map]]
The ('''B&O''') is one of the
Oldest Railroads In The United States , with an original line from the port of
Baltimore, Maryland west to the
Ohio River at
Wheeling, West Virginia and
Parkersburg, West Virginia . It is now part of the
CSX network, and includes the oldest operational railroad bridge in the world. The B&O also coincidentally included the
Leiper Railroad , the first permanent railroad in the U.S.
The railroad's former shops in Baltimore, including the Mt. Clare
Roundhouse , now house the
B&O Railroad Museum .
Two men — , passed
February 28 ,
1827 , and the state of
Virginia on
March 8 ,
1827 , chartered the , with the task of building a railroad from the port of
Baltimore, Maryland west to a suitable point on the
Ohio River . The railroad, formally incorporated
April 24 , was intended to provide an alternative, faster, route for
Midwestern goods to reach the
East Coast than the seven-year-old, hugely successful, but slow
Erie Canal across
Upstate New York . Thomas was elected as the first president and Brown the treasurer. The capital of the proposed company was fixed at five million dollars.
1
Construction began on
July 4 ,
1828 , and the first section, from Baltimore west to
Ellicott's Mills (now known as
Ellicott City ), opened on
May 24 ,
1830 . Further extensions opened to
Frederick (including the short
Frederick Branch )
December 1 ,
1831 ,
Point Of Rocks April 2 ,
1832 ,
Sandy Hook December 1 ,
1834 (the connection to the
Winchester And Potomac Railroad at
Harpers Ferry opening in
1837 ),
Martinsburg May
1842 ,
Hancock June
1842 ,
Cumberland November 5 ,
1842 ,
Piedmont July 21 ,
1851 ,
Fairmont June 22 ,
1852 and its terminus at
Wheeling, West Virginia (then part of
Virginia ) on
January 1 ,
1853 .
On
July 20 ,
1877 there were bloody
Riot s in
Baltimore, Maryland from Baltimore and Ohio Railroad workers. Nine rail workers were killed at the hands of the
Maryland Militia . The next day workers in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania staged a
Sympathy Strike that was also met with an assault by the state militia; Pittsburgh then erupted into widespread rioting.
The
Pennsylvania Railroad acquired the
Philadelphia, Wilmington And Baltimore Railroad in the early
1880s , cutting off the B&O's access to
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania . The B&O chartered the
Philadelphia Branch in Maryland and the
Baltimore And Philadelphia Railroad in Delaware and Pennsylvania and built a parallel route, finished in
1886 . The
Baltimore Belt Railroad , opened in
1895 , connected the main line to the Philadelphia Branch without the need for a
Car Ferry across the
Patapsco River , but the cost of its
Howard Street Tunnel drove the B&O to bankruptcy in
1896 .
The
Chesapeake And Ohio Railroad took control of the B&O in
1963 , and incorporated it, along with the
Western Maryland Railway , into the
Chessie System in
1973 . In
1980 , the Chessie System merged with the
Seaboard System Railroad to create
CSX . In
1986 , the B&O finally went out of existence when it formally merged with the C&O (which itself formally merged with CSX later that same year).
At the height or railroading's golden age, the B&O was one of several trunk lines uniting the northeast quadrant of the United States into an industrial zone. It marked the southern border and corresponded to the New York Central's marking of the northern border. The Pennsy and the Erie railroads worked the center. The corners of this map are Baltimore in the southeast, Albany in the northeast, Chicago in the northwest, and St. Louis in the southwest.
When construction began on the B&O in the
1820s , railroad engineering was in its infancy. Unsure of exactly which materials would suffice, the B&O erred on the side of sturdiness and built many of its early structures of
Granite . Even the track bed to which
Iron strap rail was affixed consisted of the stone.
Though the granite soon proved too unforgiving and expensive for track, most of the B&O's bridges have survived until the present, and many are still in active railroad use by CSX. Baltimore's
Carrollton Viaduct , named in honor of
Charles Carroll Of Carrollton (who laid the cornerstone), was the B&O's first bridge, and is the world's oldest railroad bridge still in use. The
Thomas Viaduct in
Relay, Maryland was the longest bridge in the United States upon its completion in
1835 , and remains in use as well. The B&O made extensive use of the
Bollman Iron Truss Bridge in the mid-1800s; its durability and ease of assembly aided faster railroad construction.
(©2001 A.E. Crane, courtesy of
byways.org ).]]
;Washington
In
1831 a law was passed in Maryland, enabling the B&O to build its
Washington Branch , connecting Baltimore to the national capital of
Washington, D.C. This opened in
1835 , and later served as a terminus for the
Annapolis And Elk Ridge Railroad to
Annapolis .
;Mount Airy
;Frederick
The
Frederick Branch was built as part of the original line, opening on
December 1 ,
1831 . The continuation of the main line from
Frederick Junction opened
April 2 ,
1832 .
;Metropolitan
The Metropolitan Branch was opened in the early 1870s. It leaves the District of Columbia and proceeds northwest through
Montgomery County , joining the B&O main line at
Point Of Rocks . It serves as a bypass around Baltimore and is still in active use.
;Georgetown
The line was operated in some manner from 1889 until 1985 when it was proposed for abandonment; it served basically as a minor freight spur carrying
Coal and building materials to local outlets in
Chevy Chase ,
Bethesda and
Georgetown . It was originally built with the intention of connecting to southern railroads to compete with the
Pennsylvania Railroad 's
Long Bridge , but no bridge across the
Potomac River was ever built. The abandoned right-of-way is now used as the
Capital Crescent Trail .
