One of the joys of historical research is the happenstance uncovering of some tidbit of new and/or unusual information, often unlooked-for. An instance of this occurred this week when I received an out-of-the-blue email from an interested reader of this blog, who generously shared a digital copy of a document he obtained from eBay:

Digital file courtesy of Art Audley

Digital file courtesy of Art Audley

This is an interesting find because it gives us a glimpse of the business environment in which the S&NY operated ca. the mid 1920’s. We can see the various connections and routings with other railroads, all of whom probably had a loose alliance with each other (especially the Reading and the SNY) in order to share the larger freight revenue pie. Notice, there is NO mention of connections with the PRR. The Pennsy would have been the “big dog” in the region, and the smaller railroads undoubtedly did their best to steer traffic away from the PRR onto their own lines.

From a modeling perspective, I can set up many different kinds of car routings with this information, which may help make op sessions a little more interesting, as well as giving hints as to what “foreign road” cars may have plied SNY rails.

Thanks for sharing, Art!