(erielack) Santa Fe interest in EL

["MDelvec952_@_aol.com"]

In a message dated 6/3/00 10:36:39 PM Eastern Daylight Time, diamond folks 
were discussing:

> > He claims that AT&SF wanted to purchase the Erie Lackawanna just before
>  > the Conrail takeover in 1976. This would have created the first true
>  > transcontinental railroad in the US. By this time, however, the EL was
>  > committed to Conrail.

I've actually talked to Santa Fe managers who were around when the merger 
with EL was being explored.  They recalled that soon after that had started 
the beginnings of the SP-SF merger had begun, and the Santa Fe execs jumped 
on that instead.  It wasn't the EL people who dropped the ball on EL Santa 
Fe.  I don't recall any mention of any official name proposals for the new 
company.  Suffice to say, had the ATSF and EL merged the EL would still be 
around and the Conrail story would have been quite different.

Would the Phoebe Snow / Lake Cities have been renamed the E-L Capitan?

                             ....Mike

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