Puneet Varma (Editor)

1879 in rail transport

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This article lists events related to rail transport that occurred in 1879.

Contents

January events

  • January 28 – Construction of the Waimea Plains Railway, the first railway constructed under the District Railways Act of 1878, reaches Inverrcagill, New Zealand.

    • February events

  • February 10 – The Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railway begins freight operations.

    • May events

  • May – James J. Hill forms the St. Paul, Minneapolis and Manitoba Railway from the assets of the bankrupt St. Paul and Pacific.
  • May 17 – The Texas and St. Louis Railway, a predecessor of St. Louis Southwestern Railway, is organized as a way to ship cotton south to Texas.
  • May 31 – The first electric railway opens at the Berlin Trades Exposition.

    • July events

  • July 4 – The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, building southwestward from Kansas, reaches Las Vegas, New Mexico.
  • July 31 – The Caledonian Railway opens the original Glasgow Central station in Scotland.

    • November events

  • November 1 – The first British dining car service leaves Leeds for London King's Cross. This was provided by the Pullman car Princess of Wales which accommodated only 10 first-class passengers.
  • November 20 – Narrow gauge Sandy River Railroad completed to Phillips, Maine.
  • November 22 – The North Pennsylvania Railroad begins operating the Philadelphia, Newtown and New York Railroad, a subsidiary of Pennsylvania Railroad.
  • November 25 – The Waldenburgerbahn was founded as a separate company and took over the concession for the railway from Liestal to Waldenburg, Switzerland.

    • December events

  • December 28 – Tay Bridge disaster: The North British Railway's Tay Bridge across the Firth of Tay in Scotland collapses in a violent storm while a passenger train is crossing it. 75 lives are lost. William Topaz McGonagall produces his epic poem The Tay Bridge Disaster to commemorate the event.

    • Unknown date events

  • Southern Pacific Railroad engineers experiment with the first oil-fired steam locomotives.

    • March births

  • March 6 – Patrick H. Joyce, president Chicago Great Western Railway 1931-1946, is born (d. 1946).

    • April births

  • April 24 – Oris Paxton Van Sweringen, American financier who, with his brother Mantis, controlled the Nickel Plate Road and other eastern railroads (d. 1936).

    • October births

  • October 18 – Charles Eugene Denney, president of Erie Railroad 1929-1939, Northern Pacific Railway 1939-1950, is born.

    • Unknown date births

  • Ralph Budd, president of the Great Northern Railway 1919-1932 and Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad 1932-1949 (d. 1962).

    • References

    1879 in rail transport Wikipedia
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