(rshsdepot) Chicopee, MA

["Bernie Wagenblast" <brwagenblast_@_home.com>]

Branch rail line a link to history

Wednesday, August 22, 2001

Today's column is in response to a note I received from Russell
Jardine, who lives on Reed Avenue.

"I have questions regarding the railroad station opposite the
City Hall," Jardine wrote. "I do not understand it at all.

"The tracks seem to parallel the river and Front Street and the
station was clearly a passenger station. If the train were to
proceed towards Chicopee Falls, then it would run out of track at
the Fisk and the mills."

Since the old Chicopee Falls branch line is the proposed route
for the Chicopee riverwalk and bikeway, Jardine's note is
certainly current. In January, Mayor Richard J. Kos established a
Chicopee Bikeways Advisory Committee to address issues of
security and land acquisition connected with the site.

The 2½-mile Chicopee Falls branch was built in 1845 in
conjunction with the construction of an initial rail link between
Springfield and Northampton. The factory village was growing with
the addition in the 1840s of several new manufacturing
operations, led by J.B. Stevens Arms, Lamb Knitting Machine and
the Belcher Taylor Agricultural Tool Co. Placement on the
valley's main rail link north and south would make Chicopee Falls
a major player in the region's industrial growth. Unfortunately,
that would not be the case. The track bed never crossed the
Chicopee River.

The man most responsible for the valley's transportation industry
was Chicopee native Chester W. Chapin. His career began on
Chicopee Street where he and Stephen Bemis operated a dry goods
business. Before his 25th birthday, he was in the stage-line
business with the Morgan Family of Palmer, occasionally holding
the reins on the Hartford-to-Brattleboro run. He became the
route's general manager, and it so prospered under his management
as to yield him large returns on his investment.

In 1830, steamboat pioneer Thomas Blanchard sold his
Hartford-to-Springfield steamship franchise to Chapin. In control
of the region's land and water routes, Chapin turned his
attention to railroad construction. First as a minor stockholder
in the Western Railroad, during the banking crisis of 1835, he
saw the state back out of a deal to buy $1 million worth of
company stock.

Chapin eventually turned his attention to politics. Without
legislative approval and the commonwealth's financial support,
railroad construction was nearly impossible. Chapin learned to
play the Boston game.

In 1842, he won approval for the Northampton and Springfield,
chartered and underwritten by the Legislature. Construction began
at Springfield. Before the roadbed construction reached
Cabotville (Chicopee Center), the Northampton and Springfield
merged in l845 with the Greenfield and Northampton to form the
Connecticut River Railroad. Chapin became the first president of
the line.

By now, Chester Chapin was one of the Pioneer Valley's most
important business leaders. His influence in Boston was growing
but in 1845 he was no match for a group of 19th-century
capitalists called the Boston Associates. They were financing a
new town on the Connecticut River. The holding company had
unlimited funds and was called the Hadley Falls Co.

Wyatt E. Harper, in his "The Story of Holyoke," writes, "All of
these men were able operators. Together these men furnished one
of the finest examples of the practice of the interlocking
directorate. Outstanding among them were George W. Lyman, Edmund
Dwight, William Appleton, Samuel Cabot and Ignatius Sargent,"
whose names of course grace the most important streets in
Holyoke. Most of them were on the board of directors of 22 cotton
manufac-turing corpora-tions situated all over New England from
Dover, N.H., to Taunton.

Together they controlled four mills in Chicopee, eight in Lowell
and three in Taunton. The year Chapin's railroad reached
Cabotville, the Boston capitalists, in conjunction with the
Fairbanks Co., formed a corporation to undertake the construction
of a dam and a city.

George W. Lyman became the president while a man named James K.
Mills was elected treasurer of the Hadley Falls Co. Harper refers
to Mills as an able gentleman. He was, in fact, a major player in
Massachusetts politics. During the Civil War he was a major
stockholder in the Ames Sword Co.

The Connecticut River Railroad construction crews were Irish
laborers under contract to John Chase. Chapin and Chase decided
to continue construction on the Chicopee Falls branch before the
Legislature granted the necessary right-of-way approval. The
debate in Boston would prove crucial. Several northern routes
were under consideration. Chapin was already building from
Cabotville. He favored a route along the Chicopee River, crossing
the river at the factory village, thence on to South Hadley and
Hadley, crossing the Connecticut River near the site of the
Oxbow. Since the Boston Associates owned the mills in Cabotville
and Chicopee Falls, he expected their support. Another route
under consideration involved crossing the Chicopee River at
Cabotville, thence through Willimansett, South Hadley, Hadley,
again crossing the Connecticut River near the Oxbow.

The Chicopee route was doomed from the start. Boston capitalists
and politicians were committed to the development of Ireland
Parish. (It wouldn't be called Holyoke until 1850.) The route
that was finally agreed upon remains to this day. The rails would
cross the Chicopee River near its mouth, then continue through
Willimansett, crossing the Connecticut River into Holyoke.
Holyoke would develop into a major manufacturing center and John
Chase and his Irish laborers would be hired to build the first
Holyoke Dam.

The Connecticut River Railroad established a freight depot at the
foot of Ferry Street (Exchange Street) adjacent to the Chicopee
House hotel. Abner B. Abbey had constructed the hotel (Chicopee's
first) in 1841. He moved the hotel in 1845 to accommodate the
railroad. The Chicopee Falls branch line opened in 1846.

During the Civil War, the railroad built a short spur line, a
turntable and a large freight station at the end of the line in
the factory village adjacent to the Chicopee Manufacturing Co.
Following the Civil War, the company added passenger service from
Chicopee Falls to the center. A third station was constructed in
Market Square.

During the 1880s, the center station became known as the Robinson
Station. In 1884, a resident of Springfield Street became the
governor of Massachusetts. According to local legend, the Boston
and Maine locomotive backed up the short distance from the
Chicopee Junction to pick up Gov. George D. Robinson on his
weekly trips to Boston. The Boston and Maine system absorbed the
river line in the 1890s. The company curtailed passenger service
in 1926 and sold the line to Guilford Transportation Co. in 1981.

But if all goes well, the historic, picturesque 2½-mile Chicopee
Spur will become a riverwalk and bikeway bringing people back to
the river. The trail will increase the understanding of the role
of the river in the city's history while providing healthy
exercise and recreation.

Stephen R. Jendrysik is a Chicopee historian and a history
teacher at Chicopee Comprehensive High School. His column runs
every other Wednesday.

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End of RSHSDepot Digest V1 #137
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