The CC&C and LS&MS The
Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Railroad (CC&C) was chartered in 1836. After several false starts at construction, in November 1848 the company finally issued a
request for proposals to build the first leg of the line from Cleveland to
Columbus, Ohio. Frederick Harbach, a
surveyor and
engineer for several Ohio railroads, surveyed the route for the new spur in 1847. Stone had worked with Harbach and another railroad engineer,
Stillman Witt, while building railroad bridges in New England.
Alfred Kelley, an attorney and former state legislator, canal commissioner, banker, and railroad builder, was president of the railway, and he, too, knew Stone well from his railroading days in the east. Kelley and the CC&C managers reached out to Stone, Harbach, and Witt, and asked them to bid on the project. Stone, Harbach, and Witt formed a company in late 1848 to bid on the contract, which they then won. Construction began on the line in November 1849, and the final spike was driven on February 18, 1851. Stone, Harbach, and Witt agreed to take a portion of their pay in the form of stock in the railroad. The stock soared in value as soon as the spur was completed, making Stone very wealthy. In 1849, Stone, Harbach, and Witt also won a contract to build the
Bellefontaine and Indiana Railroad. The Indiana portion of the line was finished in 1852, and the Ohio portion in July 1853. In 1850, Stone was appointed construction superintendent of the CC&C, and he moved to Cleveland. He was named a director of the railroad in 1852. Stone also became construction superintendent of another railroad in 1850, one that would eventually be known as the
Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway (LS&MS). The line began in 1833 as a series of small, independent railroads which then combined into larger and larger companies. One of the first of these smaller lines was the Cleveland, Painesville and Ashtabula Railroad (CP&A), which had been chartered in 1848 to build track from Cleveland to the border with Pennsylvania. Alfred Kelley was one of its directors. On July 26, 1850, the CP&A awarded a contract to build its line to the firm of Stone, Harbach, and Witt. The line was completed in autumn 1852, and Stone was named a director of the railroad in August 1853 at a salary of $4,000 a year ($ in dollars). He continued in this position until the corporation's merger into the LS&MS in May 1869, and served as the CP&A's president from August 1858 to March 1859. While Stone served as director, the CP&A leased the
Jamestown and Franklin Railroad (J&FR) in March 1864 for 20 years. He oversaw the construction of the Union Depot (named because all railroads in the city would use the same station) in
Erie, Pennsylvania, in 1866, and became a director of the J&FR (probably for a single year) in 1868. Stone was again elected a director of the LS&MS in August 1869, and was appointed the LS&MS' general manager in July 1873 (serving until June 1875). The railroad was in financial difficulty by mid-1873, and Stone's appointment was made in large part so that he could stabilize it. Just one month after Stone took over as general manager, he learned that the 1873 dividend (which cost $2 million) had been paid for with a loan from the Union Trust Company (a Cleveland bank). When the economy soured in August, the bank
called the loan. The LS&MS almost went into
receivership, but
Cornelius Vanderbilt (another director of the road) repaid the loan out of his own funds. When his health failed in 1875, Stone resigned his position as director and general manager. Stone remained construction superintendent of the CP&A until July 1853, and of the CC&C until 1854, when he resigned both offices (retaining his directorships) due to poor health. The following year, Stone and Witt signed a contract to clear and grade the
Chicago and Milwaukee Railway from
Waukegan, Illinois, to the border with
Wisconsin. He and Witt then signed a second contract in 1858 to build the track. Stone added another important railroad executive position when he became director of the Cleveland and Toledo Railroad in June 1859. Directorships for the road lasted a year, and Stone served one term. He was elected again in June 1863 and June 1867, and served as the company's president from January to June 1868. During his last term as director of the line (and while serving as a director of the CP&A), the CP&A leased the Cleveland & Toledo for 99 years on October 8, 1867, essentially running the railroad. On June 17, 1868, the CP&A changed its name to the
Lake Shore Railway, and absorbed the Cleveland & Toledo on February 11, 1869.
Civil War During the
American Civil War (1861 to 1864), Stone focused almost all his attention on running his railroads for the benefit of the
Union war effort, and became a millionaire. He was an ardent supporter of President Abraham Lincoln, and Lincoln consulted with him on both supply and transportation issues. He became a friend of Lincoln's, and raised and supplied troops for Union cause. In 1863, Lincoln offered Stone a
brigadier generalship if he would construct a military railway from
Kentucky to
Knoxville, Tennessee. Stone turned down the generalship and persuaded the president to abandon the project (which was unfeasible and unnecessary). It was probably while visiting
Washington, D.C., during a trip to visit Lincoln that Stone met and became friends with Lincoln's
private secretary,
John Hay. It became clear during the Civil War that Cleveland's lone railroad station—a small wooden structure built in 1853 at the base of Bath Street (now Front Avenue) on the
Cleveland Flats—was not large enough to handle the city's growing rail needs. The station burned to the ground in 1864, and Amasa Stone was tapped by the railroads to build a new station. Stone both designed and oversaw the construction of the luxurious and large
Cleveland Union Depot, which opened on November 10, 1866. By 1868, Stone's annual income had risen to $70,000 a year ($ in dollars), and a few years later he owned property worth at least $5 million ($ in dollars).
Association with Cornelius Vanderbilt Cornelius Vanderbilt waged a long and bitter war for control of the
New York Central Railroad from 1865 to 1867. The Central, governed by a clique of men known as the "
Albany Regency", controlled most of the rail traffic outside of New York City. But Vanderbilt's
Hudson River Railroad not only had the only direct link between
Albany, New York, and New York City, but it also had the only rail line into lower
Manhattan. Vanderbilt won an agreement with the Central to transfer freight to his line. The contract also required the Central to pay the Hudson River Railroad $100,000 a year ($ in dollars) for keeping extra rolling stock on hand in the summer to handle the increased traffic moving north. A group of New York City investors—led by banker
LeGrand Lockwood,
American Express and
Wells Fargo founder
William Fargo, and
Michigan Southern and Northern Indiana Railroad president
Henry Keep—decided to seek control of the Central. They quickly amassed almost two-thirds of the company's stock, and ousted the "Albany Regency". Keep, elected president of the Central, immediately revoked the yearly payment. An outraged Vanderbilt stopped carrying all Central freight. Steamboats could not move the Central's cargoes because the Hudson River frozen due to a harsh winter. Freight backed up in Albany, and New York City was effectively cut off by rail. The Central's stock price fell. In an attempt to make money off the situation, Keep borrowed a significant amount of shares to
sell short. Flooding the market with shares only drove the price further downward, and Vanderbilt and his allies quickly purchased these shares. This forced Keep to pay his lenders out of his own pocket, hurting him financially, and allowed the Vanderbilt group to gain control of the Central. Keep resigned, and
Horace Henry Baxter was named president in December 1866. Vanderbilt exerted his power again in December 1867, and had himself named president of the Central. Realizing that the New York Central now depended heavily on connecting lines to reach Midwestern cities like
Chicago, Cleveland,
Detroit, and
St. Louis, Vanderbilt decided to add Amasa Stone to the Central's board of directors. Stone was first appointed to the board in 1867, and probably served until December 1868. In April 1868, Stone played a major role in bringing together Cornelius Vanderbilt and the oil magnate
John D. Rockefeller. Vanderbilt very much wanted the New York Central to carry both raw and refined oil being shipped by Rockefeller. On April 18, 1868, Vanderbilt asked Rockefeller (then visiting New York City) to meet with him. Rockefeller refused, sending only his
business card. He believed Vanderbilt would try to charge him high freightage rates, and Rockefeller knew he could get his oil to refineries and consumers without Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt persisted, however, and later that afternoon sent Amasa Stone to visit Rockefeller at Rockefeller's hotel. The two Clevelanders spoke for several hours, and Stone convinced Rockefeller to see Vanderbilt. The two men met that evening, and began a long and fruitful business relationship. Vanderbilt subsequently played another critical role on Amasa Stone's railroad career. Vanderbilt wanted control of the Lake Shore Railway, which had formed out of a combination of smaller Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois railroads on March 31, 1868. In May 1868, Vanderbilt's proxies attended the first Lake Shore stockholders' meeting, and discovered that LeGrand Lockwood had a sizeable financial interest in the company. Vanderbilt was defeated in his attempt to install his own man as the Lake Shore's president. During the next several months, Lockwood worked with investor and
robber baron Jay Gould, who was engaged in the
Erie War for control of the
Erie Railroad and wanted to divert all Lake Shore traffic to the Erie. On August 19, 1869, Lockwood and Gould rammed their plan through the Lake Shore's board of directors. Vanderbilt fought them, but his only victory was in securing the election of Amasa Stone to the Lake Shore's board. Stone served until his health failed again in 1875, when he resigned. Stone's usefulness to Vanderbilt was soon interrupted, however. On October 18, 1867, Stone and J.C. Buell, the cashier of Cleveland's Second National Bank, were hurled from their carriage after it came apart after hitting an open
gutter in
Cleveland's Public Square. Stone was severely injured, and walked with a strong limp for the rest of his life. Stone went with his family to Europe to recuperate in 1868, and spent 13 months abroad. It was the first of two lengthy trips abroad for him.
LS&MS again, and other post-war railroad career Amasa Stone had a wide range of railroad interests throughout the Midwest in the late 1860s and into the early 1880s. In 1868, he and Hiram Garrettson,
Jeptha Wade, and Stillman Witt invested in and constructed the Cleveland and Newburgh Railroad. This steam streetcar line cost $68,000 ($ in dollars) to build, and ran for down Willson Avenue (now East 55th Street) and then Kinsman Road to Newburgh (now the
South Broadway neighborhood). It went bankrupt in 1878. On July 2, 1870, the
Lake Shore and Tuscarawas Valley Railway (LS&TV) was incorporated to build a railroad from
Berea, Ohio, to
Mill Township in
Tuscarawas County, Ohio, where it would join the
Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad line. A branch to
Elyria, Ohio, was also authorized. In February 1871, Stone was among several men appointed to investigate the feasibility of constructing the line. Construction began, but the LS&TV fell into receivership in July 1874 for failing to pay the mortgage on another railroad it had acquired, and on January 30, 1875, Stone and four other investors formed the
Cleveland, Tuscarawas Valley and Wheeling Railway (CTV&W) to take over the assets of the LS&TV. Stone was named a director of the CTV&W in 1877, serving until 1882. The CTV&W once again fell into receivership in February 1883. After a Cleveland investor purchased it, it was sold to yet another investors' group—once again led by Stone—which filed a charter on March 1, 1883, to incorporate the
Cleveland, Lorain and Wheeling Railway (CL&W), which assumed the assets of the CTV&W. As before, Stone was named a director of this new road. In 1870, at the conclusion of his 13-month trip to Europe, Stone once more was elected a director of the LS&MS. He retained this position in 1871, 1872, 1873, 1874, 1875, 1876, and 1879. Cornelius Vanderbilt became president of the Lake Shore in July 1873, and asked Stone to become managing director and
de facto president of the railroad. Stone was managing director of the line in 1873, 1874, and 1875. The interruption in his directorship and the termination of his position as managing director occurred after he resigned due to ill health in June 1875 to go abroad for 18 months. In 1871 and 1872, Stone was named a director of the
Toledo, Wabash and Western Railway (TW&W). This road had formed in 1865 when the
Toledo and Wabash Railway,
Great Western Railway of Illinois, the
Illinois and Southern Iowa Railroad, the
Quincy and Toledo Railroad, and the
Warsaw and Peoria Railroad merged. Cornelius Vanderbilt picked up large blocs of stock in the road as part of the Erie War, and the TW&W and LS&MS had effectively agreed to merge in 1869. Vanderbilt subsequently installed his strongest business associates as directors of the TW&W, which explains Stone's appointment. Beginning in 1872, Stone played a role on three Michigan railroads as well. The first was the
Northern Central Michigan Railroad, whose stock was purchased by the LS&MS in 1871. The LS&MS operated the road, and installed its own directors as directors and officers of the North Central. Beginning in 1872 and lasting to the end of 1876, Stone was a director of this road. He left the board after 1876 due to his 18-month trip in Europe. Similarly, the LS&MS purchased all the stock in and operated the
Detroit, Monroe and Toledo Railroad. Stone was a director and president of this road without interruption from 1872 to his death in 1883. Finally, the LS&MS also purchased and operated the
Kalamazoo and White Pigeon Railroad. Stone was a director of this road without interruption from 1872 to his death in 1883. Beginning in 1873, Stone began playing a major role in the
Mahoning Coal Railroad (MCR). The company incorporated in 1871 to build a line from
Youngstown, Ohio (the location of a burgeoning steel industry) to
Brookfield Township in
Trumbull County, Ohio. A branch line from
Liberty Township (also located in Trumbull County) to the Ashtabula Branch of the LS&MS was also authorized. The MCR gave improved access to extensive coal mines, and its rolling stock was designed specifically to carry bulk coal. The LS&MS leased the line for 99 years beginning May 1, 1873. Stone was a director of the MCR for the rest of his life (except for the 18-month period in 1875 and 1876 when he was in Europe to regain his health).
Health issues and the Ashtabula bridge disaster In the
Panic of 1873, Stone lost as much as $1 million ($ in dollars) making payments on loans called by desperate bankers and friends, and in financially propping up his friends and business associates. He also lost large sums of money selling stock in the LS&MS and in
Western Union at panic prices. Stone hid the extent of his financial difficulties from almost everyone, but his son-in-law John Hay believed Stone neared bankruptcy. Stone weathered the financial crisis, however, and recovered most of his wealth. Stone's financial situation recovered enough that he was able to invest in the
Mississippi Valley and Western Railway. This was a railroad (organized May 22, 1871) which merged on January 20, 1873, with the Mississippi Valley and Western Railway and the Clarksville and Western Railroad Company under the name Mississippi Valley and Western Railway. Amasa Stone invested in the new company on January 20, 1873. The railroad defaulted on its bonds, and Stone not only became a co-owner of the road but was also named a director of the line on August 7, 1874. The bankruptcy court put the railroad up for sale, and it was sold to Andros Stone on April 14, 1875. Six days later, Andros Stone sold the railroad to the
St. Louis, Keokuk and North Western Railway (SLK&NW), which had been formed by Andros Stone and others to acquire the assets of the bankrupt line. In December 1879, Stone became a director of the SLK&NW. Stone remained on the board of the SLK&NW until his death. Stone invested in another railroad, the
Keokuk, Iowa City and St. Paul Railroad, in 1875. This road, which formed in 1870, still had incomplete when Stone acquired it in May 1875. A board of directors (which did not include Stone) was installed, but the railroad's history is unclear after this. Stone began to suffer from undisclosed major health problems in the spring of 1875, and he and his wife went to Europe for 18 months beginning in late 1875. This event largely sparked Stone's retirement from most of his business ventures. While overseas, he left the management of his enterprises in the hands of his son-in-law, John Hay. During his absence, the
Great Railroad Strike of 1877 occurred, hitting his railroads hard. While Stone was overseas in 1876, one of the greatest events in his life occurred. At 7:30 PM on December 29, the LS&MS bridge over the
Ashtabula River collapsed in what came to be known as the
Ashtabula River railroad disaster. One of two locomotives and 11 passenger railcars of the LS&MS plunged into the ice-clogged river below. The wooden cars burst into flame when their
kerosene-fed heating stoves overturned, but rescue personnel made no attempt to extinguish the fire. The accident killed 92 people and injured 64. Amasa Stone had personally overseen both the bridge's design and its construction. He ordered the bridge built using a Howe truss design despite his chief engineer's argument that the span was too long to be safely bridged by that design. Stone later admitted that using a Howe truss for such a long span was "experimental". When bridge engineer
Joseph Tomlinson expressed concern that the bridge could not handle the stresses place upon it, Stone fired him. State investigators later concluded that the bridge had been improperly designed, inadequately inspected by the LS&MS, and had used faulty materials (provided by the
Cleveland Rolling Mill, which Stone's brother, Andros Stone, managed). They also found extensive evidence that the bridge had been poorly constructed: Struts were not in the correct place, braces were not tied together, and the
bearings had been improperly laid. Stone categorically denied that there were any design or construction flaws. Instead, he asserted that the bridge was designed to be stronger than it needed to be. In one of his last major railroad positions, Stone briefly became a director of two railroads, the
Massillon and Cleveland Railroad and the
Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway, in early 1883. ==Standard Oil==