The Fort Worth and Denver Railway(reporting markFWD), nicknamed "the Denver Road," was a class IAmerican railroad company that operated in the northern part of Texas from 1881 to 1982, and had a profound influence on the early settlement and economic development of the region.
The Fort Worth and Denver City Railway Company (FW&DC) was chartered by the Texas Legislature on May 26, 1873. On August 7, 1951, the company changed its name to the Fort Worth and Denver Railway Company (FW&D).[1]
At the end of 1970, FW&D operated 1,201mi (1,933km) of road on 1,577mi (2,538km) of track; that year it reported 1493 million ton-miles of revenue freight. (Those totals may or may not include the former Burlington-Rock Island Railroad.) In 1980, operated mileage had dropped to 1181, but freight was 7732 million ton-miles.
Construction
The Panic of 1873 delayed the start of construction until 1881, when Grenville M. Dodge became interested in the project. As chief engineer for the Union Pacific Railroad, Dodge had played a large part in the construction of the first transcontinental railroad. Dodge organized the Texas and Colorado Railway Improvement Company in 1881 to build and equip the FW&DC in return for $20,000 in stock and $20,000 in bonds for each mile of track laid. In the same year, the FW&DC and the Denver and New Orleans Railroad Company, organized in Colorado, agreed to connect their systems at the Texas-New Mexico border. The FW&DC received no state subsidy other than the right-of-way easements to cross state-owned lands totaling 2,162 acres (8.75km2).[1]
Construction began at Hodge Junction, just north of Fort Worth, on November 27, 1881, and by September 1882, Dodge had completed 110mi (180km) of track to Wichita Falls, Texas. By 1885, the line reached Harrold;[2] by 1886, Chillicothe; by 1887, Clarendon and Amarillo;[3] and by 1888, Texline on the New Mexico border. Continuing into the New Mexico Territory, the FW&DC finally linked with the D&NO where the railheads met at Union Park, near present-day Folsom, New Mexico, 528mi (850km) from Fort Worth, on March 14, 1888.[1]
Service between Fort Worth and Denver began on April 1, 1888. In 1895, Dodge became president of the company, one of several railroads in which he held a financial interest.[4]
Expansion
In 1899, the FW&DC was acquired by the Colorado and Southern Railway, successor to the D&NO. The C&S itself was bought by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad in 1908, but the three companies continued to operate as separate legal entities. In part, this separation was due to Texas law, which required all railroads operating in the state to have their headquarters in Texas. This had the effect of requiring all operating railroads in Texas to be wholly owned, even if independent companies of the regional or national roads.[5]
Map of the Colorado and Southern Railway lines, including the Fort Worth and Denver City lines in Texas
The FW&DC was the first rail line to penetrate the northwest part of Texas, which contributed greatly to the growth of Texas cities such as Wichita Falls, Childress, Amarillo, and Dalhart. In addition, the railroad actively promoted settlement of the rural areas it served, providing free seeds, trees, and tree seedlings to farmers and ranchers to promote cotton- and wheat-growing, as well as erosion prevention.[1]
In the first four decades of the 20th century, the FW&DC built or acquired a number of feeder lines in its territory, so that by 1940, the Burlington-owned system operated 1,031mi (1,659km) of main track in Texas in addition to the Burlington-Rock Island Railroad.[6]
The Fort Worth and Denver City leased the Fort Worth and Denver South Plains (completed in 1928, 206mi (332km) from Estelline to Plainview and Lubbock; the Fort Worth and Denver Northern (completed in 1932, 110mi (180km) from Childress to Pampa); and the Fort Worth and Denver Terminal (providing access to railyards and terminals in Fort Worth).[1] In reality, all three lines were projects of the parent company from the outset.
Several feeder lines operated by the Wichita Valley Railway Company (another subsidiary of the Colorado and Southern) connected with the FW&DC at Wichita Falls, including the Wichita Valley Railway (Wichita Falls to Seymour), the Wichita Valley Railroad (Seymour to Stamford), the Abilene and Northern (Stamford to Abilene, Texas), the Stamford & Northwestern (Stamford to Spur), and the Wichita Falls and Oklahoma Railway (Wichita Falls to Byers and Waurika, Oklahoma). In 1952, the Wichita Valley and its subsidiaries were merged into the Fort Worth and Denver Railway.[1]
The premier passenger train of the FW&DC was the streamlined Texas Zephyr (trains #1 and 2), which operated between Dallas and Denver from August 22, 1940, to September 11, 1967. Other passenger trains included the Gulf Coast Special (train #7, Denver and Dallas), the Colorado Special (train #8, Dallas and Denver), and the Sam Houston Zephyr (trains #3 and 4 -Ft. Worth - Dallas - Teague - Houston), Twin Star Rocket (trains #507 and 508) as well as motorcars over the South Plains line between Childress and Lubbock and over the Wichita Valley between Wichita Falls and Abilene.[7]
At the railroad's peak in 1944, during the World War II economic boom, the Texas Railroad Commission reported that the FW&DC earned $12,132,515 in freight revenue, $5,839,399 in passenger revenue, and $1,488,095 in other revenue. However, by 1972, in the face of competition from interstate highway traffic and airlines, the Fort Worth and Denver owned 20 locomotives and 1,520 freight cars, but operated at a loss of $1,743,551.[6]
Successor companies
In 1970, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, the Great Northern Railway, and the Northern Pacific Railroad merged themselves into a single railroad, the Burlington Northern Railroad, but their subsidiaries in Colorado and Texas continued to have a separate legal existence until the Burlington Northern acquired the Fort Worth and Denver Railway by virtue of the merger between BN and the Colorado and Southern Railroad on December 31, 1981. The Fort Worth and Denver Railway's corporate existence came to an end when it was formally merged into Burlington Northern Railroad on December 31, 1982.[6]
The FW&D's former main line through the Texas Panhandle and North Texas is now a heavily used route of BN's successor, the BNSF Railway, primarily for coal and intermodal trains between Fort Worth and the western United States.[8] Additionally, the Union Pacific Railroad has track rights on this line from Fort Worth to Dalhart.[9] No passenger trains have operated in scheduled revenue service on this route, though, since the FW&D ended all passenger service in 1967, before the creation of Amtrak in 1971.
Memphis is a city and the county seat of Hall County, Texas, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population was 2,290.
The Burlington Northern Railroad was a United States-based railroad company formed from a merger of four major U.S. railroads. Burlington Northern operated between 1970 and 1995.
The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad was a railroad that operated in the Midwestern United States. Commonly referred to as the Burlington Route, the Burlington, or as the Q, it operated extensive trackage in the states of Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Wyoming, and also in Texas through subsidiaries Colorado and Southern Railway, Fort Worth and Denver Railway, and Burlington-Rock Island Railroad. Its primary connections included Chicago, Minneapolis–Saint Paul, St. Louis, Kansas City, and Denver. Because of this extensive trackage in the midwest and mountain states, the railroad used the advertising slogans "Everywhere West", "Way of the Zephyrs", and "The Way West".
The Fort Worth and Western Railroad is a Class III short-line railroad headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas. Operating only within the state of Texas, its main freight service route is between Carrollton, Fort Worth and Brownwood.
The Denver and New Orleans Railroad (D&NO) was a railroad in Colorado started by Colorado Governor John Evans, along with railroad entrepreneur David Moffat and other associates in 1881. Originally chartered to build a railroad from Denver, Colorado to the Gulf of Mexico, the charter was later changed instead connect southward to the Fort Worth and Denver City Railway which was building northwest from Fort Worth, Texas.
The Colorado and Southern Railway was an American Class I railroad in the western United States that operated independently from 1898 to 1908, then as part of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad until it was absorbed into the Burlington Northern Railroad in 1981.
The Burlington-Rock Island Railroad came into existence on July 7, 1930, through the reorganization of its predecessor, the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway Company (T&BV), nicknamed the "Boll Weevil Line."
U.S. Highway 287 (US 287) in the U.S. state of Texas is a major U.S. Highway that begins on the Gulf Coast in Port Arthur and heads north through Fort Worth, northwest to Childress, Clarendon, Wichita Falls, and Amarillo in the Texas Panhandle and into Oklahoma near Kerrick.
The Texas Zephyr was a named passenger train operated by the Colorado & Southern Railway and the Fort Worth & Denver Railway. The train was originally designated number 1 southbound, and number 2 northbound.
Article X of the Texas Constitution of 1876 covers railroad companies and the creation of the Railroad Commission of Texas. The federal government later created the Interstate Commerce Commission to regulate railroads, and eight of the nine sections of Article X were repealed in 1969 as "deadwood".
The West Texas & Lubbock Railway is a shortline railroad in Texas, owned by Watco. It connects the BNSF in Lubbock with agricultural and oil-producing areas to the west and southwest. The company operates 107 miles of two ex-Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway lines, extending to Whiteface and Seagraves parallel to State Highway 114 and U.S. Highway 62. The primary commodities hauled are fertilizer, construction aggregates, grain, cotton, chemicals, peanuts and plastics.
The following is a brief history of the North American rail system, mainly through major changes to Class I railroads, the largest class by operating revenue.
The following is a brief history of the North American rail system, mainly through major changes to Class I railroads, the largest class by operating revenue.
The Fort Worth and Rio Grande Railway, chartered under the laws of Texas on June 1, 1885, was part of a plan conceived by Buckley Burton Paddock and other Fort Worth civic leaders to create a transcontinental route linking New York, Fort Worth, and the Pacific port of Topolobampo, which they believed would stimulate the growth and development of southwest Texas in general, and the economy of Fort Worth in particular.
Barwise is a small, unincorporated community located on the level plains of the Llano Estacado about 10 mi (16 km) west of Floydada in western Floyd County, Texas. The town was founded in 1928 after the Fort Worth and Denver South Plains Railway Company laid tracks through the area. The rail spur that passes through Barwise extended from the Fort Worth and Denver Railway junction at Estelline to Lubbock and Plainview.
Fort Worth and Denver City Railway 410 / Texas and Pacific Railway 400 is a class "E-4A1" 2-8-2 "Mikado" that was originally operated by the Fort Worth and Denver City Railway (FW&DC). It served the FW&D from 1915 to 1958 before being sold to the T&P on January 29, 1958. It was briefly used for Flood Service in Louisiana before being retired and donated to Marshall, Texas in 1963. Today, the locomotive is on display at the Texas and Pacific Railway Museum in Marshall, Texas.
The Wichita Falls and Oklahoma Railway, together with its affiliate the Wichita Falls and Oklahoma Railroad of Oklahoma, built a line from Wichita Falls, Texas to Waurika, Oklahoma in two stages, starting in 1903 and completing in 1923. Results were disappointing, and the line was abandoned in late 1942.
↑ "Missouri-Kansas-Texas Lines, Condensed Time-Tables, Tables 77, 83, 84, 88, 90". Official Guide of the Railways. National Railway Publication Company. 78 (12). May 1946.
Overton, Richard C. Gulf to Rockies: The Heritage of the Fort Worth and Denver - Colorado and Southern Railways, 1861-1898. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1953, rev. ed. 1970. ISBN0837130352
Wagner, F. Hol. The Colorado Road: History, Motive Power, and Equipment of the Colorado and Southern and Fort Worth and Denver Railways. Intermountain Chapter, National Railway Historical Society, 1970. ASIN B0015YX8ZO
Railroads in italics meet the revenue specifications for Class I status, but are not technically Class I railroads due to being passenger-only railroads with no freight component.
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