1848–1882 The earliest predecessor of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, the
Aurora Branch Railroad, was chartered by act of the
Illinois General Assembly on October 2, 1848. The charter was obtained by citizens of
Aurora and
Batavia, Illinois, who were concerned that the
Galena and Chicago Union Railroad would bypass their towns in favor of
West Chicago on its route; at the time, that was the only line running west from Chicago. The Aurora Branch was built from Aurora, through Batavia, to Turner Junction in what is now West Chicago. The line was built with old strap rail and minimal, if any, grading. Using a leased locomotive and cars, the Aurora Branch ran passenger and freight trains from Aurora to Chicago via its own line from Aurora to Turner Junction and one of the G&CU's two tracks east from there to Chicago. The G&CU required the Aurora Branch to turn over 70 percent of their revenue per ton-mile handled on that railroad; as a result, in the mid-1850s, surveys were ordered to determine the best route for a railroad line to Chicago. The line from Aurora to Chicago was built through the fledgling towns of
Naperville,
Lisle,
Downers Grove,
Hinsdale,
Berwyn, and the west side of Chicago. It was opened in 1864, and passenger and freight service began. Regular commuter train service started in 1864 and remains operational to this day, making it the oldest surviving regular passenger service in Chicago. Both the original Chicago line, and to a much lesser extent, the old Aurora Branch right of way, are still in regular use today by the Burlington's present successor
BNSF Railway. The company was renamed Chicago and Aurora Railroad on June 22, 1852, and given expanded powers to extend from Aurora to a point north of
LaSalle; this extension, to Mendota, was completed on October 20, 1853. Another amendment, passed February 28, 1854, authorized the company to build east from Aurora to
Chicago via
Naperville, and changed its name to Chicago and Southwestern Railroad. The latter provision was never acted upon, and was repealed by an act of February 14, 1855, which instead reorganized the line as the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. The new railroad was formed by the consolidation of the Chicago and Aurora Railroad, the Central Military Tract, the west end of the Peoria & Oquawka, and the Northern Cross Railroad companies. With a steady acquisition of locomotives, cars, equipment, and trackage, the Burlington Route was able to enter the trade markets in 1862. From that year to date, the railroad and its successors have paid dividends continuously, and never run into debt or defaulted on a loan—the only
Class I U.S. railroad for which this is true. After extensive trackwork was planned, the Aurora Branch changed its name to the Chicago and Aurora Railroad in June 1852, and to Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad in 1856, and shortly reached its two other namesake cities,
Burlington, Iowa, and
Quincy, Illinois. In 1868 CB&Q completed bridges over the
Mississippi River at both Burlington and Quincy, giving the railroad through connections with the
Burlington and Missouri River Railroad (B&MR) in Iowa and the
Hannibal & St. Joseph Railroad (H&StJ) in Missouri. In 1860 the H&SJ carried the mail to the
Pony Express upon reaching the Missouri River at
St. Joseph, Missouri. In 1862 The first Railway Post Office was inaugurated on the H&StJ to sort mail on the trains way across Missouri. The B&MR continued building west into Nebraska as a separate company, the
Burlington & Missouri River Rail Road, founded in 1869. During the summer of 1870 it reached
Lincoln, the newly designated capital of Nebraska and by 1872 it reached
Kearney, Nebraska. That same year the B&MR across Iowa was absorbed by the CB&Q. By the time the Missouri River bridge at
Plattsmouth, Nebraska, was completed the B&MR in Nebraska was well on its way to
Denver. That same year, the Nebraska B&MR was purchased by the CB&Q, which completed the line to Denver by 1882. Early repair shops for rolling stock were built by the
Aurora Branch Railroad in Chicago, but the first true shop site was established at
Aurora, Illinois in 1855. These were capable of repairing and building locomotives, freight cars, and passenger cars. Other shop sites were established or inherited from predecessor lines as the system grew. By the early 1900s, the shops at Aurora served the Chicago Division, the shops in
Galesburg, Illinois served the Galesburg Division, the shops in
Hannibal, Missouri served the St. Louis Division, the shops in
West Burlington, Iowa and in
Creston, Iowa served the Iowa Division, and the shops in
Denver, Colorado served the McCook and Red Cloud Divisions. The latter were the final steam era shops built for the CB&Q, completed in 1922.
1882–1901 Burlington's rapid expansion after the
American Civil War was based upon sound financial management, dominated by
John Murray Forbes of Boston and assisted by
Charles Elliott Perkins. Perkins was a powerful administrator who eventually forged a system out of previously loosely held affiliates, virtually tripling Burlington's size during his presidency from 1881 to 1901. Ultimately, Perkins believed the Burlington Railroad must be included into a powerful transcontinental system. Though the railroad stretched as far west as Denver and
Billings, Montana, it had failed to reach the
Pacific Coast during the 1880s and 1890s, when construction was less expensive. Though approached by
E. H. Harriman of the
Union Pacific Railroad, Perkins felt his railroad was a more natural fit with
James J. Hill's
Great Northern Railway. With its river line to the
Twin Cities, the Burlington Route formed a natural connection between Hill's home town (and headquarters) of
St. Paul, Minnesota, and the railroad hub of Chicago. Moreover, Hill was willing to meet Perkins' $200-a-share asking price for the Burlington's stock. By 1900, Hill's Great Northern, in conjunction with the
Northern Pacific Railway, held nearly 100 percent of Burlington's stock. By 1899, the company had rostered 1,205 locomotives, 936 passenger cars and 40,720 freight cars. In 1901, a rebuffed Harriman tried to gain an indirect influence over the Burlington by launching a stock raid on the Northern Pacific. Though Hill managed to fend off this attack on his nascent system, it led to the creation of the
Northern Securities Company, and later, the
Northern Securities Co. v. United States ruling by the
U.S. Supreme Court.
Burlington strike of 1888 The only major strike in the line's history came in 1888, the
Burlington railway strike of 1888. Unlike most strikes, which were based on unskilled workers, this one was based on the highly skilled well-paid engineers and firemen, a challenge to management prerogatives. A settlement would have been much cheaper, but President Perkins was determined to assert ownership rights and destroy the union threat. The fight dragged on 10 months before the financially and emotionally exhausted strikers finally gave up, and Perkins declared a total victory. However, he had spent heavily on strikebreakers, lawsuits, and police protection, hurting the balance sheets and putting the railroad in a poor position to face the nationwide depression of the
Panic of 1893.
1901–1945 locomotive
No. 710 on static display at
Iron Horse Park. Following the purchase of the Burlington by GN and NP, expansion continued. In 1908, the CB&Q purchased both the
Colorado and Southern Railway and the
Fort Worth and Denver Railway, giving it access south to Dallas and the Gulf of Mexico ports in
Houston and
Galveston. It also extended its reach south in the Mississippi Valley region by opening up a new line from
Concord, Illinois, south to
Paducah, Kentucky. It was during this period that the Burlington was at its largest, exceeding just over 12,000 route miles in 14 states by the 1920s. With the
First World War having the same effect on the railroad as on all other railroads, during the 1920s, the Burlington Route had an increasingly heavy amount of equipment flooding the yards. With the advent of the
Great Depression, the CB&Q held a good portion of this for scrap. In 1929, the CB&Q created a subsidiary, the
Burlington Transportation Company, to operate intercity buses in tandem with its railway network. On January 1, 1932, the CB&Q received a new president; former Great Northern Railroad president
Ralph Budd. By which time, the CB&Q was facing a decline in passenger ridership from the Depression, and U.S. President
Franklin D. Roosevelt was exploring ways to help the rail industry improve. In 1936, the CB&Q would become one of the founding members of the
Trailways Transportation System, and still provides intercity service to this day as
Burlington Trailways. 1940 was the final year the CB&Q added steam locomotives to their roster, having completed construction on their
O-5A class locomotives at the West Burlington, Iowa shops. With their freight traffic weighing 31 million tons that year, the CB&Q saw no further necessity for any more steam or diesel locomotives to be added to their roster. August 31, 1949, was Ralph Budd's final day as president of the railroad before he would retire during that year's
Chicago Railroad Fair, and Harry C. Murphy succeeded him in September. The final division on the CB&Q to be fully dieselized was the Beardstown Division in Southern Illinois, where 2-8-2 locomotive No. 4997 worked the last revenue steam assignment for the railroad at Herrin Junction on January 27, 1959. The only major U.S. railroads to operate revenue steam after this date were the Union Pacific,
Illinois Central,
Nickel Plate Road,
Norfolk and Western,
Grand Trunk Western,
Duluth, Missabe and Iron Range, and
Lake Superior and Ishpeming. in 1969, with an experimental paint scheme that would later be adopted by the
Burlington Northern the following year, albeit in a different form On July 1, 1965, Harry Murphy retired from his position as president of the CB&Q (he remained on the railroad as a director until October), and former
Frisco Railway president
Louis W. Menk took over as president and CEO. As the financial situation of American railroading continued to decline throughout the 1960s, forcing restructuring across the country, the CB&Q merged with the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, and the
Spokane, Portland and Seattle (SP&S) railroads on March 2, 1970, to form the
Burlington Northern Railroad (BN), with Louis Menk serving as the company's first president and CEO (twenty-six years later, the BN and
Santa Fe Railroads merged to become the
Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway (BNSF)). Most passenger operations would be assumed in 1971 by
Amtrak. Harry C. Murphy was a steam fan who recognized the popularity of steam locomotives, and he commissioned for additional steam excursions to take place on the railroad throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s. Twenty-one steam locomotives of varying classes took part in the CB&Q's new steam excursion program, of which only two remained operational by 1961: 2-8-2 No. 4960 and 4-8-4 No. 5632. In 1962, the CB&Q's passenger department began sponsoring the excursion runs by offering ticket discounts to paying customers, and the Burlington began to host several school trains for school students. In the process of reducing operating costs for the railroad, Murphy's successor, Louis Menk, ordered for the CB&Q's steam excursion program to be shut down by August 1, 1966. Despite a public outcry and protest over the program's cancellation, the No. 4960 locomotive pulled the railroad's final excursion train on July 17. ==The Burlington
Zephyrs==