Re: (rshsdepot) Mill Hall, Pa. (NYC)

["ANN MILLER" <amiller156_@_verizon.net>]

To all:
DeLand, Fla., railway station renovations complete

The DeLand Amtrak station, just west of town on Old New York Avenue, has 
survived 90 years of change, including a fire. Now it's being prepared to 
serve West Volusia for the remainder of this century, local newspapers 
report. The station opened in 1918, in the days of steam engines. It was 
known as the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad DeLand Junction passenger depot.

The station has been renovated over the past couple of years. In recent 
months, efforts have been concentrated on the interior, with work led by 
Mark Shuttleworth and his team from Florida Victorian Architectural Antiques 
in Downtown DeLand. New ceilings, new drywall and new paint mark the 
restoration process. A new roof was completed about a year-and-a-half ago.

Fueled by a $500,000 Florida transportation grant, major restoration work 
began in 2006, after Amtrak and CSX Transportation, which owns the land, 
reached a partnership agreement. Along with the new roof, the station got 
rebuilt restrooms, access for people with disabilities, new period-looking 
light fixtures, and a rebuilt platform and canopy.

The waiting room is now a lovely piece of Victoriana, with graceful wooden 
benches, potted plants, and carefully framed newspaper clippings and 
pictures of trains. An antique brass spittoon, donated by Florida Victorian, 
sits in a display case, a reminder of Victorian-era fixtures.

In 2007, the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation honored the DeLand 
train station as a Preservation Award Winner for outstanding achievement in 
restoration and rehabilitation, calling it "an intrinsic resource for the 
River of Lakes Heritage Corridor."

The station may become part of the commuter rail that will connect DeLand to 
Orlando and other Central Florida communities, bringing together the past 
and the future.

- ----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Alexander D. Mitchell IV" <LNER4472_@_bcpl.net>
To: <rshsdepot_@_lists.railfan.net>
Sent: Tuesday, September 25, 2007 6:43 AM
Subject: (rshsdepot) Mill Hall, Pa. (NYC)


> Buffalo Line in PA and NYFate of historic train station on the line
> Lock Haven (Pa.) Express
>
> there is a picture in the online edition
> www.lockhaven.com/express
> By MATT CONNOR - Express Staff Writer
>
> The historic Mill Hall train station MILL HALL - It's one of the last 
> surviving remnants of a glorious period of railroading in Pennsylvania, a 
> time when millions of tons of coal were transported across the state by 
> rail to feed the voracious appetites of the New York Central railroad's 
> steam locomotives.
> On the hard wood planks of the interior of the Mill Hall train station, 
> such luminaries as William H. Vanderbilt (at the time the nation's 
> wealthiest individual), author Mark Twain and State Senator S.L. Peale 
> (for whom the town of Peale, PA was named) may well have trod.
>
> In the 1950s, the legendary New York Central locomotive Number 999 - which 
> once shattered the land speed records and is now housed at the Museum of 
> Science and Industry in Chicago - paused in Mill Hall to take on 
> passengers.
>
> In 1980, the station was the first recipient of the Bruce A. Bechdel 
> Memorial Preservation Award, named for a passionate local historic 
> preservationist, and presented just weeks after his death. This being the 
> same Bruce Bechdel, by the way, who was the subject of a 2006 New York 
> Times best seller penned by his daughter, Alison.
>
> The saying, "If these walls could talk" might almost have been written 
> specifically for the Mill Hall train station, and if local supporters have 
> their way, a spectacular new chapter may soon be written for this 
> seemingly humble little depot.
>
> Tonight, Lock Haven City Council will decide the fate of this historic 
> structure, a fate that has been heavily influenced by financial 
> contributions by civic organizations and individual donors and ongoing 
> initiatives by county, city and state government, public utilities, and 
> private industry.
> The informal "Save the Mill Hall Depot" movement also has been fueled by 
> the recent losses of local historic structures like the former Samuel 
> Christ house on West Main Street, which was demolished earlier this summer 
> to make way for a parking lot for Lock Haven University's East Campus.
>
> It all began several months ago, when the Mill Hall train station's 
> current owner, Bob Rightnour, announced his desire to expand his business 
> onto the property upon which the station now stands. Rightnour 
> Manufacturing Co, located adjacent to the station, has a separate office 
> in Mingoville, but Rightnour hopes to consolidate all of his operations in 
> Mill Hall. To do that, he simply needs more space. However he also wants 
> the station preserved and is offering the property for free to anyone who 
> can do so.
> That requires moving the one-story, wood frame structure to another spot, 
> which will cost an estimated $60,000. An empty lot on Bald Eagle Street 
> behind City Hall and next to the Norfolk Southern railroad tracks would be 
> the ideal place for the relocated station, according to Elisabeth Lynch, 
> county planning department assistant and one of the people driving the 
> effort to save the station.
>
> As of last Monday, the amount available to save the property stood at only 
> $37,400, though local efforts at fundraising have been ongoing. Because of 
> the funding shortfall, City Council now must re-visit its commitment to 
> donate the empty Bald Eagle Street lot, and will reportedly make its 
> decision after getting a fundraising update from City Planner Leonora 
> Hannegan tonight.
>
> Meanwhile Rightnour Manufacturing, which previously delayed its expansion 
> for the sake of the train station, will start construction in mid October.
>
> In other words, the clock is ticking, and what happens in the hours 
> leading up to tonight's council meeting may determine whether another 
> piece of Clinton County's architectural history remains intact or goes the 
> way of the wrecking ball.
>
> Among the last of its kind
>
> Sadly, demolition is an all-too common fate for structures like the Mill 
> Hall train station.
>
> According to Jeff Feldmeier, an historian who has spent years researching 
> the New York Central-Beech Creek Railroad, for which the Mill Hall depot 
> was originally constructed, "There are only a handful of stations 
> surviving in what was the Beech Creek district. The stations have become 
> few and far between as the railroad has consolidated operations."
> Modern transit companies, Feldmeier said, "don't generally need small-
> town facilities. They have centralized facilities that handle a broad 
> area. So over the course of decades, small town stations were phased out. 
> When that happened, the railroad just simply removed them. They bulldozed 
> them or burned them down or, in luckier cases, sold them off. That was the 
> case with the Mill Hall station."
>
> Indeed, the building was extremely lucky to have survived this type of 
> downsizing and, in 1952, came under the stewardship of a local couple who 
> seemed devoted to the structure. At that time the station was rented as 
> office space for the Valley Oil and Gas Co., owned and operated by Frank 
> Davenport. Davenport and his wife purchased the building and surrounding 
> property for less than $7,000 about 10 years later.
>
> Today, Feldmeier said, the Mill Hall station "is one of the few remaining 
> examples of a New York Central station in the territory."
>
> He added that "Another interesting thing about that station is that it was 
> a union station, meaning that more than one railroad used it. As far as I 
> know there were only two such union stations, and the other was in 
> Keating, and that's long gone.
> "The other railroad that used it was the Central Railroad of Pennsylvania. 
> That ran from Mill Hall down to Bellefonte. So someone who was a passenger 
> on the Beech Creek railroad coming out of Clearfield could go to Mill Hall 
> and take the Central Railroad down to Bellefonte."
>
> The construction of a railroad from Bellefonte to Mill Hall began a decade 
> after the New York Central-Beech Creek depot was built, according to a 
> June 15, 1893 account in the Clinton Democrat newspaper.
>
> "J.W. Gephart, esq., is devoting most of his time in the construction of a 
> new railroad from Bellefonte to Mill Hall," the paper reported. "The work 
> of grading the road was commenced about one month ago, and since then 
> additional numbers of men have been put to work each week until the army 
> of workers number nearly 400. There are about 300 knights of the pick and 
> shovel at work grading the road in the vicinity of Hecia."
>
> Also being erected at Mill Hall, the paper reported, was "A large boarding 
> shanty. for the accommodation of 75 laborers who will commence work today. 
> This number will be increased in a few days, so the work will be pushed 
> along very rapidly."
>
> Gephart, the paper said, arranged "for the accommodation of a large force 
> of men, which will be brought to work. It's a go and before the winter 
> months have come trains will be running on the new road between Mill Hall 
> and Bellefonte."
>
> One hundred and 14 years later, Feldmeier said, it's extremely rare to 
> find a train station that performed the duties of the Mill Hall depot.
> "And as far as the Central Railroad, there's only the Mill Hall station 
> and two others that survive from that railroad. It comes back to the fact 
> that these stations are just not that common anymore. There's just so few 
> examples of these structures left in the area, it would be a shame not to 
> save one, to let it slip through the fingers."
>
> Born of King Coal
>
> Built in the early 1880s, the Mill Hall Train station was one stop on the 
> 113-mile New York Central-Beech Creek railroad when it first opened to the 
> public, according to Feldmeier.
>
> "Mill Hall was part of New York Central's Beech Creek District, which ran 
> all the way from Jersey Shore to Cherry Tree, Indiana County," he said. 
> "The main line itself on the Beech Creek rail ran from Jersey Shore down 
> to Mahaffey. Avis was the big train yard and shop town nearby. There's 
> still a large yard in Newberry Junction, down by Williamsport, where you 
> changed trains with the Reading line."
>
> At that time, Feldmeier said, one could take a train from Mill Hall to New 
> York City, changing several times along the way on the nearly 12-hour 
> journey. If one could afford a sleeper car, however, no changeover was 
> necessary.
>
> "For a time they even had a sleeper car on that train," he said. "So if 
> you had a berth in a sleeper car, you wouldn't even have to change trains. 
> They just shifted the car around for you."
>
> Construction on the Beech Creek line began in 1883 on the eastern end at 
> Jersey Shore, Feldmeier said, and "the drive to build that line was to 
> in-source New York Central's coal supply for locomotives, station heat, 
> things like that. Before that the company was buying coal on the open 
> market and they got to the point where they felt they were being gouged."
>
> According to Feldmeier, the owners of the New York Central Railroad, the 
> Vanderbilt family, were tired of paying what they considered exorbitant 
> prices for coal so to save money, they decided to mine their own.
>
> "So they created the Clearfield Bituminous Coal Co. They decided to 
> essentially take control of their own coal supply, and to reach these coal 
> fields, they built the Beech Creek Railroad."
>
> Much of the land upon which the Vanderbilts constructed their new railroad 
> was owned by Lock Haven resident Samuel Richard Peale, a former state 
> senator who lived in a lavishly appointed home called "Hillside" on North 
> Fairview Street.
>
> Peale's obituary, published in The Express on August 3, 1910, reported 
> that, "In 1881, he began purchasing coal lands in Clearfield County and 
> the following year bought many thousand acres of coal lands on Moshannon 
> creek, near Kylertown."
>
> The obituary went on to state that, "The late William H. Vanderbilt was 
> later led to purchase a half interest in the lands and also with the 
> building of the Beech Creek railroad, with which project the deceased was 
> so intimately connected, to open up the new Clearfield bituminous coal 
> fields. "Mr. Peale was the general solicitor of the new road from 1882 
> until 1895. He had charge of the purchase of the right of way for the 
> Beech Creek railroad. He was instrumental in organizing large and 
> prosperous coal interests affiliated with the New York Central lines."
>
> William H. Vanderbilt, by the way, was the son of "Commodore" Cornelius 
> Vanderbilt, who left William the vast majority of his huge fortune when he 
> died in 1877, estimated at $100 million, an astounding $143 billion in 
> today's currency (yes, that $143 billion, with a "b").
> Eventually a sizeable chunk of that fortune was passed down to William 
> Vanderbilt's granddaughter, author and fashion designer Gloria Vanderbilt, 
> mother of CNN reporter Anderson Cooper.
>
> "The Vanderbilts were extremely involved in the operation of the 
> railroad," Feldmeier said. "They made at least one or two trips to 
> Clearfield on the Beech Creek line and overnighted there. They were 
> certainly interested in the area and recognized its importance."
> "They were all heavily involved in the New York Central's affairs," he 
> added. "They were getting an earful from their purchasing people about 
> their coal supply costs, and that's what drove their decision to go deep 
> into the Pennsylvania coal fields."
>
> Legendary stopovers
>
> Other notable figures that traveled along the Beech Creek rails included 
> beloved author Samuel Clemens, also known as Mark Twain.
>
> "Mark Twain traveled the line," Feldmeier said. "He had an aunt that lived 
> in Peale and I understand he visited there. He also had stock in the 
> Clearfield Bituminous Coal Co., which was mining in that area."
>
> Whether the legendary literary figure stepped off the train to stretch his 
> legs when the locomotive came to a stop in Mill Hall is, sadly, lost to 
> history. Another legend known to have stopped on the rails outside the 
> Mill Hall station was of the non-human variety, and it is as celebrated 
> today as it was in its prime, regularly marveled over by members of the 
> general public.
>
> On May 10, 1893, history was made when New York Central Engine 999 and its 
> attached passenger train, the Empire State Express, broke the world's 
> land-speed record by racing at 121.5 miles per hour on a route that ran 
> from Syracuse to Buffalo, N.Y. No other vehicle of any kind had reached 
> speeds of over 100 miles per hour at that time, and it would be another 
> decade before another locomotive matched the 999's velocity.
>
> "The New York Central's 999 locomotive set a world speed record for that 
> time, 121 miles an hour," Feldmeier said. "This locomotive was, in the 
> latter stages of its life, downgraded and put into branch line service and 
> worked the Beech Creek line. Twice in the 1950s it passed down the Beech 
> Creek line to Clearfield and would have passed through Mill Hall."
>
> After its period of service on the Beech Creek line ended, however, the 
> famous locomotive seemed headed for an ignoble end.
>
> "It ended up in the scrap line in Avis," Feldmeier said. "That's when some 
> superintendent happened to notice it and realized its historical 
> significance. So it was pulled out of the scrap line and restored."
> In 1962, he said, "the railroad donated it to the Museum of Science and 
> Industry in Chicago and people can go and see it today. It's the only 
> steam locomotive in existence today that worked the Beech Creek line."
> At about the same time the 999 found its new Chicago home, the little 
> depot in Mill Hall came under the ownership of the Davenports, who had 
> already been renting the facility for a decade and who spent $25,000 to 
> renovate the interior and exterior of the station after signing deed to 
> the property.
>
> For 15 years after the Davenports first began occupying the station, it 
> continued to feel the rumble of trains passing by it, though the station 
> itself no longer served in an official capacity for the railroad. In 1966, 
> rail traffic over much of its line was discontinued.
> "Before we bought the station it probably had not been painted for 20 
> years," Frank Davenport told The Express in 1980. "Luckily it was 
> constructed sturdily with thick lumber enabling it to withstand the 
> neglect and weather."
>
> The Davenports received the Bruce A. Bechdel Memorial Preservation Award 
> by the Clinton County Historical Society that year, just weeks after the 
> death of former Clinton County Historical Society Chairman Bruce Bechdel, 
> whose life and death has since been chronicled in his daughter's 
> best-selling memoir.
>
> According to the Clinton County Historic Sites Survey, compiled during the 
> period in which the Davenports owned the station, "Architecturally, this 
> building is typical of the railroad vernacular architecture. Its most 
> atypical feature is its wide hip roof. The height of the roof is 
> comparable to the height of the first story. Other features of importance 
> include the wide projecting overhand supported by angel bracing, the 
> projecting ticket window bay, and the 9-over-9 windows."
>
> The Survey went on to report that, "This structure ... is all that remains 
> in Mill Hall Borough providing evidence that there was a Beech Creek, 
> Clearfield & Southwestern Railroad."
>
> Frank Davenport said that in the station's prime it housed seven employees 
> and that at the time of the award in 1980 his company employed 15.
>
> Accomodations for women
>
> "It might be interesting to note that in the heyday of the railroad, there 
> were ladies' and men's waiting rooms at the station in Mill Hall," 
> Davenport said.
>
> In fact, in 1904 the Clinton County Times reported that, "It is indeed 
> good news that the N.Y.C. Railroad Co. has determined to erect a new 
> waiting station with two departments, one for men and one for women, and a 
> freight station separate from the waiting room. This is an accommodation 
> the company owes their patrons
>
> "The increased travel on this division is growing daily and is now far 
> above the Pennsy (the competing Pennsylvania Railroad) at this point. As 
> it now is, the ladies are either compelled to stand outside or sit in a 
> cloud of tobacco smoke, and the improvement is therefore a necessity."
> Twenty seven years after the Davenports won their preservation award, the 
> depot is once again in need of restoration. During its most recent 
> incarnation as a restaurant, it was substantially upgraded, with a 
> commercial kitchen and customer seating.
>
> Money is already being earmarked for that restoration, should the building 
> be saved from demolition. Feldmeier has contributed about six historic 
> images of the building and copies of blueprints of other standard model 
> New York Central depots he had in his private collection.
>
> The Feldmeier materials will help to serve as a guideline as the efforts 
> to save and restore the structure continue to ramp up. Those efforts began 
> last Spring, said Lynch, of the county planning department.
>
> "It started in the Borough of Mill Hall in, I think, April," Lynch said. 
> "They were talking about it during the borough planning meeting, and 
> members were really upset that they heard the train station was going to 
> be torn down, and they felt kind of hopeless. So I went over to the train 
> station and talked to the owner of the building, Bob Rightnour. He was 
> just as upset as everybody else. He was really concerned, but he needed 
> the space."
> Rightnour, Lynch said, "has put everything on hold so we can do this. It's 
> had a financial impact on him because he has to close his Mingoville plant 
> and move everything here. But he can't stop paying for bills at the 
> Mingoville plant until he can move everything and all of his crew down 
> here to Mill Hall. So he's carrying two loads right now. He's doing that 
> for the project."
>
> After her initial conversations with Rightnour, Lynch said, "I came back 
> and talked to the planning director, Tim Halliday, and found him very 
> supportive even though we all knew it was a long shot. So what I did, for 
> the next three months - as a volunteer - was go around and collect 
> information to see how feasible it was."
>
> A few complicated dead ends followed, Lynch, said, before City Planner 
> Leonora Hannagan proposed that the city-owned Bald Eagle Street lot would 
> be the perfect new home for the building. Lynch went before City Council 
> in July and found them supportive, but concerned about costs and leery 
> about spending taxpayer money on the project.
>
> After an article on the "Save the Mill Hall Depot" movement appeared in 
> The Express, two retired professors offered a $15,000 donation to move the 
> building, which added substantial momentum to the project.
>
> "Once we got that $15,000, that was really the catalyst," Lynch said. 
> "Having some funds to back up the concept, or the dream, made it a 
> potential reality."
>
> Soon in-kind services were offered by public utilities like PPL, Comcast, 
> Verizon, Norfolk Southern and the Wayne Township Landfill. Financial 
> support from the Clinton County commissioners, via the environmental fund, 
> came next.
>
> In addition to the land parcel, the City of Lock Haven donated staff time 
> by Hannagan and city code enforcement officer Dave Romig to try to iron 
> out additional details. State Rep. Hanna earmarked $10,000 for the 
> building's restoration.
>
> Donations began trickling in from local civic organizations and 
> individuals. Figures on how much money has been raised - and whether it is 
> enough - will be released tonight when Hannegan makes her presentation to 
> City Council.
>
> Until then, the fate of the Mill Hall train station remains in question.
>
> "Once the building is there, the grant money will come and restoration can 
> begin, but it's just getting the building there," Lynch said.
> If the project comes to fruition, and the Mill Hall train station finds 
> itself rolling down Route 220 to the Lock Haven Exit, down the off-ramp 
> and settling into a foundation in its new home across Bald Eagle Street 
> from the old National Hotel, it will happen as a result of substantial 
> collaboration between city, county and state government, private sector 
> business and individual philanthropy.
>
> "It's a textbook example of cooperation," Lynch said.
>
> Section: News Posted: 9/24/2007
>
>
>
>
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End of RSHSDepot Digest V1 #1699
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The Railroad Station Historical Society maintains a database of existing
railroad structures at: http://www.rrshs.org