Any of you D&H railroaders know why the N&W sold the D&H for only $500k to Timothy Mellon? Seems awfully cheap. He had just paid about $20mil for the MEC, and about $42mil for the B&M. Were they that desperate to sell it and disolve Dereco after the EL bankrupcy and inclusion in CR? Any info/comments appreciated. Bill [ 26. June 2003, 03:56: Message edited by: wabash_one ]
I seem to remember that when EL became part of CR the N&W dropped their interest in D&H. The B&M, MEC and D&H were not part of the CR take over so were on their own. B&M sold the area within about 50 miles of Boston to MBTA so did OK for a while but D&H did not do so well. After Mellon got control of B&M and MEC the D&H was ready for anyone to take over. I left B&M in 71 and went with FRA and from 74 to 79 inspected all three as well as many others. Lots of my friends got shafted when Mellon leased the B&M and MEC to Springfield Terminal. ST was 6 miles long and had one loco, a 44 ton GE and about 5 employees.
Thanks Gil. Appreciate that info. I wonder what kind of financial shape the D&H was in when N&W/Dereco decided to sell it so cheap? Must have had a lot of debt or something. I read recently where Conrail made life a living hell for the D&H, especially with intentional dispatching delays and fees that were triple what they charged others. Sounds like CR was trying to beat the D&H to death at that time. Combine that with the strike, and it's a miracle it even survived! Also appreciate the B&M info. Sounds like your move to the FRA was a wise one, based on what happened to your B&M friends after the line leases to the ST. Any other B&M info would be much appreciated. Thanks again, Bill
Springfield Terminal was nothing more than a union busting move. IIRC, there was an article in Railway Age about that, and the premise was to cut labor costs to regain a competitive edge in the area's transportation needs. I know the trackage lost points to a dismal failure on the competition hoped for. Keeping politics out of this, and from a railfans perspective, it ruined the whole area railfanning wise. Greg Elems
Strang as it may seem the ST was a UTU union railroad but there was one class of employee - railroad worker. Their pay was lower than all other union wages so when ST leased the B&M and MEC all emplyees came under the new class. I happened to be visiting in Mass and was talking to the Signal Supvr when he got a phone call and was told to abolish all positions in 5 days. He was told if they wanted to work they could apply to ST. He asked what the pay and benefits were and was told they didn't know. I lost touch with him as his headquarters were moved and I did not know where he went. Before CR D&H got traffic from EL at Binghamton but then EL became part of CR so D&H got shut out there. They did get trackage rights to Buffalo where they connected to N&W. They also lost the business from Lehigh Valley as that also became CR. The cars that LV and EL gave to D&H now went on the old NYC to Syracuse and north via Watertown to Montreal. Without all the interchange they used to have D&H did not get much traffic.
Yeah Greg, I gotta believe you're right. Doesn't seem to be any other reason I could think of that would make sense. But Gil makes a good point. They were with the UTU. Wonder why not with the BLE??? (like the national contract) Maybe too small an operation at the time. But you would think a D&H employee group of some kind would have been interested in buying the D&H in the first place before N&W sold it so cheap to Mellon. I'm still in the dark about that $500k sale price. It almost sounds like a bargain basement fire sale price. Or was the D&H in such bad shape that it wasn't worth anymore than that, and everybody including the labor groups (possible buyers) at the D&H knew it??? (and this was BEFORE the havoc of Guilford!) Bill
I am pretty sure ST was union when I left the B&M. They had 3 highway crossings and B&M signal forces maintained them for ST. The ST also owned the bridge between Springfield, VT and Charlestown, NH where they interchanged with B&M. It was also a highway bridge and the ST charged tolls for highway traffic. If my memory is correct at that time it was either a nickle or a dime and one cent for cattle. Never saw any cattle on it. I was not there when D&H was sold but when I left the east coast in 79 they were in very poor shape as CR had eliminated most of their interchange and there was very little on line business. The B&M had started to interchange with CR at Worcester, MA instead of Rotterdam Jct, NY.
ST could have been under the UTU union. I don't remember the whole story, but it was an unpopular move at the time and even the UTU was against it. I know that with the formation of CR hurt the D&H and Guilford didn't help. An employee owned D&H would have certainly changed the out look of the employees. Greg Elems
I survived Pat McGinnis and watched him go to jail and then B&M went into bankruptcy. They were doing pretty good but I could not see much future there so went with FRA. Soon after I left Mellon came in and it got worse. The Mellon lawyers figured out how to use the UTU contract on ST to their advantage. The D&H employees were more like a family and did all they could to help the railroad but I doubt if they could have found any funding to buy the RR considering that CR controlled what business they could get.
