Vincent Francis Seyfried

“ Because the South Side terminal was at the north end of the village of Far Rockaway, passengers still had the long distance of a mile to walk to the bathing beach and had to compete for space with the boarders of the many hotels in the village. West of the present Beach Twentieth Street there were no houses or hotels, and the beach and sand dunes stretched for miles; it occurred to the railroad directors that simply by constructing a sweeping curve along the north and west of the village, they could have a terminus right at the water's edge with a beach of their own. ”

“ As early as the fall of 1866 long before the road turned a shovelful of earth, some of its promoters induced some of the prominent residents of Williamsburgh to support them in a petition addressed to the Common Council of Brooklyn to enter the city along the line of Metropolitan Avenue and North Third Street down to the ferry, and with a main depot at Union Avenue. The residents of the then very new village of Greenpoint signified that they were more than willing to let the railroad come through their area, should Brooklyn prove inhospitable. ”

“ Quick, cheap transit to the suburbs is one of Brooklyn's crying needs.
7. Access to Long Island summer resorts and beaches will be a boon to every Brooklyn family.
8. Progress cannot be stopped by a Japanese policy of a closed door.
9. The distance the railroad would go through crowded city streets is only a half mile to a Union Avenue depot or a mile to the ferry.
As the argument raged in the hearings and in the press, the local newspaper came out strongly in favor of the South Side road. The Brooklyn Times and the Brooklyn Union championed the railroad, and the Eagle favored the idea. ”

“ Because the cars were drawn through Boerum Street and Broadway by horses, a train had to be broken up into individual cars, and a six-horse or eight-horse team attached to draw each coach to the ferry. In the railroad's view this process was cumbersome and increased the chances of accident. Using a steam dummy seemed the best solution.
Nothing quite like the old-fashioned steam dummy exists today; perhaps the closest modern analogy is the little diesel switcher popular in rail yards and freight terminals. In size the steam dummy resembled a small horse car of the period. ”

“ The dummies, because of their low power and gearing ratio, could go no faster than eight miles per hour, and their bells and flagmen easily warned carriages and passers-by of their approach. Their very slowness, in fact, made them an irresistible attraction to boys of the neighborhood. Groups of lads often ran after the freights as soon as they pulled out of the ferry terminal, and grabbed the many handles and rungs on the cars for a free ride up Broadway and Boerum Street. ”

“ In 1816 the Pavilion, the first seaside resort hotel in Rockaway opened its doors. During the 1830's visiting the Pavilion became fashionable, but not for the bathing facilities available. Persons of wealth boarded at the shore, ate quantities of "Rockaways," the most esteemed clams of that day, and attended cotillions and concerts in the evening. Life had a leisurely and aristocratic flavor, and none but the wealthy could afford the long, costly trip to the beach. ”

“ The installation of a second track on any road is virtually equivalent to building it twice over, for it necessitates doubling the width of the graded area and doubling the size of all the bridges and culverts. When one considers that the South Side RR was running at its peak only nine trains a day each way, it is obvious that the second track was a luxury not strictly justified by the traffic. ”

“ Goetchius, the treasurer, arrived in Hempstead and found Snediker and Pusey and a constable with a few hired men asleep in their car. Mettler, the lone engineer, was on his engine, readying it. Very quietly Litchfield and Goetchius, with some employees loyal to them, detached the engine and proceeded with it some distance down the tracks so that it could not be secured. The noise awakened Snediker and Pusey, who rushed out and threw sticks and stumps on the track to stop the engine but in vain. ”

“ It was easy to pillory the railroad corporation as a souless monster ruthlessly monopolizing the public streets and crushing out the lives of golden-haired innocents under the wheels of its iron juggernauts. ”

“ To gratify a foolish vanity, the South Side RR was forced to assume a third mortgage of half a million dollars, the interest on which could only add to the burden of fixed charges on the road. Competition of other roads. From the opening of the road in October 1867 to June 1872 the South Side RR enjoyed the advantage of a monopoly of the traffic on the south side and to Rockaway. The first serious inroad into the South Side's prosperity was the opening of the Long Island Railroad's Rockaway Branch in June 1872. ”

“ President Fox was a practicing Baptist, and most of the directors were eastern Long Island men reared in the strict tradition of Sabbath observance. The people of Brooklyn were not in accord with this uncompromising Sabbatarianism, and regarded the absence of Sunday trains as a hypocritical device on the part of wealthy Rockaway property owners to keep the beach on Sunday to themselves. Fox and his directors regarded the prosperity of the road as the visible proof of divine approval of his policy and resisted all attempts to inaugurate Sunday service. ”

“ On the night of the twenty-sixth, just before the service was scheduled to be cut off, someone with an interest in the road, fearing that the engine and cars would be confiscated and sold, sneaked into the Hempstead depot, tore up the tracks and switches, ran the engine and cars off the track, and completely looted the freight house and ticket office of their contents. ”

“ The directors and president of the LIRR had been approached on several occasions to build such a road, or at least extend branches to the big villages, but they had always refused. It became clear that if a south side road was to be built at all, it would have to be built by independent capital.
Charles Fox of Baldwin was the leading spirit behind the organization of the new road. A wealthy man owning much real estate in Manhattan, a senior partner in the big clothing house of F. B. Baldwin and an alderman in New York, Fox induced a group of other wealthy men to invest in the new project. ”

“ In December 1870 surveyors mapped out a continuation of the line eastward from Hempstead across the Hempstead Plains to Breslau. In February 1871 another change of route was made on the western end of the railroad, the track being now scheduled to pass through Jamaica and terminate in Garden City. In East New York several farmers donated a right of way to the railroad, and by March the contract was let for grading and constructing the road to one Patrick Shields of Jamaica who immediately put a large force to work at three points, Flatbush, New Lots and Woodhaven. ”

“ One of the greatest stimuli to both passenger and freight traffic was the new city of Breslau, renamed Lindenhurst as of July 14, 1891. During 1861-69 a Mr. Wellwood bought up 5000 acres of farmland near Babylon and laid out the tract in 25 × 100-foot lots. In October 1869 he named the place "Breslau" and formed a partnership with Charles S. Schleier of Brooklyn and formerly of Breslau in Silesia. Together the men promoted lots and campaigned intensively among the Germans of the metropolitan area. By 1872 there were about 400 houses and a population of about 3500. ”

“ A five-car train was drawn up at the station and filled with the mayor, the whole Common Council, and prominent people of Brooklyn, plus the officers and directors of the South Side R.R. Other cars contained the prominent officials of Jamaica and Queens County, some Assemblymen from Albany and gentlemen of the press. The weather providentially turned out sunny and clear. After an hour's ride the train reached Babylon and the party was escorted to the American Hotel where "an elegant and sumptuous repast" was served. ”

“ The company then planned a large covered passenger depot, additional freighthouses and side tracks to permit horse cars to drive into the covered station area and unload passengers. In 1876 toward the end of South Side days, the Eagle remarked: "The depot, as at present it appears, is an unprepossessing object, and were it not for the tracks, trucks and railroad carriages in the vicinity, might be mistaken for a dog kennel, for a dog kennel would most unjustly suffer by the comparison. It is the meanest of many mean buildings in the neighborhood and its size dwarfed by an ordinary railroad car ”

“ On February 20, 1868 a petition was presented by the owners of property on Broadway to permit the railroad to run horse cars on Broadway. On March 2 the Common Council granted this request, giving the South Side a line along Montrose Avenue from Bushwick Avenue to Union Avenue, down Union Avenue a block to Broadway, and thence along Broadway to the ferry. The only conditions set were that the company should pave the rails with stone, operate only steam coaches, not park cars in the public street, and transport no manure. ”

“ Nothing could be done over the winter months but with the end of March, the whole project sprang to life and fresh details were released to the press. The estimated cost of the road from Bay Ridge to Valley Stream was $600,000 including right of way and dockage. The Bay Ridge dock was to be 850 feet long, extending into the water 500 feet on one side and 800 feet on the other, with a minimum depth of water of fifteen feet. The Bergen farm of seven acres provided abundant land for freight and passenger facilities. ”

“ During 1874 and 1875 another powerful movement was at work in Williamsburgh that would materially affect the operations and fortunes of the Southern RR. When the road first entered Williamsburgh in 1868, service from Bushwick Station to South Eighth Street ferry had been maintained by teams of horses drawing individual coaches to the ferry. Then, in 1869, the railroad, over powerful opposition, had mustered the bare minimum of support necessary to insure the introduction of dummies on Boerum Street and Broadway. ”

“ A large backward area of Kings County and an empty area south of Jamaica were to be developed and opened to commerce and settlement. The Bay Ridge docks were so favorably situated with reference to the Jersey Central and Lackawanna docks that the lion's share of bulk freight would pass over the new road. In March 1873 the directors of the road opened conversations with Oliver Charlick for permission to use the Long Island RR rails between East New York and Dunton, and with President Fox of the South Side for the use of the tracks between Dunton and Valley Stream. ”

“ Gangs of men with ties and rails were dispatched to South Jamaica and Springfield. Another gang began Work on the eastern end of the road in May. In June enough rail had been laid at the Jamaica end to run an engine and work cars. Old Beaver Pond between Beaver Street and Liberty Avenue in Jamaica presented something of an obstacle to the railroad because of the swampy marshland on its edges ”

“ The Brooklyn Eagle raised its powerful voice against the passage of the bill, insisting that the property owners of one street had no right to deprive a whole city of rail transportation and that the general welfare was paramount. ”