The Prototype

The Albany & Susquehanna was incorporated in 1851 and essentially completed in 1867. In connected Albany NY to Binghamton NY. Its 6 foot gauge track ran through rolling hills and farmland.

In 1869, Jay Gould took a fancy to the Railroad and began a proxy fight beyond what was extreme even in that era. At its height a train load of Erie railroad employees took a train from Binghamton and headed towards Albany seizing the stations along the way. One station got a telegraph message out, and a train load of A&S employees took a train from Albany and headed south towards Binghamton. The trains met (with a thud) at Tunnel, NY. A fight using whatever was at hand ensued only ending when it got dark. The next morning the state militia arrived and put an end to it.

The proxy fight ended up in court and Jay Gould was tossed out. To prevent a repeat of the proxy fight the A&S quickly leased the railroad to the Delaware & Hudson in perpetuity.

My railroad takes up the story in the late 1970's after the formation of Conrail. The D&H was a bridge line at this point with most of its traffic originating and terminating on other railroads. It was dependent on connections with friendly railroads for traffic. With the formation of Conrail, all of these friendly roads were rolled up into Conrail. Since Conrail wasn't about to send traffic over the D&H that it could just deliver itself, the D&H was given extensive trackage rights. This gave the D&H new connections in Buffalo, NY, Harrisburg PA, and Newark NJ. It already had connections with other railroads in Montreal, Canada, and Mechanicville NY.

The major yards for switching trains were in Oneonta and Binghamton. The Binghamton yard handled switching trains coming from and heading to Buffalo and Oneonta handled the rest. This would change later with Binghamton doing everything.

The motive power at this time was also interesting. The D&H had just doubled in size and it got a lot of power from the railroads that formed Conrail. This includes power from the Lehigh Valley railroad, the Reading railroad and the Erie railroad. In addition there was pool power and leased power from the Norfolk & Western, the Bangor and Aroostook, the Boston and Maine and the Union Pacific. It seems you could justify just about any engine on the railroad at this time.