A change in employment has me driving from Cumberland to Greenfield on a daily basis. Unlike my journey to West Carmel, where there is one fastest way to get to my place of work, there are many ways to get to my new work location. Many. Since I have been actively avoid the perpetual orange forest that is Interstate 70 in Hancock County, I have found several interesting drives to work. And although my time on it is short, I find myself interested in Franklin Street in Greenfield.

Franklin Street is closing in on 200 years of history. In its earliest days, it was the Lafayette State Road, at least at the Greenfield end. It was the most direct route connecting Greenfield to Lafayette. The old state road travelled from Greenfield to Noblesville through Fortville. At Noblesville, it would connect to the Noblesville-Lafayette State Road (covered in the State Road 38 West of Noblesville post).

Looking at a map, one will notice that Franklin Street is about 3/4 mile west of what is now SR 9, or the old Anderson State Road. Greenfield wasn’t that big in the beginning. But the old Lafayette State Road connected to the National Road west of the town that was located because of the National Road.

When the counties started selling off the county roads for maintenance, Franklin Street, outside the town, would become the Fortville Pike. As such, it would still serve its purpose to connect to Noblesville…albeit with a toll involved. The road outside the town still connected to the National Road at Franklin Street.

The road was so important that some maps included it as an official state road. This was shown in 1923 in this map.

The road would be officially added to the state highway system in summer of 1932. The State Highway Commission took over the route from Franklin and Main Streets in Greenfield north and northwest. But, the commission had made the comment that instead of Fortville, the state road would connect to SR 67 at McCordsville. No mention of the route it would follow was made. And as it turned out, it didn’t happen that way. The Fortville Pike was used, and it became SR 238. That number was assigned to the entire route from Greenfield to Noblesville.

Within a decade, the state had changed the routing of SR 13 to connect to Greenfield instead of Indianapolis (SR 13 to Indianapolis became SR 37 between Indianapolis and Noblesville). The numbering change would be announced in the Greenfield Daily Reporter of 9 April 1941. This change would bring a third major state road to Greenfield. It would also mean that the road, which has the purpose of connecting county seats, would make Wabash its first governmental center connection. As SR 238, it connected to Noblesville. Not like it made that much of a difference.

One of the things that is mentioned in the newspaper is that SR 13 would connect to SR 9 in Greenfield. But it would end at US 40. Also, “as present, Indiana 13 branches south of Elwood, one lane of traffic leading to Indianapolis through Noblesville, and another coming southeast on the aforementioned route.” That route was listed in the headline: “Highway 238 Gets New Name.”

And although it was still State Road 13 with the building of Interstate 70 (see I-70 At Greenfield), there were no plans to create an interstate interchange at the Fortville Pike. As mentioned in that other article, this created a complete disaster traffic wise in Greenfield in 1967. Unfortunately, within the decade (by 1976), the Fortville Pike was decommissioned as SR 13, and Franklin Street in Greenfield became just another city street.

Albeit one with a long, long, history.

In the past, I have covered street name changes in Indianapolis. The biggest example of street name changes in the city was in the 1895-1896 time frame. I covered it in an article called “Changes of Indianapolis Street Names in 1895,” the 250th post of my blog. But today, I want to go back to the 1896 changes, and share what the Indianapolis Journal had to say about the whole thing.

The street car conductors, as soon as the new numbers were applied to the streets, started calling out the new street names. Keep in mind that before the change of the names, Indianapolis DID have a First Street. Check out the article “Why Do Indianapolis Street Numbers Start at 9?” for more information. (And before you mention it, I know that there is a 7th Street in Indianapolis. But it was an afterthought and is, funnily enough, at 725 North, not 700.)

The Journal relates the story of the lady riding the Illinois Street trolley. “A lady riding on an Illinois-street car the other night amused other passengers by the consternation she expressed when the conductor poked his head into the car and called out: Tenth Street!”

The lady jumped to her feet immediately, saying she meant to get off the trolley at Fifth Street! Oh, no! The conductor explained to the lady that where she wanted was now 14th Street, not Fifth, as the names had been changed. “That’s the old name madam,” explained the conductor. And shortly thereafter, the trolley came to a stop at 14th Street for the lady.

What amused the passengers, and the conductor, was the look the lady gave to the conductor as she got off the streetcar. “Hateful thing to scare me half to death!” the conductor heard the lady say as the streetcar trundled on down the line. It is stated in the article that most passengers were concerned, as they didn’t know where they wanted to get off the streetcar with the new street numbering system.

There were two different ordinances passed within a year concerning the changing of street names. The first, occurring in 1895 and mentioned in the article above, changed the numbers of the streets above St. Clair. The second, passed a few weeks before the publishing of the Journal article on 7 December 1896, ridding the city of duplicate street names. It is mentioned that under the first ordinance, Ninth Street was created out of Pratt, Gregg, Vine, John, Randolph, and Greencastle Streets. The second ordinance made the following change: “the name of Ninth street from its eastern terminus to its western terminus is hereby changed to Pratt street.” Hence the street guide not showing a Ninth Street.

The problem was that the house numbering system wasn’t immediately changed. I have mentioned before that houses were numbered from the beginning of the street, not a specific location in the city. As pointed out in the Journal, someone living at 53 Gregg Street simply couldn’t say they lived at 53 Pratt Street after the change. Gregg Street ran for two blocks – from New Jersey Street to Park Avenue. The corner of East and Gregg Streets was listed as 59 Gregg Street, making 53 Gregg Street just west of East Street. East Pratt Street ran from Meridian Street to Fort Wayne Avenue. 53 E. Pratt Street would be just east of Pennsylvania Street. West Pratt Street ran from Meridian Street to Paca Avenue. 53 W. Pratt Street was just west of Illinois Street.

“Until the streets are renumbered endless confusion will ensue in delivering mail matter. The advocates of the ordinances changing street names argued that it would be of great assistance to the Postoffice Department, but until the streets are renumbered letter carriers will have more serious problems to contend with than ever before.”

The article points out that “there is no arbitrary rule by which the numerical names of the east-wan-west streets north of Pratt street can be determined.” The old First Street, which ran east from White River to Pennsylvania Street, became Tenth Street. Add to that St. Mary Street from Delaware Street to Fort Wayne Avenue, Cherry Street from Fort Wayne to Massachusetts Avenue, and Clifford Street from Massachusetts to Rural Street (the end of the city at that time).

Even then, due to the way Indianapolis was expanded over the years, not all of the same street number was along the same line of the map. As I have mentioned before, Indianapolis was built of neighborhoods built to be separate entities…so very rarely did streets line up from one expansion to another. The street numbers north of what became 16th Street became a complete nightmare. Each broken end street was lumped with the street number closest to it.

The City Engineer, and his crew, were busy putting up new street signs for the new street names. They were doing this as quickly as possible to avoid as much confusion as possible. The city engineer was against the idea of changing the 50 numbers to a block rule to the soon to come 100 numbers to a block. The City Council was considering the changing of the addressing of houses, and the number of house numbers per block, in a meeting that evening. And, it seems, who would be in charge of changing house numbers in the city.

On 25 February, 2019, I posted in this blog an article that I had originally written on 19 August 2014 in the Indiana Transportation History Facebook group about the Fairland, Franklin & Martinsville Railroad. Today, I want to look at the end of the railroad, at least west of Franklin, as reported by the Franklin Star of 24 October 1942. Merchants from Trafalgar, Morgantown and Martinsville were trying to save their 89-year old railroad. But the newspaper article brings up more memories and history than it does any real news.

“While merchants of Trafalgar, Morgantown and Martinsville fought hard today to preserve an 18-mile western section of the Big Four railroad from abandonment, residents of cities along the line turned their thoughts to fond memories of gayer days when ‘Old Jerkwater’ was the proud possessor of most of the passenger and freight business between Fairland and the Morgan county seat.” Thus starts the article that appeared on the front page of the Evening Star that day.

Abandonment hearings were held for the section of the railroad on 21 October 1942 in the Franklin City Hall. But the newspaper laments the fact that most of the old timers of the area “unfortunately, most everyone has referred to ‘Old Jerk’ with a touch of laughter, calling it ‘Old Pumpkinvine’ and other names certainly unbefitting to such a fine old institution.”

The first memory shared was that of Tom Sommerville. Sommerville had been a conductor, superintendent and paymaster of the railroad. He is described as “practically the ‘whole show.'” Sommerville had worked on the railroad so long that he was well known by “almost everyone in towns along the line.” One story is related that morning rides from Morgantown to Franklin, a group of men, with Sommerville, would walk to two or three saloons in downtown Franklin. This was after the train had stopped at the Jefferson Street crossing. The stop at Jefferson Street would end with the remark “Well, Ferd ought to be about ready now.”

Ferd Baldwin, the brakeman that would later become conductor, was known to have a vocabulary that would rival a sailor. His description in the newspaper included the words “had the reputation of being the wickedest man in his talk who ever lived, but a pretty good fellow otherwise.” Ferd was a very polite gentleman, unless something on his train went wrong…especially on a cold day.

Once Sommerville thought that Ferd should be ready, he would walk the men back to the station via Water Street. There, they would board the train bound for Fairland, and the trip to Indianapolis. The return to from Indianapolis to Fairland to Morgantown would be repeated that afternoon/evening. No date was described in the telling of this tale. I would have to think that either a) the men made it a ritual to use the Big Four for their journey, or b) it was before the Indianapolis Southern Railway (later Illinois Central, now the Indiana Railroad) made it to Morgantown.

Another story about Tom Sommerville was related by a Mr. Freeman. “Sommerville was one who always had the safety of others foremost in his mind at all times, and Mr. Freeman recalls coming from Martinsville once, ‘bumming’ a ride on a car loaded with pipe. When Uncle Tom finally noticed him at Morgantown, he made Mr. Freeman go back and take a seat in one of the coaches.” It was also stated that “if any of the youngsters wanted to get home, all they had to do was to walk to the railroad and, regardless of whether or not they had the fare, Uncle Tom would always stop the train to pick them up.”

There were times that special trains, especially for basketball fans, were added to the schedule. Several hundred Martinsville High School basketball fans chartered a special train to take them to Shelbyville for what was described as “an important contest.” The train would haul the spectators from Martinsville, through Fairland, to Shelbyville. The train ride home was, apparently, miserable. On a very cold (sub-zero) night, the slow plodding of the train as it carried the downtrodden fans and team back to Martinsville after a sound beating in Shelbyville. The defeat was still in the minds of those onboard the train as it “chugged slowly through Franklin in the wee small hours of the morning on its return journey, the feelings and spirits of the Martinsville supporters at a very low ebb as a result of hte setback and the slow speed of the train on such a cold and disagreeable night.”

The Franklin Evening Star then goes into more of a history of the line.

On 20 January 1846, the State of Indiana incorporated the Martinsville & Franklin Railroad Company. A special act was passed on 13 February 1851, and the railroad opened for traffic on 17 May 1853. At that point, it was operated, under five year lease, by the Madison & Indianapolis Railroad. It ended at the M&I in Franklin. After the lease, the railroad was in such bad shape that on 19 October 1858, it was abandoned due to poor physical condition.

On 19 May 1859, the line was sold at foreclosure. It was conveyed, by deed, by United States Marshall to Franklin Nichols on 28 November 1859. The new railroad, the Franklin & Martinsville Railroad Company, would not be operated during its entire life, stretching from 20 December 1859 to 26 September 1865.

The latter date was when the Indiana General Assembly reincorporated the railroad under the control of General Ambrose E. Burnside and associates, creating the Cincinnati & Martinsville Railroad. The new company would revamp the line between Martinsville and Franklin. On 14 June 1866, the line would be opened between Franklin and Fairland. General Burnside, also in 1865, would propose, and get chartered, the Indianapolis & Vincennes Railroad.

The entire line would eventually fall into the Big Four due to the fact that it was leased when completed to Fairland, to the Indianapolis, Cincinnati & Lafayette Railroad. Or, actually, that company and the people that would end up with the same through receivership.

The property would be sold once again under foreclosure on 9 May 1877 to become the Fairland, Franklin & Martinsville Railroad. It would be operated by the receiver of the Indianapolis, Cincinnati & Lafayette Railroad. The IC&L would become part of the Cincinnati, Indianapolis, St. Louis & Chicago Railway on 6 March 1880. Thus the FF&M would be operated by the predecessor company of what would become the Big Four until 7 June 1889. Then it would become operated by the Big Four (Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis) Railway.

The lease of the Fairland, Franklin & Martinsville would end on 16 June 1915, when, with delivery of the deed dated 17 December 1913, the ownership of the line would become property of the CCC&StL. One last change of “ownership” occurred on 2 January 1920, effective 1 February 1930, when the New York Central Railroad Company leased the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis. The latter would eventually become absorbed into the former.

Today, I want to focus on rail yards in the Indianapolis area. I chose this area because I have access to aerial photographs of the area. I chose the year 1941 because it is the earliest I can find complete photos. There are some available from 1937…and you can check them out at the MapIndy site.

Yes, it is basically only pictures. It also includes links to articles that I have already written…and gives me some future topics to cover.

Beech Grove Shops and Yards

Brightwood Yards

Hawthorne Yards

Illinois Central Yards

Leota Street (Hill) Yards

Moorefield Yards

Yards along the Monon & Nickel Plate

State Street Yards

PRR Transfer Yards

West Bank of White River

One of the most interesting places when it comes to railroad history in Indiana is the hill leading out of Madison, Indiana. Madison was the starting point to both the Michigan Road and the first long distance railroad in the state, the Madison & Indianapolis. The problem with Madison is that its location, in the Ohio River bottoms, had always been a detriment to transportation connections to the rest of the state. The hillside behind Madison climbed as much as 400 feet above the town. When the railroad was built, there was no way to accomplish the feat without a serious gradient…a gradient that was very difficult for locomotives at the time to conquer.

As shown in the topographic map above, the city of Madison is at an elevation of 450 feet above sea level, and lower toward the Ohio River. Just north of the city limits, just east of SR 29, the top of the Madison Hill is at an elevation of 850 feet.

The route that is marked SR 29 on the map is the original Michigan Road. It was built to connect the Ohio River at Madison to Lake Michigan at Michigan City. The route of SR 7 was originally the Madison-Indianapolis State Road, which would connect Madison to Indianapolis via Vernon, Columbus and Franklin.

Below is another topographic map of the area, this time from North Madison and the year 1956. It shows in more detail the rise in elevation of the massive hill that was a hinderance to Madison’s growth over the years.

On the 1939 map, it shows that State Road 7 is also called Hanging Rock Road. The map above shows where Hanging Rock actually is. It also shows that SR 29 has become US 421, with the SR 29 designation disappearing from southern and most of central Indiana.

The most “famous” part of the Madison hill is that of the route of the Madison & Indianapolis Railroad. The route of the railroad was cut through the hillside, creating the steepest railroad grade on any Class I railroad in the United States. Over a span of 7,012 feet (1.33 mile), the railroad gained 413 feet in elevation. This created a grade of 5.89 percent, or roughly one foot of elevation every 17 feet traveled.

To put this into perspective, many railroads would build long and winding sections of track to avoid grades higher than, say, two percent. One of the most famous examples of this is Horseshoe Curve outside Altoona, Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Railroad built, in 1854, a track that would cross the Kittanning Gap with an elevation change of 1.45 (now, according to Norfolk Southern 1.34) percent. The maximum grade between Altoona and Gallitzin is 1.85 percent.

The steep grade of the Madison Hill was quite the show stopper. In the beginning, train cars were lowered down the grade in an incline car fashion. This meant that the cars were normally disconnected from the locomotive, and pulled up or down the hill using horses, then a cog-wheel system. These methods would be used for the first 20+ years of the lines life. In 1868, the Jeffersonville, Madison & Indianapolis Railroad, successor to the Madison & Indianapolis, would introduce the most powerful locomotive built to that time. It was called the “Reuben Wells,” after the man that designed her. The Wells was a wood fired locomotive, built by the railroad at their shops in Jeffersonville. Her sheer weight, around 50 tons, and the fact that all that weight was on driver wheels, made the Wells able to handle the steep grade by adhesion to the track alone. The locomotive would be on the downhill side of every train it worked, slowing the descent, or pushing during the ascent. The Wells would perform this feat for 30 years before being retired in 1898.

In 1926, the Pennsylvania Railroad discussed the likelihood that the Madison cut would be leveled on each side to avoid landslides onto the road bed. The cut would be widened for just that purpose. But the grade has always remained.

While the railroad had changed owners several times, it was not to be part of the 1975 Final System Plan creating Conrail from its constituent parts, including the bankrupt Penn Central. The City of Madison, through the City of Madison Port Authority, would purchase the route from North Vernon to Madison, operating it as the Madison Railroad.

The Reuben Wells, the most powerful locomotive built at the time, still exists and can be visited. In 1968, 100 years after it was built, the Penn Central gave the locomotive to the Indianapolis Children’s Museum, where it is on display to this day. After its life on the hill that gave it purpose, it floated around the Pennsylvania Railroad system for many years. It had remained in a Pennsylvania Railroad yard from 1949 to the time it was donated to the Children’s Museum.

Dedicated passenger service to Madison would be discontinued by the Pennsylvania Railroad on 15 August 1935. A passenger coach, attached to freight trains bound for the city, would do that function until they too were discontinued on 10 October 1938.

The Madison Hill that still remains today would have been bypassed completely had a plan started in 1853 not run into financial problems. That plan called for a 4.75 mile detour through the Clifty Creek valley to the top of the hill. $309,479 was spent on the plan, which would have included two tunnels, before the railroad ran out of money for the project.

Modern engineering, including the US 421 bypass, have made the rise out of Madison less noticeable and intimidating. The best ways to experience the hill today, at least by car, are using the State Road 7 entrance to Madison, or following the Historic Michigan Road Byway.

It should be noted that the reason that Madison was picked for Indiana’s first railroad was that it was the closest point to Indianapolis on the Ohio River. It was, at the time of statehood, also the second largest town in the new state. The Michigan Road was designed to end at the town…but not by complete consent. The vote to end the road at Madison was 11 for and 10 against. The Madison-Indianapolis State Road was built to connect county seats to the new state capitol. Today, Madison is a historic town, with many things to see and do. It is always worth a visit.

Today, I want to cover two things that have a close relationship. Recently, I covered the end of SR 100 and US 52 on the southeast side of Marion County, and why it was the way it was. (See: US 52 And the End Of SR 100.) But not much has ever been written about the other end of SR 100’s north and east bypass of Indianapolis. Part of that is because the road just ended. But where it ended was interesting. And right near the end of SR 100 is the community of Royalton, a location on the old Indianapolis-Lafayette State Road that received a post office in 1832, but is now the location of a subdivision and the junction of Interstates 465 and 865.

The first thing to realize is that the end of SR 100, at the old Lafayette State Road (now just Lafayette Road), was a relatively modern invention, much like its counterpart on the other side of the county. I have covered, in great detail, the creation of SR 534 and SR 100 (both are the same, by the way) with the article SR 100: How did it come to be? Suffice it to say that construction had begun on the non-existent road in 1948 when it was still SR 534.

The new construction would be completed in time for the 1950 Indiana Official State Highway map to have been published. Now, one could skirt Indianapolis from the northwest corner of the county to US 40 due east of the state capitol. At that time, US 52 also became a divided highway. At least for the intersection of the two state roads. (Yes, US 52 is a US highway…but it really is a state road.)

The intersection of the two roads wouldn’t change much from 1956 until sometime before 1995, when the grassy area was removed from Lafayette Road. By that time, both the US 52 and the SR 100 designations had been removed, as they were both replaced by new roads. US 52, through this section, would be moved to duplex with Interstate 65. SR 100 was expanded, and replaced by a complete bypass loop called Interstate 465.

Now, I have seen some maps of SR 100, from the Indiana State Highway Commission (meaning those maps are official), showing that SR 100 did not end, for a few years, at US 52. The designation SR 100 would be continued along Lafayette Road to outside Whitestown, where it ended at SR 334. (I scanned those maps, but can’t find them at this point.) This made US 52 and SR 100 a duplex through the community of Royalton.

The community of Royalton is in Boone County, just north of the Hendricks County line. When the state built the road connecting Indianapolis to Lafayette, now called Indianapolis Road in Boone County and Lafayette Road in Marion, there were two different kinks in the road that the state would, when it reclaimed the facility, remove. The first would be north of 88th Street where Stones Ferry Road is today.

The other was an “S” curve that started just outside Marion County, in Hendricks County, but crossed over the Boon County line shortly after it began. it would swerve to the north, then almost due west to turn north again. When the state came through to straighten US 52, the new road went right through the middle of the “S” curve.

That wasn’t the last of the destruction of the old “S” curve. In 1960, Interstate 65 was also built through the area…crossing over US 52, which it was replacing, in the exact spot where the then new US 52 crossed the “S” curve. This finally split the curve into two separate parts, divided by an interstate.

A Google Map satellite image, snipped on 15 October 2020, shows that not much has changed in the area, although there is a subdivision north of Royalton proper. The three maps that I have used (1953 topo, 1964 topo and the 2020 Google snip below, cover the same area…from the intersection of Indianapolis Road and Boone County Road 750 South to the intersection of Lafayette Road and 88th Street in Marion County.

Around the near center of Indianapolis is the Indianapolis Belt Railway. It never actually made it completely around the city, but it did make it enough to serve almost every major outlying industry in it. Today I want to focus on one part of the railroad…and one junction in particular: Dale.

Dale is located between Madison Avenue and East Streets, just south of Beecher. Visiting the junction is quite easy, as one could literally walk right up to it. It is still legally trespassing, so I recommend you do it at your own peril.

Dale junction is where the Indianapolis Belt meets the old Madison & Indianapolis. When the Belt was originally being constructed, Dale was the end of the line. The Belt came from the west, dead ending at the Belt just east of the old Madison State Road. Construction past this point, and to be honest the majority of the Indianapolis Belt Railway, began in 1876 heading east from Dale. Connections to the Madison went both ways from the Belt.

With the completion of the Belt east of the Madison, the two tracks connecting to the Belt heading west fell more or less into disuse. Most maps I have seen show the connections running east, both north and south of the Belt most of the time. The western connections vary. Some have the northwestern connection, some have the southwestern connection. Very few have both at the same time. And, hence, very few maps I have seen show all four connections in place.

By the time the first aerial photos are available, in 1937, the northwest corner of Dale no longer contained any connection tracks. It is hard to tell in the southwestern connection track was in place. It does, however, look like if it wasn’t in place, it hadn’t been gone for long. Also apparent in the 1937 aerial is the concentration of industrial tracks entering the Stokely plant that was at the Belt and East Street. This factory would go on to be the Gatorade Bottling plant, before it was moved in the late 1990’s – early 2000’s.

The northwestern connection track would never be put back in place. A factory was built in that section of the right of way, coming really close to both sets of tracks. The southwestern connection track kept coming and going. In 1941, it looks to be there, but the resolution isn’t the greatest. In 1956, it is mostly there…but again, with the resolution, it is hard to tell. That section of the map is unavailable in 1962. But it is in place in 1972, as shown below.

The southwestern connection track would finally be permanently removed sometime before 1978, probably under Conrail. The question that comes up when discussing this is: why not connect all the tracks in all directions? From what I can tell, there are two answers to that question. First, is, honestly, why connect them in all four directions. Train movements can be made, as long as the track isn’t overly busy, in all four directions using just two connecting tracks. Going west simply required some backing movements.

Second, tax purposes. For the longest time, railroads were getting hit really hard for property taxes across the United States. It was no different in Indiana. Some locations were jacking up the assessed value of the railroad rights of way, or, most often, charging much higher rates for those rights of way. Eliminating some of them cut taxes for the railroad quite a bit.

Sometime between 1979 and 1986, the Belt Railway was single tracked through the Dale crossing. It remains that way to this day. It does make for some interesting stories at times. One time, in 2000 or 2001, I was standing at the East Street crossing of the Belt watching trains. Two of them as a matter of fact. One was heading westbound on the Belt, just east of East Street. One was going eastbound, sitting in the middle of Dale crossing. I didn’t stay to see which of the long trains won that argument, as it was late at night, and I was tired.

I have, over the past 18 months, done several articles about the Interstate Public Service electric traction line that would run south from Indianapolis, ultimately connecting to Louisville. From the Indianapolis end, it would follow what is now Shelby Street south to connect to the old Madison State Road (Madison Avenue) on its way to Greenwood. From there, it followed either the Madison Road right of way, or that of the old Jeffersonville, Madison & Indianapolis (later Panhandle and Pennsylvania Railroad) right of way. With slight detours in towns, it would hold true to those rights of way.

While doing other research, I found a 1942 USGS topo map showing the route of the old IPS route from north of Edinburgh to north of Seymour. What I found was interesting. Yes, the Interstate Public Service line followed the Pennsylvania Railroad to a point south of Columbus. From there, it blazed its own trail across the Bartholomew County landscape on its way to Azalia, where it shared the right of way with the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific, familiarly known as the Milwaukee Road.

It would follow the Milwaukee into Seymour, where it would split again for its southbound journey to the Ohio River.

The only map of the route that I have found, so far, is the one to the left. This is a section of that 1942 USGS map with the interurban route highlighted in red.

It should be noted here that this map was released the year after the last train would run along the line, as mentioned in this article: Interstate Public Service.

Thanks to other available resources online, especially that of http://www.railwaystationlists.co.uk/pdfusaiu/indianainterurbanrlys.pdf, it is possible to not only follow the route more closely, but to get an idea of what stops there were between Edinburgh and Seymour.

Edinburgh itself was .3 miles south of Stop 42, known as Irwin Siding. Irwin Siding was 31.5 rail miles south of the Indianapolis Traction Terminal. The next numbered stop, Stop 43, also known as Elk Siding, was .7 miles south of that. This put Elk Siding at milepost 32.5, along the Bartholomew/Johnson County line. Stop 44 was located at the intersection of the traction line and what is now Bartholomew County Road 900 North.

Another stop, King Siding, was located halfway between County Roads 900N and 800N. The list of stops shows that there was possibly a passenger stop here. This siding would have been at what is now the south end of Edinburgh, near where there is a private drive coming from Walnut Street towards the railroad tracks. The above topo map shows no farmhouses in the area, so I lean toward it being just a passing siding.

From there, south to Columbus included:
Stop 45 (34.5) at CR 800 N
Stop 46 (35.6) at CR 700 N
Taylorsville, 36.1 miles from Indianapolis, at Tannehill Road
Stop 47 (37.1) at CR 550 N
Stop 48 (37.6), CR 500 N
Stop 49, CR 450N
Perry Siding (Stop 50) at CR 400N
Lowell (Stop 52) at Lowell Road
Washington and 10th Streets, also known as Corn Brook Siding
Columbus, located at Washington and Third Streets, 42.9 track miles from Indianapolis.

It is not hard to find the location where the interurban tracks crossed the Flat Rock River to enter Columbus. Keep in mind that electric power service entered the city via the power lines that served the interurban. It was kind of a two for one deal. The lines that supplied power to both the city and the electric traction now belong to Duke Energy. Those lines were once part of the Public Service Indiana company before being purchased by Duke Energy. They started as part of the Interstate Public Service company, serving the electric traction lines that crossed at that location.

One of the things that makes interurban lines so generally easy to follow, especially in rural areas, is the remnants of the power feed lines. Many of those lines are still there because the electric company that put them there still has the right of way. When the interurbans were built, the electricity that was provided to run them was a bonus to the company. Or so it was thought. Turned out, the electric traction roads were always losing money by themselves, and staying afloat by selling electricity. When the Federal Government ordered the separation of the traction lines from the electric utilities, the choice for the companies was easy. Bye-bye traction lines.

In places southeast of Columbus, where the electric lines no longer exist, the remnants of the traction lines do still stand out. Some property lines along the way still exist, and can be easily seen in both Google Map’s satellite imaging, and in the closer up views of the regular maps.

From Columbus to Azalia, while the traction line went cross country, there were eight stops: Stop 53; Stop 54 (Troy Siding); Stop 56; Stop 57 (Newsom Siding); Mineral Spring; Stop 58; Stop 59 (Morris Siding) and Azalia. Azalia is unique (sort of) in that before the town was Stop 59 and after was Stop 61. Most of the time, towns were not counted in stop numbers.

The Interstate Public Service lines joined the Milwaukee Road at what is not County Road 800 South, which the IPS considered Stop 61, which was 52.3 miles south of the Indianapolis Traction Terminal. The next town along the way was Reddington. It was after Stop 62 (Gravel Pit), Stop 63, Stop 64 (Gibbons Siding), and Stop 65. The line crossed the Bartholomew-Jackson County line at Gibbons Siding. Reddington was not Stop 66, that was nearly a mile south of the town.

At some point, between Stop 66 and Stop 67 (57.4 and 58.5 miles south of Indianapolis respectively), a stop was added half way between the two. This was known as Stop 66 1/2. This was done occasionally, as sometimes roads and/or farms were added between the original locations. Most stops were at county roads in the rural sections. If a new road or farm was built along the line, then adding a stop at that location was often done.

After Stop 67, there were only four more before reaching Seymour. They were Stop 68, Stop 69, Tople and Seymour. The last two would also be considered numbered stops, strangely. Stop 71, called Seymour, was 62 miles from the Indianapolis Traction Terminal. This would put that station almost half way to the Louisville Terminal, which was 116.8 rail miles from Indianapolis. The last stop number used, Stop 106, was 14.4 miles north of Louisville. From that point, stops were named, and rather close together…being that there were 24 stops in that 14.4 miles.

This is a brief overview of the Interstate Public Service from Edinburgh to Seymour. As more maps become available, I plan to cover this further.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Today marks the 500th entry in the Indiana Transportation History blog. I have said it before, and will say it again: I want to thank each and every one of you for your support. You make this a very fun project to work on. I appreciate you spending time with my ramblings on Indiana history. Thank you, very much.

Recently, a picture was posted in the Indiana Transportation History Facebook group of a railroad crossing in Griffith, Indiana. Actually, it was three railroad crossings. In different directions. Across a street. That picture, as shared to the group by Randy Wilson, is available here. One of the comments to the picture was “what logic told to have all the tracks cross at that point?” You know, it’s a good question. But I want to focus on how they got there in the first place.

First of all, where and what is Griffith? Griffith is a town in Calumet Township, Lake County, Indiana. (Although as of 2020, the town was looking to legally remove itself from Calumet Township, moving either to St. John Township or North Township, both of which it borders.) The town itself claims to have been established in 1904. It had appeared on maps prior to that. It is in the Chicago Metropolitan area. As such, it became in the crosshairs of transportation facilities.

The town came into being in 1880, with the completion in the area of the Grand Truck, shown on the map above as moving from east-southeast to west-northwest. The town’s very name, apparently, came from the surveyor of that section of the railroad, E. P. Griffith. That section of the Grand Trunk started life as the Chicago & State Line Extension Railway Company. This company was formed by the state of Indiana by law of 17 April 1879. By 8 September 1879, the Chicago & State Line Extension Railway had been consolidated into the Northwestern Grand Truck Railway Company. Between the two companies, 24 miles of railroad were built from Valparaiso to the Illinois-Indiana State line. This was, according to the Interstate Commerce Commission, was completed in 1880.

The Northwestern Grand Trunk would not last long, either. It would be consolidated with four other companies on 6 April 1880 to form the Chicago & Grand Trunk Railway. This would fall into receivership 3 January 1900, and be sold at foreclosure to the Indiana & Illinois Railway on 31 October 1900. 22 days later, it would become a part of the Grand Trunk Western Railway Company.

The Michigan Central rails through the area were also built by another company originally. But not one that would become part of the Michigan Central. Completed in 1854, 36 miles of track were constructed to connect Michigan City, Indiana, to the Illinois-Indiana State Line through the area that would become Griffith. This track was built by the New Albany and Salem Railroad. Yes, the same company that would later be known as the Monon. It would be acquired by the Michigan Central on 4 October 1878.

Two railroads that show up on that 1900 map that are hard to nail down are the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railway and the Erie. Both are well documented…but I always want to make sure that I have every bit of my information nailed down. ICC reports from both of these lines is sparse. I will be looking more into this.

Four years after the printing of the map above, the Chicago, Cincinnati & Louisville Railroad company completed a railroad track of almost 14 miles from Beatrice to Griffith. This track was completed on 7 February 1904. The railroad worked its way out of Griffith to the Illinois-Indiana State line, a total of just shy of eight miles, in October of the same year. The Chicago, Cincinnati & Louisville would be sold at foreclosure on 23 June 1910, becoming the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway Company of Indiana on 5 July 1910.

As shown in the above USGS map, Griffith became quite the railroad junction town by 1956. At that time, five rail companies would cross the town: New York Central (Michigan Central); Elgin, Joliet & Eastern; Chesapeake & Ohio; Grand Trunk; and the Erie. By 1968, the Erie would become part of the Erie-Lackawana, and the New York Central would merge with longtime rival Pennsylvania to form Penn Central.

The Grand Trunk Western had been a part of the Canadian National since 1923, when the Canadian government formed the Canadian National out of several properties that were consolidated and taken over by that government. In 1971, the Grand Trunk found itself more free of CN influence, as a new holding company was formed to contain the GT’s losses. This would last two decades, when the Canadian National would reassert its control over the GTW. The Canadian National would, 16 years after the reimaging of the GTW to CN, would purchase the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern. The CN would announce the purchase in 2007. On the first day of 2013, the EJ&E name was officially removed from being a corporate entity for (at least right now) good.

Below is a 1992 USGS Map of the area. It shows the old Michigan Central, EJ&E, Erie and C&O as old railroad grades.

More research is needed. But this is a brief overview of how a little town in a swampy area of Indiana became a railroad center.

When one looks at SR 37 northeast of Indianapolis, it is most often seen through the eyes of Interstate 69. And, honestly, I can understand that. But the current location of SR 37 through the area predates the interstate by at least 15 years. Looking through the history of the road, its purpose might not have been what I had always assumed. I know it was built to bypass Noblesville and Fishers. Let me explain.

Rumblings started when the state was planning to rebuild SR 37 through Fishers and Noblesville. This plan started in 1949. In 1950, it was reported that the citizens of Noblesville demanded a bypass of their city. At the time, SR 37 entered both Fishers and Noblesville along the old Fort Wayne (Allisonville) Road, and passed through Noblesville as Tenth Street. The traffic volumes along the state highway were getting higher and higher, especially in Noblesville. One plea came from Mrs. Alan Tener, representing the Parent-Teacher Association. She noted that “1,000 pupils attend three school buildings located on the present Ind. 37 in Noblesville. She said the Boy Scout traffic patrols have done an excellent job in preventing injury to the pupils, but that it is too great a responsibility for 11-year-olds.” (Source: Indianapolis News, 18 January 1950)

Flash forward to 26 April 1952, it was reported in the Indianapolis Star of that day that “Ind. 37 To Be 4-Lane; Gas Tax Hike ‘Needed’.” The Indiana State Highway Commission planned on making a four-lane limited access highway from Indianapolis to a point northeast of Noblesville. The entire plan consisted of, as reported by the Star, “12 miles of new construction in a Noblesville by-pass and 13 miles of reconstruction following the present highway in large part.” The cost, in 1952, was estimated to be $5,625,000.

But the limited amount of money from the gas tax was causing the ISHC to get behind on maintenance, let alone allow for new construction such as that on this project. It was estimated that the section of road between Noblesville and Indianapolis saw an average of 6,000 to 7,000 cars a day in 1952.

The new road plan called for “two one-way strips of pavement, each 24 feet wide, and 15 feet apart to a point about two miles north of Road 100” (then 82nd Street). “Then the division between the pavements will be widened to 30 feet.” The plan was for SR 37 to veer to the northeast from about three miles south of Noblesville, running 1.25 miles east of the city, and connecting in a straight line to the then current SR 37 northeast of Noblesville. The right of way would be between 120 and 150 feet wide through the project zone, requiring some property purchases.

This was after the State Highway Commission had stated in March 1952 that construction could be started that year. The proposed location was to be .25 east of the Hamilton County Home. This was the plan that Hamilton County government officials liked the best, as other surveys put the new road closer to the home.

Moving forward, the SR 37 bypass would have a contract bid date established: November 1955. But it wouldn’t for a complete bypass of Noblesville. The bid was to build a two lane bypass east of Noblesville starting at SR 32, working 2.6 miles north to connect to the then current SR 37. (It should be noted that two other projects were to be bid at this time, as well – two railroad underpasses on the Madison Avenue Expressway and the SR 46 bypass north and east of Bloomington.)

The results of the bidding for the project were announced on 22 November 1955. Grady Asphalt Inc., of Indianapolis, placed the low bid of $362,556.87 for the 2.6 mile section of new road. The engineering estimates at the time were $423,883.63.

The plan was, according to reports, to build the new SR 37 from the point 2.6 miles north of SR 32 to a point on Keystone Avenue, in Indianapolis, near 44th Street. According to the Tipton Daily Tribune of 17 September 1956, a detour at the northern end of the above let construction area would be in place for 30 days, forcing traffic along the “new” State Road 19 (which had been proposed and built when the proposal for the new SR 37 bypass was released) and into and through Tipton. The closure was due to the fact that the old SR 37 intersection with the new construction area was to be moved south to connect to the new SR 37 at a right angle. This required that one half mile of the old road be removed, and, according to the newspaper, the new intersection be moved south by one quarter mile.

After the first contract was let, the rest of the road’s contracts soon followed. This encouraged several articles in the Noblesville Ledger about pending rash of accidents that were soon to follow on this “excellent” road. Especially concerning was the intersection of SR 37 with SR 32/38. The original state plan was to allow SR 37 to be free flowing, with stop signs controlling the SR 32/38 multiplex. This was seen by the newspaper, Hamilton County government officials, and ordinary citizens in general as not one of the best ideas.

While the people of Noblesville demanded that SR 37 bypass their city due to traffic concerns, they weren’t exactly ready to give up a state road though there. After the completion of the new SR 37, the designation SR 37A was applied to the old SR 37 route along the Allisonville Road. That designation would last into the 1980’s before the state finally put its foot down to remove it from the ISHC maintenance list. More about that can be read in my article “SR 13/37 in Marion and Hamilton Counties.”

I covered the section of the bypass at Castleton in the article “SR 37/SR 100/I-69 at Castleton.”

After World War II, two of the largest railroads in the Eastern United States were fighting for survival. Both had been hit hard by massively increased traffic and deferred maintenance during the war years. How each dealt with it, however, was a different story…and led to some very bad feelings over the years. Those railroads were the Pennsylvania and the New York Central. Bitter rivals, until they couldn’t afford to be anymore. Bitter acquaintances which caused them to afford it even less.

It all started in the 1950’s. Both railroads were floundering. They were, by far, the largest companies east of the Mississippi. The Pennsylvania, at one point, hired more people than the Federal Government. When rail traffic was dying after the war, and the Federal Government controlled what rail companies could charge, these two companies had two choices when it came to spending what little money they had: employees and maintenance. (There were more places to put money, yes, but these were the major two!) The New York Central, brought up to be a businessman’s railroad, tried their best to split these down the middle. The Pennsylvania, always known as a railroadman’s company, often erred on the side of the employees. This led to a shortage of cashflow, for the PRR, for the maintenance that was really needed. And this led to some major problems.

So the two railroads went out to find partners to help with the little thing called survival. The New York Central owned a big chunk of the Chesapeake & Ohio. The Pennsylvania owned a large share of the Norfolk & Western. All they needed was for the government to approve mergers along those lines. Which didn’t happen. As they scrambled for a way to survive, both companies realized that the only way to survive was to combine forces. Combining forces happened…the survival not so much.

But before the merger, the PRR/NYC management started working on joint projects in case the Interstate Commerce Commission should, at hearings in August 1962, seriously consider letting these two giants get together. One such project was proposed for the New York Central’s Big Four Yards in Avon.

The State of Indiana was important to both railroads. Those two companies, by far, were the largest railroads in the state, with the Pennsylvania being the bigger of the two. If the two were to go ahead together, it would certainly affect a lot of the state.

The Indianapolis News of 17 July 1962 described that the “officials of the New York Central and Pennsylvania Railroads announced plans here today to build a $4,285,000 diesel engine maintenance terminal at the Big Four freight yard in Avon.” The Avon yards, at that point, weren’t even two years old, having been dedicated on 15 September 1960. The News continued “construction of the terminal hinged on approval by the Interstate Commerce Commission of the proposed merger which has been requested by the two systems. ICC hearings on the merger proposal are scheduled for late August.”

The new repair facility would require three years to build, and would provide for the maintenance of 570 locomotives.

More cost-saving plans were announced at the meeting announcing the planned maintenance terminal. In the Indianapolis area, most of the measures would lean toward New York Central facilities.

First, a major expansion to the Big Four Yards in Avon. Since it was new, and one of the world’s largest and most modern railroad yards, it was decided that Avon would become the gateway to the southwest for the combined system’s freight.

Second, consolidation of passenger equipment maintenance would be done with the New York Central’s Beech Grove shops being the beneficiary. Most major repair of freight equipment would be moved to Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania, to the Pennsylvania Railroad shops there. All major passenger equipment maintenance would move to Beech Grove.

Third, the Pennsylvania’s two major yard facilities in Indianapolis, Hawthorne and the Transfer Yards, would see major sections abandoned in an effort to save money on maintenance and taxes. Which leads to the fourth item on the NYC/PRR management list, availability of the abandoned facilities for industrial development.

Fifth, use of NYC’s Hill and west side yards, as well as the unabandoned portions of Hawthorne and Transfer, for freight service to support local industries.

And last, but not least, total removal of the Indianapolis Union Railway as a separate corporate entity. The IU owned trackage in and out of Union Station, the station itself, and the Indianapolis Belt Railway. However, due to the way that the Indianapolis Union was built, the Pennsylvania Railroad owned 60 percent of the company, with the other 40 percent being owned by the New York Central.

The railroad management stressed that potential job losses in the Indianapolis area, under this plan, would be around 256. It was also stressed that this compares to the 11,000 employees that have been laid off annually by both railroads over the previous decade. Also, the 256 employees would have job protection under the ICC plan. Those 110,000 people laid off previously had no job protections at all.

Ultimately, the New York Central/Pennsylvania merger would occur on 1 February 1968. The resulting company, Pennsylvania New York Central Transportation Company, or Penn Central, would stagger around for approximately two years before becoming the largest bankruptcy in the United States to that time. Avon would become the largest yard facility in the area. Hawthorne and the Transfer Yard would be scaled back. Beech Grove would take over passenger maintenance…and would go with the passenger service when Amtrak was created. The Pennsylvania’s east-west mainline through Indianapolis would be abandoned in favor of the New York Central’s.

And, ultimately, the company created out of the ashes of the Penn Central debacle, Conrail, would be split up among the two major eastern US railroads: CSX and Norfolk Southern. And when that split happened, the equipment of Conrail was marked to denote which equipment would go which direction. The letters NYC were used to denote equipment going to CSX, a descendant of the Chesapeake & Ohio. The letters PRR were used to mark that which was going to the Norfolk Southern, the descendant of the old Norfolk & Western.