The OHIO HISTORICAL Quarterly
VOLUME 66 ?? NUMBER 1 ?? JANUARY 1957
Faith vs. Economics: The Marietta and
Cincinnati Railroad, 1845-1883
By JOHN E. PIXTON, JR.*
In the 1850's Cincinnati was Queen of
the American West, and
eastern railroad builders pressed
eagerly toward the prize of her
commerce.1 And even before the rails
reaching westward from New
York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore
breached the Appalachian barrier,
Ohio promoters were building lines to
connect with them. By 1857
four Ohio roads fought for traffic
between Cincinnati and the
Atlantic seaboard.
In 1851 a railroad later to become part
of the New York Central
thrust down across Ohio from Cleveland
to Columbus, where it
connected over the Little Miami
Railroad with Cincinnati. In 1857
another local effort, the Steubenville
and Indiana, crossed eastern
Ohio and waited fondly at the river for
a connection with the
* John E. Pixton, Jr., is assistant
professor of history at Pennsylvania State University.
This article and the one following it,
"The Steubenville and Indiana Railroad: The
Pennsylvania's Middle Route to the
Middle West," by Walter R. Marvin, were the
papers given at a session of railroad
history specialists known as the Lexington Group
during the annual meeting of the
Mississippi Valley Historical Association at Pitts-
burgh, April 19-21, 1956.
1 This article is based chiefly upon the
papers of William P. Cutler, the president
of the Marietta and Cincinnati Railroad
through most of its independent existence. In
addition to correspondence, Cutler left
thirty-two little notebook diaries, covering,
with unequal emphasis, most of his adult
life from 1830 to 1888. The manuscripts
are in the Marietta College Library.
Other basic sources were the annual
reports of the M & C, issued irregularly from
1851 to 1877, a complete set of which is
in the Marietta College Library; the annual
reports of the Ohio Commissioner of
Railways and Telegraphs, which begin in 1867;
and other official documents, as well as
newspapers and periodicals (especially the
Railroad Record, published at Cincinnati from 1852 to 1872).
2
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
Pennsylvania. Access to Cincinnati was
afforded over the tracks of
the Central Ohio and the Little Miami.
Two Ohio rivals sought the favor of the
B & O. The Baltimore
road had hoped to press directly
westward to the Ohio River at
Parkersburg, but the decisive influence
of Wheeling in the Virginia
legislature compelled it to build first
to Benwood, just south of
Wheeling on the river. Here it met the
Central, Ohio, which by 1854
had built to Columbus, where the Little
Miami provided access to
Cincinnati. Later, when Wheeling's
fears of being isolated had
abated, the B & O secured a charter
to build to Parkersburg. Into
this highly competitive situation the
fourth suitor for the favors of
the Queen City was born, aspiring to
displace the Central Ohio as
the B & O's main connection with
Cincinnati. With a zeal at first
hopeful, then grim, and finally
desperate, the managers of the
Marietta and Cincinnati struggled for
its precarious existence.
The Marietta and Cincinnati Railroad
was chartered in 1845
as the Belpre and Cincinnati, with a
capital of $1,000,000 authorized,
to build from Belpre, across the river
from Parkersburg, to Cin-
cinnati. Foremost supporter of the
project was the speaker of the
lower house of the Ohio legislature,
William P. Cutler. Grandson
of Manasseh Cutler and an Ohio farmer
and politician of dis-
tinction, Cutler was a Lincolnesque
figure--six feet tall, of swarthy
complexion, and with those rough-hewn
features which seem to
testify to reflectiveness, sincerity,
and great endurance. More than
anyone else he was the creator of the
railroad, and during a long
desperate struggle, its preserver. His
vision of the M & C was as
the "Great Central Route of the
Ohio Valley." Another supporter
of the M & C, Judge Alphonso Taft,
told a Cincinnati audience in
1850 that the railroad would make their
city into "the port of
Cincinnati," and that they would
no longer "pay tribute to the
merchant princes of the East." It
would appear from this statement
that Judge Taft, unlike his latter-day
descendant Robert A. Taft,
was not an isolationist.
Here was the vision of the M &
C--trunk line of the Ohio Valley,
firmly linking Cincinnati with the
Atlantic seaboard and carrying
the burgeoning produce of a vast
hinterland tributary to it. This
MARIETTA & CINCINNATI R.
R. 3
was the vision and the faith which
collided with harsh economic
reality.
Construction of the M & C was
delayed by the uncertainty as to
where the B & O would strike the
Ohio; the result was a bitter
controversy between advocates of Belpre
and advocates of Marietta
as the eastern terminus. Marietta won
out, and enabling legislation
was secured changing the name of the
company to the Marietta
and Cincinnati Railroad, and
authorizing it to build to Marietta
and up the river to Wheeling, from
which a connection with the
Pennsylvania would be made over a
proposed road from Wheeling
to Greensburg, Pennsylvania. A powerful
influence in this decision
to change the eastern terminus was
stock subscriptions totaling
$1,500,000 from Washington County
(Marietta), Wheeling, and
the Pennsylvania Railroad. Cutler
remarked shrewdly to a colleague,
"This tall talk about dollars has
a charm not easily to be resisted."
In 1853 construction was pushed
vigorously, beginning from Chilli-
cothe westward, and by midsummer the
entire road, from Loveland,
near Cincinnati on the Little Miami,
all the way to Wheeling was
under contract. This decision to build
the entire route almost simul-
taneously, before any part of it was in
operation, testifies to the
stupendous optimism of the fast-growing
West. Cincinnati's Railroad
Record reported proudly that six thousand men and several
steam-
powered excavators were laboring on the
line from Marietta to
Wheeling, and the M & C was
pronounced financially sound and
"beyond contingencies." In
September 1853 the company's shares
were quoted at 70 bid, 75 asked, its
bonds at 95.
In the spring of 1854 disaster struck
suddenly and with shattering
effect. The M & C's New York
investment firm, Winslow and
Lanier, reported that bonds were not
selling at any price. Cutler
suspended all work east of Chillicothe,
and the Wheeling extension
was abandoned altogether. Today
trackless cuts, barren embank-
ments, and masonry for bridges never
built remain as mute testi-
mony to the failure of this added
endeavor. Negotiations with
contractors and other creditors were
begun, some agreeing to take
partial payments in stock or bonds;
Noah L. Wilson, an Ohio banker
and vice president of the M & C was
sent to Europe to try and
4
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
sell the company's bonds; a petition
for a land grant was submitted
to congress; violence broke out among
the unpaid crews. Cutler
commented gloomily: "A week's
anxiety and care results in meeting
about half the claims and estimates we
ought to pay.... It is awful-
awful to be thus haunted with
obligations which one cannot meet."
The grand vision had been reduced to
ashes by the business recession
of 1854. The main hope that it might
emerge from the ruins lay
in the fact that the line from
Chillicothe west to Loveland was
completed in October and put in
operation.
By dint of strenuous efforts various
unsecured bond issues,
euphemistically called "income
bonds," "sterling bonds," and
"domestic bonds," were sold
locally and foisted on reluctant
creditors. One million dollars of
second mortgage bonds were also
sold to a Polish banker in Paris, whose
only return on this invest-
ment was to have the town of Zaleski,
Ohio, perpetuate his name.
These expedients, combined with some
perilous economies in con-
struction, enabled the M & C to
reach the river.
Notwithstanding the collapse of the
effort to connect with the
Pennsylvania, the M & C managers
unwisely adhered to their in-
tention to build first to Marietta, and
on April 9, 1857, the long-
awaited sound of whistle and bell was
heard as a locomotive
pulling a baggage car and one passenger
car rolled into town.
Meanwhile, the B & O had completed
its line to Parkersburg, and
between the two railroads lay thirteen
miles of Ohio River, fraught
with all the hazards of ice, flood,
drought, and the acidulous in-
dependence of ferryboat captains.
The B & O was not happy with this
uncertain arrangement, and
was also understandably resentful of
the M & C's courtship of the
Pennsylvania. Consequently, the B &
O's chief engineer, Benjamin H.
Latrobe, proposed to build down the
Ohio from Parkersburg to the
Hocking River, and from there up the
river valley to Athens.
Besides shortening the distance from
Athens to Parkersburg by
about ten miles, this line would enjoy
a direct cross-river connection
which sooner or later could be bridged.
Such a line would of course
cut severely into M & C traffic
east of Athens. "This looks like
trouble," Cutler remarked.
But it was a battle the Ohio men could
fight in the comfortable
MARIETTA & CINCINNATI R. R. 5
seclusion of their state legislature.
One of the M & C's directors
drew up a bill prohibiting the
construction of new railroads in any
county which had already taken stock in
other railroads unless a
majority of the voters favored it in a
referendum. Since Athens
County had subscribed $200,000 to M
& C stock, this bill would
exclude Latrobe's Hocking Valley line
unless a majority of the
voters in the county favored it, which
was dubious at best, and in
any case took time to arrange.
Cutler appealed effectively to his
friends in the legislature, and
the bill passed the senate with only
one dissenting vote. In the
house there was angry maneuvering to
postpone or amend it, but
it finally passed 58-35. A disgruntled
representative of the Hocking
Valley people offered the following
sarcastic amendment to the
title of the act:
An act to interfere with the railroad
policy of the United States and
force trade and travel out of its
natural channels by giving to two counties
the right to veto all railroad
projects in south eastern Ohio, for the benefit
of speculators in town lots and peddlers
of mince pie and ginger-bread in
the village of Marietta.
The M & C surmounted this threat
only to face more serious ones.
The year 1857 was one of supreme agony
for Cutler. The panic
blighted the sale of bonds, depressed
freight rates, and threatened
the over-extended directors of the M
& C who had endorsed its
notes. Winter storms blocked the road
entirely for ten days in
January; unpaid workers left their jobs
and obstructed trains, de-
manding their pay. Creditors holding
chattel mortgages on rolling
stock appeared and seized twelve
locomotives and several cars. In
1858 sixty inches of rainfall on the
unballasted track completed the
undoing of the M & C. There were
numerous slips, and a passenger
car plunged fifty-three feet from a
trestle, killing five. In these cir-
cumstances there was little sympathy for
the M & C. Cutler observed
bitterly: "Everybody who can swear
profanely curses the road, up
grade, down grade, around the curves,
across the trestles, and
through the tunnels. The cars run
through a fog of curses thick
enough to stop an Ohio River
steamboat."
Cutler's gloomy Calvinism afforded him a
meager reconciliation
6
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
with total calamity. With a strange
mixture of submissiveness and
defiance, he wrote: "Have tried
earnestly and humbly to submit
this horrid business to the Hand of Him
who doeth all things well.
It is hard to feel that He has managed
this road well. . . . Submit,
submit, submit is my lesson and I am a
dull learner." On this latter
point the Lord may have been inclined
to agree.
At the time it surrendered to
receivership the M & C had built
157 miles of road from Loveland, where
it intersected the Little
Miami, to Marietta. For this work the
balance sheet for 1857 shows
funds expended totaling nearly
$10,600,000, or $67,500 per mile.
This figure is high compared to that of
other pre-war railroads of
the region, but a detailed analysis
readily reveals factors which
account for the difference, primarily
the $250,000 expended on
the Wheeling extension, and rudimentary
accounting procedures
which failed to show bond discount. In
short, the high cost of the
M & C was a consequence of the poor
management characteristic
of many of the early railroads, not of
fraud.
The M & C was reorganized, the
first and second mortgage
holders getting six percent first and
second preferred stock on
condition that they raise $1,000,000 in
new capital. The small
number of third mortgage bondholders
were paid one half their
claim in common stock. The stockholders
and unsecured creditors
divided about $1,800,000 in common
stock, the creditors receiving
twice the percentage of claim which the
stockholders received. Thus
the bondholders sacrificed little in
paper values; the stockholders
and unsecured creditors sacrificed
about $3,800,000. Since the bond-
holders were mostly foreigners, and the
stockholders and creditors
were local governments, contractors,
car builders, and individuals,
it is no surprise that the arrangement
was bitterly challenged in
the courts.
Apparently on the theory that lightning
could not strike thrice
in the same place, the M & C
directors launched the reorganized
company in 1860 with unchastened
visions of grandeur. The Union
Railroad was built to connect Marietta
with Belpre; $2,000,000 was
scheduled for improvements of the main
line; an extension to
Cincinnati, and a branch line to Dayton
were planned. But lightning
did strike again, this time in the form
of the Civil War, which
MARIETTA & CINCINNATI R.
R. 7
initially had a disastrous effect on
through traffic. Cutler's direction
of the M & C was interrupted by a
term in congress, and by a period
in which he commanded, as president of
the railroad, five companies
of infantry, which he deployed along
the M & C to cut off the
escape of fast-moving rebel raiders
under John Hunt Morgan.
As if strikes, accidents, bankruptcy,
and civil war were not enough,
Cutler had also to face the sublime
wrath of four stalwart pioneer
women who regarded his rails as an
intrusion upon the sanctity
of property and his locomotives as
smoky agents of Satan. To secure
a right of way over their property near
Athens the four Currier
sisters forced the M & C to resort
to condemnation proceedings,
and, to emphasize their contempt for
such legal shenanigans, re-
peatedly tore up sections of track and
piled up rails, ties, and brush
in a sort of blockade. Attempts to
arrest the formidable foursome
resulted only in indignity to the
sheriff, so Cutler, backed by a de-
tachment of troops, mounted a train and
sallied forth to remonstrate
with them. The soldiers cleared the
inevitable blockade while Cutler
submitted to a torrent of abuse from
three of the sisters and
passengers peered from the cars with
profound amusement. As the
train was about to start up again, the
fourth lady appeared wrapped
in the national flag which, it was
said, she had captured single-
handed from an assembly of copperheads,
and planted herself
squarely on the track, proclaiming that
she was willing to die for
freedom. A detachment of troops was
posted there permanently,
but the defiant women were cowed no
more by military than by
civil authority, and the track at
Athens remained in peril for a
long time.
Unlike the Currier sisters, there were
others who thought the
railroad might be a benign influence
for spiritual progress. The
minister of a Warren church (between
Belpre and Marietta) pro-
posed that the M & C furnish a
Sunday local from Belpre to
Warren in the spring when the six miles
of intervening mud was a
serious obstacle for the devout. Cutler
assented, and the arrange-
ment assumed a permanent rather than
seasonal character. It worked
well at first, and the Warren minister
enjoyed large audiences. But
when the weather improved the train
began to have a larger clientele
than the church. Picnickers and
joyriders filled the train, got off at
8
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
the church and promptly disappeared in
the woods or along the
river bank. This experience, wrote the
historian of the Warren
church soberly, "exploded the
theory that Sunday trains helped
the church." In any case, it cost
Cutler twenty-five dollars per trip.
Despite the relative prosperity of the
later years of the war, the
debt and interest burden borne by the M
& C steadily mounted,
and Cutler was soon again in a
desperate struggle for survival. It
was perhaps poetic justice that the B
& O, long blamed for the
M & C's misfortunes, twice saved it
from foreclosure by purchasing
second mortgage bonds, the proceeds of
which Cutler used to make
interest payments and thus stave off
bankruptcy. Finally, the B & 0,
seeing the inevitable, bought a
controlling interest in the M & C
and guaranteed interest on its bonded
debt. Cutler, weary of his
long, losing battle was happy,
temporarily, to step out of railroading.
The B & O got no bargain. Revenues
remained inadequate to
carry the debt, and enormous
expenditures were necessary to build
a cut-off from Parkersburg to Athens
and acquire independent
access to Cincinnati, which became
necessary after the Pennsylvania
got control of the Little Miami in
1869. In 1878 the M & C again
went into receivership. In 1883 it was
reorganized as the Cincinnati,
Washington, and Baltimore, and this
company was eventually in-
corporated into the B & O. In view
of frequent charges that the
B & O conspired to get the M &
C for a song at a foreclosure sale,
one fact deserves to be mentioned. The
owners and creditors of
the original M & C property
received stocks and bonds of the
succeeding companies equal to or more
than the face value of their
securities. John W. Garrett, commenting
on these charges to the
B & O's directors at the time it
assumed control of the M & C, said,
"As great facts finally govern the
judgment of the people, so have
the mis-statements and hostilities to
the Baltimore and Ohio Com-
pany melted away." This
"great fact" thoroughly discredits these
charges, for, with such a conclusion,
it would have been an un-
profitable conspiracy.
As with many of the early railroads, an
incurable optimism,
buttressed to some extent by ignorance,
contributed to the failure
of the M & C. How else explain
Cutler's serene prediction in 1848
that the M & C could earn
nine percent on $5,000,000 of capital?
MARIETTA & CINCINNATI R. R. 9
Or Vice President Wilson's triumphant
arithmetic, which, by adopt-
ing B & O gross revenues per mile
and a fifty percent operating
ratio, showed that M & C profits
from the through business alone
would be $1,300,000? Total profits
never reached one-fourth this
figure, and the operating ratio was
seldom below seventy percent.
Another place where this stubborn
optimism was revealed was
in construction cost estimates. Of
course, to err is human, and to
err in engineering estimates is
inevitable. The renowned Benjamin
Latrobe underestimated the cost of the
B & O's Northwestern
Virginia Railroad by over twenty
percent, but this was precision
itself as compared with M & C
estimates. At various times costs
were estimated at $18,000, $25,000, and
$46,000 per mile. Further,
the cost of capital was blithely
ignored, though it amounted to nearly
twenty-five percent of the expenditures
before the road first went
into receivership in 1858.
Two developments quite beyond the ken
of its managers also
doomed the M & C: the rise of
northern Ohio, and the eclipse of
Cincinnati and St. Louis by Chicago.
Both local and through traffic
flowed by on the northern trunk lines
in a broadening stream which
left Cincinnati and southern Ohio in
the eddying backwaters.
But there is no reason to believe that
if Cutler and his associates
had been better forecasters or
accountants the history of the M & C
would have been substantially
different. Their faith was as great
as their vision. They believed, as one
enthusiast put it, that even
"if there were [east-west] roads
ten miles apart from the Ohio
River to the Lake, all would pay."
This bouyant belief sustained the
unpaid creditors, the unremunerated
stockholders, and the doggedly
persevering Cutler. They poured out
about $25,000,000 to build a
railroad before its time. If their
optimism was excessive, their vision
and faith have nevertheless been
vindicated. The old M & C line,
except for the abandoned section
between Athens and Marietta, is
today the profitable main stem of the B
& 0, and east-west railroads
cross Ohio, if not every ten miles, at
least every twenty miles from
the river to the lake.
Old William P. Cutler kept on building
railroads and lived to
suffer through two more panics. Indeed,
his entire life was a struggle
to build in the face of forces beyond
his power to understand or
10 THE OHIO HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
control. Riding horseback through Ohio
snows, wading across
flooded farmlands, remonstrating with
the Currier sisters, sullen
workmen, and unpaid contractors, or
standing in the family grave-
yard, where all but one of his nine
children were buried before
they were six, he is a somber yet
inspiring figure.