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CHAPTER 4

The Railroad A SHORT HISTORY OF THE BALTIMO RE & OHIO RAILROA D Previous to the building of the B&O Railroad and the C&O Canal, the only east-west trade route of this region was the old National Road Oater U.S. 40) to and from Baltimore. As the condition of the road deteriorated and east-west trade grew, it became apparent that a better trade route must be developed. The first answer to this was the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Company, which set out to construct a canal along the Potomac River from Georgetown to the Ohio River. On fact, the canal never reached beyond Cumberland .) Fearing the canal would divert to Washington the trade which formerly went by the National Road to Baltimore, interests there saw this as a greatthreat, and ideas to prevent such a loss were sought. Some wanted to build a branch of the C&O Canal to Baltimore, but were convinced by engineers that such a plan was impractical. As Baltimore needed a new land route, a charter was granted on February 28, 1827, and on April 24 of that year, a group of bankers and merchants formally incorporate d the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company to build a line of railroad from Baltimore to an unspecified point on the Ohio River.The building of a railroad, particularly over the rocky terrain the B&O covers, was a novel idea. It was a precedent; therefore all facets of its development were truly created by the B&O, the only available help being bits of information from England. The B&O Railroad and the C&O Canal started construction on the same day. On July 4, 1828, the cornerstone of the B&O was laid at Mount Clare, christened by Charles Carrol of Carrollton, the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence; in Georgetown, President John Quincy Adams turned the first shovel of ground for the C&O Canal. The B&O's first stretch of track, running thirteen miles along the Patapsco River to Ellicott's Mills, was open in two years. The first railroad

consisted of cars drawn by horses; steam came into use in 1830, with the purchase of Peter Cooper's "Torn Thumb," so named due to its size. The Torn Thumb was put to work on the Ellicott's Mills line, pulling a car of 24 passengers at twelve miles per hour. Fearing competition from this mode of transportation, a stagecoach line challenged the Torn Thumb to a race to Ellicott' s Mills and back. The first trip it broke a leather strap and the horse won. This, however, did little harm to the B&O' s business. The design of locomotives improved rapidly. The B&O Railroad and the C&O Canal were fiercely competitive from the beginning, and when the two finally met at Point of Rocks (C&O reaching there in 1831, B&O in 1832), this competition brought about a lawsuit which stopped the progress of both for a year. At Point of Rocks, there was only enough land between the river and the cliffs for one right-ofway. The C&O had claimed this strip of land, but the B&O took it. The lawsuit resulted in the giving of the land to the C&O, and the B&O was forced to bore tunnels through the cliffs at Point of Rocks and Catoctin, further delaying its progress. When the B&O got to Berlin, it simply passed through, leaving only a tool shed and a small section gang, and went on to Martinsburg, West Virginia, where it built major yards. The C&O had much greater effect on Berlin than the B&O for the first fifty-five years of their existence here. Berlin became a small trade center for the canal, and its populaltion tripled (to 300) due to the canal. The B&O and the canal continued on their courses, the B&O reaching Cumberlan d in 1842, the C&O following in 1850. The service of the railroad, haphazard at first, continued to improve. The Civil War, though, interrupted the growth of the B&O due to Maryland's location, as the military placed an embargo on trade in Baltimore and the Confederate Army repeatedly cut the B&O 47