The Grand Trunk Railway in New England

Webpage of the Grand Trunk Railway in New England (1883 Timetable Cover)

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History

(from Wikipedia, updated)

The line was first proposed as a connection between Portland, Maine and Montreal, Quebec in 1844 by Portland entrepreneur John Alfred Poor. Portland was desperate to connect its ice-free port with Montreal and Maine was at risk of being eclipsed by a similar proposal running from nearby Boston, Massachusetts. Montreal - which was in need of a means to transport grain to England during the Winter months - saw an advantage in linking with the smaller port at Portland and Poor's idea became a reality. The Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad was chartered in Maine on February 10, 1845, New Hampshire July 30, 1847 and Vermont October 27, 1848 to build a continuous line from Portland, Maine northwest into northeastern Vermont.

Construction started July 4, 1846. The first section, from Portland to Yarmouth, opened on July 4, 1848. Further extensions opened to Danville January 1849, and to Bethel March 1851. Sections into and within New Hampshire opened to Gorham on July 23, 1851 and Northumberland July 12, 1852, and the full distance to Island Pond, Vermont on January 29, 1853.

Trains commenced regular operation between Portland and the depot on the Paris side of the town line with Oxford at Widow Merrill's crossing October 8, 1849, though the station was listed as "North Oxford" in timetables. The first "train" into South Paris village was contractor's engine Jenny Lind on Jan 1, 1850 when it was run carefully across temporary bridgework up to where the station was being built, as a means of satisfying one of the monied men from Paris Hill to counter his threat of withdrawing his support and money if there was not a train in the village proper on that date (an engine operating by itself without cars meets the ruling of "train"). The Androscoggin bridge was completed March 15, 1850, with regular service to Portland from the present day station grounds to Portland beginning on the 18th. (From John R. Davis) On December 30, 1879, the Norway Branch Railroad opened, running from Norway village on a line 1.45 miles long to connect with the Grand Trunk Railroad at South Paris.

The St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railway was chartered to build the part of the line in Quebec, and on August 4, 1851 the two companies agreed to meet at Island Pond. Joining of A&StL rails with those of the StL&A occurred at Island Pond on July 11, 1853. Regular operations commenced with passage of the first through train July 18, 1853 between Montreal and Portland. Four months later, on August 5, the Grand Trunk Railway leased the two companies, giving the Toronto-Montreal line an extension east to Portland. A branch was also built from Richmond, Quebec northeast to Point Levi, across the St. Lawrence River from Quebec City.

The line was originally built to the Provincial Gauge of 5 ft 6 in (1,676 mm), and was later converted to standard gauge. The increased traffic from Portland and Point Levi to Montreal placed significant demands on the small car ferry service across the St. Lawrence River at Montreal, and this was replaced by the Victoria Bridge by 1860.

The Grand Trunk in 1885 - click to enlarge

The GTR line to Portland was built during the boom period for New England textile mills and various mill towns in northern New England soon saw an influx of French Canadian workers who quickly found work in the region.

The GTR's bankruptcy in the early 1920s saw it nationalized by the Canadian federal government, which merged it into the nascent Canadian National Railways (CNR). Unfortunately for Portland, the CNR also included various other rail lines to ice-free Canadian ports in the Maritimes, notably Halifax, Nova Scotia, and their now ex-GTR mainline to Montreal soon became a secondary mainline under CNR as traffic dropped significantly.

CN (acronym/name change post-1960) continued to operate the Portland-Sherbrooke line as its Berlin Subdivision but traffic continued to decline and by the late 1980s, following deregulation of the U.S. railroad industry, it became a candidate for divestiture to a shortline operator. In 1989, the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad was formed by Emmons Transportation to take over operation of the Island Pond, Vermont-Portland section and several years later this was extended to the border at Norton. In 1998, following Canadian deregulation, the short line operator formed a subsidiary St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad in Quebec to operate the remaining line from the border at Norton through to Ste-Rosalie. The St. Lawrence and Atlantic is now owned and operated by Genesee & Wyoming Inc . See the SLR/SLQ Guide (pdf), by Fritz Gerhardt, Ph.D., for information on the modern StL&A.