brakin' on the Watertown local at that time an' we got to Mallory about 3 a.m. an' we stayed right there for a week. For three days o' that time, there wasn't no telegraph wires either." "Wind blowed 'em down, eh?" suggested Dayton. "Nope: the cut just west o' Mallory was plugged so full of snow that it was piled up three feet above the tops o' the poles an' grounded th' danged wires." 'Why, you star-spangled, nickel plated liar," exploded Conductor Andrews, "why you oughta be -" But at this point, the flagman trudged in from the cut and reported the crossing clear. The delayed train went its way and Ed went home. As he plodded through the fierce storm his mind was busy recapitulating the events of the evening. He was forced to the conclusion that the strenuous days of railroading are not all in the past, as some of our latter-day romancers would have us believe. "If," ruminated Ed. "that phone call had been two minutes later, the train would have been on its way east and the way the snow is blowing through that cut, they never would have seen the car on the track and would have run right into it. What might have happened then is anybody's guess; but the rails were in such a condition that a derailment would have been most probable - and lives might have been lost." Ed has little to say about his own quick thinking in this episode; but he is loud in praise of "Grandma" Dayton, Mrs. Wood and telephone operator, Bessie Cross. Anyway, he claims last winter was the worst he has ever seen since the blizzard of 1888, during which convulsion of nature he was born at New Milford, Conn. |
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Harvard Professor John R. Stilgoe states that: ‘Train travel will supplant highway and air travel in the next few decades.
Furthermore,
electric railroads
will increasingly be used to distribute freight items as well as mail and express packages.’
According to Stilgoe the three prime factors driving railroad development are population growth, rising gas prices, and advanced technology. “In the 1930s it was possible to order a fridge in the morning and have it delivered by train later the same day,” says Stilgoe. “Americans forgot about this, but we’re starting to put it back together.” Stilgoe slso wrote an excellent yet overlooked book on railroads and the built environment shaped by them called Metropolitan Corridor:Railroads and the American Scene that I highly recommend. Whats most interesting is that the book is 6 months old and already much has changed in that brief time to further move us toward a new era of the train and seemingly away from our old era of the highway and sprawl, particularly with respect to the financial crisis, foreclosure mess, high gas prices, politics of "change" and global warming awareness. |
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Not only can you
search hotels by city, but you can search by
your favorite chain of hotels.
We can find all the best hotels in Nice, Cannes, or Monaco,. Going to Orlando or Philadelphia or wherever, we can find all the best hotels at the best rates!!! |
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In September, 2006: The NYSW has issued a public notice listing the
following rail lines which it "anticipates will be the subject of an
abandonment or discontinuance application to be filed within three years:"
1. NYSW Utica Main Line between Chenango Forks & Sangerfield in NY, MP202.62 - MP 263.50. 2. Fay Street Branch in Utica, NY, MP 284.80 - 285.22. The Fay Street branch runs north from Oswego Street, parallelling the Rt 12 / 8 / 5 arterial. The only industry that it serves / served is the USDA bonded warehouse on Fay St. The last time it was served was back around 1986 - 1988. The switch point was pulled up about 4 years ago. The Fay Street Branch is NYO&W vintage. After the demise of the O&W the DL&W served this side till it was absorbed into Conrail. |
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The Global Highway: Interchange to Everywhere A portal to the World. The Global Highway leads everywhere! Follow it to wherever you might want to go. We have something for everyone! |
| Contributions from our Readers | |||
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The last Ontario & Western
milk came, most likely, from Pleasant Mount
(Dairyman's League)on the Scranton Division, ca. 1952.
The "Long Milk" operated from Oneida to Weehawken but was gone by the 1940s.
Honneckers' Dairy shipped on the O&W from Sherburne Four Corners, NY,
in specialized containers on modified flat cars developed by the
O&W and Motor Terminals, Inc., of Middletown, NY, to N. Bergen, NJ; --
a distance of 278 [timetable] miles. Contributed June, 2006 by Mal Houck |
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Once upon a time, milk trains were important New York Central Milk Business Creamery in South Columbia, New York There were two basic types of milk trains – the very slow all-stops local that picked up milk cans from rural platforms and delivered them to a local creamery, and those that moved consolidated carloads from these creameries to big city bottling plants. Individual cars sometimes moved on lesser trains. These were dedicated trains of purpose-built cars carrying milk. Early on, all milk was shipped in cans, which lead to specialized "can cars" with larger side doors to facilitate loading and unloading (some roads just used baggage cars). In later years, bulk carriers with glass-lined tanks were used. Speed was the key to preventing spoilage, so milk cars were set up for high speed service, featuring the same types of trucks, brakes, communication & steam lines as found on passenger cars. |
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Greenland's ice caps are melting! Find out more about Global Warming at our Ominous Ecology WebSite. |
| We can find you tickets for all the great music, sports and cultural events. We have the best prices and most availability of any ticket seller. |
VISIT OUR TICKET BOOTH |
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Head End Railway Express and Railway Post Office |
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On passenger trains, railroads operated lots of equipment other than
sleepers, coaches, dining cars, etc. This equipment was generally
called
'head-end' equipment, these 'freight' cars were at one time
plentiful and highly profitable for the railroads.
In the heyday of passenger service, these industries were a big part
of the railroad's operations, and got serious attention. We have text and pictures not found elsewhere on the Web. |
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Railroads and Snow
See some historic photographs of the railroads in snow. Rotary plows in snow! Great stories of railroad action in Winter! |
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JAZZ ON THE FRENCH RIVIERA
Sidney Bechet (1897-1959) Bechet's style of playing clarinet and soprano sax dominated many of the bands that he was in. He played lead parts that were usually reserved for trumpets and was a master of improvisation. Many African-American jazz musicians came to France and to the French Riviera because of the warm and friendly reception of the French people. Because the Riviera is an "outdoors" place, the "jazz festival" was born. In France, there are over 250 jazz festivals: mostin July and August, and most in the French Riviera. Bechet summered many years in Juan-les-Pins on the French Riviera. A statue there, presented by the city of New Orleans, commemorates his life. |
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Troop Train Photo Album
Photos of a trip from Texas to New York City (World War II) as an armored division brings its equipment and troops to the port. |
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Special Research Section on the Lake Ontario Shore Railroad. This section contains information that is unpublished elsewhere! In the early 1870's, the Lake Ontario Shore Railroad had been built from Oswego along the shore of Lake Ontario to the Niagara River (Suspension Bridge). It bypassed Rochester, had no manufacturing industries and first became part of the Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburgh which was acquired by the New York Central. |
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JWH Rapid Response Temporary Housing Our containers will make a great summer camping. We can make your summer camp a great looking building. All the comforts of home at a much less cost. |
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| Garbage Trucks |
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| See another "Alphabet Route" that used the Ontario & Western to connect Maybrook to the DL&W and Lehigh Valley. |
Nice, France Weather |
Mexico City Weather |
Philadelphia Weather |
Saint Tropez Weather |
Montreal Weather |
| Find out more about vacations in Nice, France | Find out more about vacations in Mexico City | Find out more about vacations in Philadelphia | Find out more about vacations in Saint-Tropez | Find out more about vacations in Montreal and the Laurentian Mountains |
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Find
weather around the World
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Temperature and forecasts for hundreds of cities.
See adverse weather conditions. Upcoming storms, snow, tornados, hurricanes. Check out our special weather forecasts for the French Riviera!!! Visit our Travel Reservations and Information Center and see our CRUISE section. Make Hotel Reservations as well as rental cars. Book a ferry from Nice to Corsica. Rent Vacation Homes. |
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Railroads On The Rebound |
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Over the last 50+ years, railroads have changed a lot. Now they are about to change again.
It is all about a combination of economic factors and climate factors. Since 1950 , railroads have consolidated. Freight moved from a "box car mentality" to a "unit train,mentality". Passenger went from a robust business to a "caretaker" arrangement called AMTRAK. This happened as everybody could drive for free on the Interstate Highway System or fly on an airline system where the government subsidized both airlines and airports. In the meantime, railroad express and railroad post offices went "down the tubes". The old Post Office Department and the Railway Express Agency could not adjust to the new way. UPS and Fex Ex could. |
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Carbon Calculator
What's the most environmentally-friendly way to transport goods? The answer is freight rail. The EPA estimates that every ton-mile of freight that moves by rail instead of by highway reduces greenhouse emissions by two-thirds. But what does that really mean? Our easy-to-use carbon calculator will estimate the amount of carbon dioxide that can be prevented from entering our environment just by using freight rail instead of trucks. We'll even tell you how many seedlings you'd need to plant to have the same effect. |
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There is a
"Snow Belt"
in New York State that runs above Syracuse and Utica.
It goes East from Oswego to at least Boonville. Here's the station at Boonville.
Find out more about Weather around the World Ominous Weather is about more than weather. Its about our environment. Its about our social issues that need to be surfaced if we want to save our environment. See Champions of our Environment like Al Gore SAS le Prince Albert II de Monaco John R. Stilgoe Ralph Nader. We have addressed several railroad-related projects that will conserve fuel and lessen pollution. Our Window on Europe spotlights projects that can help the rest of the World. We have other environmental sites on garbage trucks and Rapid response temporary shelters / portable housing. |
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Traveling in Europe? You will probably need to make a FERRY RESERVATION. Stop by and see our Reservations Center. |
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