March 5, 1832 The New Castle & Frenchtown Railroad begins regular daily revenue service. Passenger boats transfer their passengers to the railroad from stagecoaches, forming a through stage-boat-rail line between Philadelphia and Baltimore. During its entire existence, the NC&F is closed from December through March when steamboats are stopped by the ice.
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March 5, 1850 The Louisville & Nashville Railroad is chartered.
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March 5, 1859 The Martinsville & Franklin reorganizes as the Franklin & Martinsville (later Big Four, NYC). Traffic is so sparse on the line that it will see no trains for the next seven years.
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March 5, 1872 George Westinghouse Jr. receives patent No. 124,405 for the automatic railroad air brake.
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March 5, 1879 The Grand Rapids & Indiana leases the Allegan & South Eastern Railroad. The line has track laid from Allegan to Monteith, and unfinished portions between Monteith and the Ohio State line. The lease is retroactive to January 1.
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March 5, 1880 The first through Cincinnati Southern (later CNO&TP, NS) passenger train departs Cincinnati OH for Chattanooga TN. In the newspaper article covering the story, the reporter dubs the train the "Chattanooga Choo Choo¡±, the first use of the phrase.
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March 5, 1888 The Toledo, Ann Arbor & Lake Michigan Railway is organized to build from Cadillac to Frankfort MI.
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March 5, 1920 The Milwaukee Railroad completes the electrification of its line between Othello and Tacoma, WA, 207 miles.
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March 5, 1927 Great Northern runs its first electric train using its new single-phase system, from Skykomish to the old Cascade Tunnel.
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March 5, 1930 The Pennsylvania Railroad holds a "Golden Spike" ceremony at 41st St. in Chicago to mark the upgrading of the New York-Chicago main line to 130-pound rail.
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March 5, 1972 The last "Birney" streetcar in regular service is retired in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia.
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March 6, 1830 Colonel Stephen H. Long constructs a road bridge over the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. It is the first known road bridge to cross a railroad.
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March 6, 1834 The London & Gore Railroad in Upper Canada receives its charter; the first railroad charter in what is now Ontario. Running between Niagara Falls and Windsor, it will be later part of the Great Western, Grand Trunk and Canadian National Railways.
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March 6, 1880 The Cincinnati, Indianapolis, St. Louis & Chicago Railroad (later NYC) is incorporated.
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March 6, 1882 Regular service begins between Cincinnati OH and Dayton on the Cincinnati Northern.
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March 6, 1902 The Grand Rapids, Grand Haven & Muskegon (MI Interurban) adds service between Grand Haven Junction and Spring Lake Village.
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March 6, 1958 The New York Central dedicates its Robert R. Young yard at Elkhart, IN. It is NYC's second large, computerized yard. It has been built to pre-sort cars coming to and from the Chicago area.
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March 7, 1832 The New Jersey Railroad & Transportation Company (later PRR) is chartered to build across the state.
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March 7, 1834 The Detroit & Pontiac (later D&M, GT) receives its charter from Michigan Territory.
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March 7, 1848 The body of former President John Quincy Adams, who had died of a stroke on the floor of the House on February 21, is carried from Washington to New York via three separate railroads.
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March 7, 1850 The Toledo, Norwalk & Cleveland Railroad (later LS&MS, NYC) is chartered.
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March 7, 1865 A collision between an express train and a disabled passenger train kills five Union Soldiers and a train crewman and injures 48. The accident prompts Ashbel Welch to come up with a block system to control trains (which he had studied in England) for the Philadelphia & Trenton Railroad.
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March 7, 1873 In Prescott, AZ the last reported outbreak of the Great Epizootic devastates the horse population. The virulent equine flu has halted transportation within cities in 33 states, Canada and Cuba.
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March 7, 1887 Henry Whiting combines 7 Boston street railways into a single system, the West End Street Railway. At 1,700 cars and 200 miles of track it is the largest in the world. He is also given permission to build a subway.
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March 7, 1905 The first McKeen car, the first successful use of internal combustion on U.S. railroads, makes its first run, Omaha to Valley NE.
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March 7, 1909 The Winona Interurban Electric Railway is forced by its major creditor to begin operations on Sundays, a move resisted by its Sabbatarian founders, including H.J. Heinz and J. M. Studebaker.
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March 7, 1910 ACF builds a sleeper car with traditional sections named "Peoria" for the interurban Illinois Terminal Railroad.
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Mark Tomlonson
