Product Details
| Company |
New York & Boston Rail-Road Company |
| Certificate Type |
Capital Stock
|
| Date Issued |
May 26, 1856 |
| Canceled |
No |
| Printer |
Hosford & Co.
|
| Signatures |
Hand signed
|
|
Approximate Size
|
10 1/2" (w) by 6 1/2" (h)
|
Product Images
|
Show the exact certificate you will receive |
|
Authentic
|
Yes
|
| Additional Details |
NA
|
Historical Context
The New York & Boston Railroad (NY&B) was chartered on May 21, 1869 to build a line from Highbridge on the Harlem River in New York northeast to Brewster. At Brewster connections were to be provided to the New York & Harlem Railroad for travel north to Albany, and to the Boston, Hartford & Erie Railroad to Boston.
The New York, Boston & Northern Railway (NYB&N) was formed on November 18, 1872, as a consolidation of the NY&B with two companies to the north — the Putnam & Dutchess Railroad (P&D) and Dutchess & Columbia Railroad (D&C). The P&D was a plan for a line to split from the New York and Boston at Carmel to a point midway along the D&C. The D&C opened in 1871, running from the Hudson River to the Connecticut border. The Clove Branch Railroad was to serve as a short connection between the two parts of the planned line.
The New York, Boston & Montreal Railway was organized on January 21, 1873, as a renaming of the NYB&N. It continued north to Chatham on what is now the defunct section of the Harlem Line and then used the Harlem Extension Railroad into Vermont. The Panic of 1873 caused the cancellation of the leases and mergers on December 1 of that year. Construction on the P&D and D&C stopped; D&C later became part of the Central New England Railway, the Harlem Extension became a part of the Rutland Railroad, and the Clove Branch Railroad was abandoned in 1898.
The New York, Westchester & Putnam Railway was formed on July 3, 1877, as a reorganization, and was leased to the New York City & Northern Railroad (NYC&N), formed on March 1, 1878. Between East View and Pocantico Hills, the NYC&N built a segment leading to a perilous 80-foot-high trestle over a marsh-filled valley. Because of the dangers of crossing the bridge, which often required that trains slow down to a crawl, the line was rerouted west around that valley in 1881. The bridge was torn down in 1883, and the valley became the Tarrytown Reservoir. The line finally opened under the original plan, ending at Brewster, in April 1881. That year, the New York & New England Railroad opened to the north, using some of the grade built for the P&D and D&C. The West Side & Yonkers Railway was leased to the NYC&N on May 1, 1880, extending the line south across the Harlem River to the northern terminal of the Ninth Avenue Elevated at 155th Street. It was merged into the NYC&N by 1887. In the 1910s, the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT) of the New York City Subway purchased the bridge across the Harlem River to move its elevated lines north into the Bronx, cutting the NYP back to Sedgwick Avenue. The Yonkers Rapid Transit Railway was opened in 1888 as a branch from the NYP at Van Cortlandt northwest to Yonkers. It was merged into NYP by 1887.
The company went into receivership by 1887 and was reorganized as the New York & Northern Railway. By 1894 it was reorganized as the New York & Putnam Railroad (NY&P) by J. P. Morgan, who in turn leased the railroad to the New York Central & Hudson River Railroad (NYC&HR). The line eventually became the Putnam Division of the New York Central Railroad (NYC) by 1913.
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