Blue Ridge Mountain Wonder

Southern Railway history: The earliest portion of the Southern Railway was the South Carolina Canal & Rail Road Company, which was chartered in 1828 to build from Charleston, S. C., to Hamburg, S. C., on the north bank of the Savannah River. Its purpose was to bring trade to the port of Charleston from inland points and divert trade that would otherwise move down the Savannah River to the port of Savannah, Ga. When the 136-mile line opened in 1833, it was the longest railroad in the world. By 1857 it was part of a line from Charleston to Memphis, Tenn.—at the time the longest connected system of railroads in the world. (Two of the railroads involved, the Georgia Railroad and the Western & Atlantic, are now part of CSX Transportation.)

he Richmond & Danville Railroad was the nucleus of the Southern Railway. It was chartered in 1847 and completed in 1856 from Richmond, Va., west 141 miles to Danville, Va. Its charter allowed it to acquire and control only railroads with which it connected directly. In 1880 interests connected with the R&D incorporated the Richmond & West Point Terminal Railway & Warehouse Co. (“Richmond Terminal”) to acquire railroads that did not connect directly with the R&D. The majority owners of the R&D and the Richmond Terminal decided the existence of the Richmond Terminal was unnecessary (by then, the R&D’s charter had been amended) and in 1886 leased the railroads controlled by the Richmond Terminal to the Richmond & Danville; then the Richmond Terminal acquired the Richmond & Danville. In 1863 the R&D purchased a majority of the stock of the Piedmont Railroad, under construction from Danville to Greensboro, N. C. The line opened in 1864, and the R&D leased it in 1866. In 1871 the R&D leased the North Carolina Railroad, which was opened in 1856 from Goldsboro through Greens­boro to Charlotte. The R&D contracted to construct the Northwestern Railroad of North Carolina from Greensboro to Salem, and assisted the Atlanta & Richmond Air-Line Railroad with the construction of its line between Atlanta and Charlotte. Both those routes were opened in 1873. The Atlanta & Charlotte Air-Line Railway was organized in 1877 as the successor to the Atlanta & Richmond. In 1881 the R&D purchased the Virginia Midland Railway from the Baltimore & Ohio to get a direct Danville–Washington route about 20 miles shorter than the route through Richmond. The Virginia Midland had begun as the Orange & Alexandria Railroad, opened from Alexandria, Va., across the Potomac River from Washington, D. C., southwest to Gordonsville, in 1854. Through trackage rights on a C&O predecessor and further construction, it reached Lynchburg in 1860. It came under control of the state of Virginia in 1867, and in 1872 the Virginia & North Carolina Railroad was organized to consolidate the Orange, Alexandria & Manassas Gap (successor to the O&A) and the Lynchburg & Danville Railroad, under construction be­tween the cities of its name. The Baltimore & Ohio obtained control and named it the Washington City, Virginia Midland & Great Southern Railroad. The extension to Danville was completed in 1874, and in 1880, a cutoff from Orange to Charlottesville was opened. The company was reorganized as the Virginia Midland Railway in 1881. In 1886 the R&D leased the Western North Carolina Railroad, which had been constructed from Salisbury west through Old Fort (1869) and Asheville (1879) to a connection at the Tennessee state line with the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia.

The Georgia Pacific Railway was chartered in 1881 to build a from Atlanta to a connection with the Texas & Pacific at Texarkana. It was opened as far as Columbus, Miss., in 1887. It was leased to the Richmond & Danville in ­January 1889, shortly before it completed its line as far as the Mississippi River at Greenville, Miss. The Mississippi portion of the GP, which had remained a separate entity, was cast off as the Columbus & Greenville in 1920. In 1892 the Richmond Terminal and the railroads it controlled (Richmond & Danville; Virginia Midland; Charlotte, Columbia & Augusta; Western North Carolina; Georgia Pacific; and East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia) entered receivership. The banking house of J. P. Morgan came to the rescue. In 1869 two railroads out of Knoxville, Tenn., the East Tennessee & Virginia and the East Tennessee & Georgia, were consolidated to form the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia Railroad. The East Tennessee & Virginia was built from Bristol, Va., to Knoxville, 131 miles, between 1850 and 1856. The East Tennessee & Georgia opened a line from Dalton, Ga., to Knoxville, 110 miles, and a branch from Cleveland, Tenn., to Chattanooga in 1859. In 1881 the ETV&G acquired and constructed lines from Dalton to Brunswick, Ga., and ­Meridian, Miss. Three other major routes were more or less affiliated with the ETV&G: Chattanooga–Memphis, Mobile–Selma, Ala., and Louisville–Lexington, Ky. Southern Railway The Southern Railway was chartered in 1894 to acquire the properties of the Richmond ­Terminal. The system comprised lines from Alexandria, Va., to Columbus, Miss.; from Chat­tanooga through Atlanta to Brunswick, Ga.; from Memphis through Chattanooga to Bristol, Va.; from Selma, Ala., to Rome, Ga.; and from Danville, Va., to Richmond. The Southern acquired other railroads; among the larger ones were the Georgia Southern & Florida Railway in 1895 and the Louisville, Evansville & St. Louis Consolidated Railroad in 1898. The Southern acquired a number of subsidiaries over the years. Many retained independent status, and the continued existence of these subsidiaries was attested to by initials on locomotives and cars. In the 1970s the Southern was notable for staying out of Amtrak, continuing to run its remaining passenger trains and gradually trimming service to just the Washington-Atlanta-New Orleans Southern Crescent. Amtrak took over operation of that train on Feb. 1, 1979. On March 25, 1982, the Interstate Commerce Commission approved the acquisition by Norfolk Southern Corporation, a newly organized holding company, of the Southern Railway and the Norfolk & Western. Merger took place on June 1, 1982. At the end of 1990 the Norfolk & Western Railway became a subsidiary of the Southern Railway (it had been a subsidiary of Norfolk Southern Corporation),

and the Southern Railway changed its name to Norfolk Southern Railway. I have two post cards with the exact same picture on the front. The backs are somewhat different from each other. I have scanned the backs of both postcards. Although they were both printed by the same printer (Curt Otto Teich) and published by the same publisher, the backs are different. I believe that the top one is older than the bottom one; I say this because the top one contains the price of the postage. It was the same for a very long time, then, with the changes it became more accurate to not post the prices.