The New York, Philadelphia and Norfolk Railroad (Nicknamed the "Nip and N") was a railroad that owned and operated rail lines on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and Virginia connected by its ferries and barges to Norfolk, Virginia, Old Point Comfort and Portsmouth, Virginia where it owned less than a mile of railroad. It built the line from Pocomoke City, Maryland to Cape Charles, Virginia and an extension from Townsend, Virginia to Kiptopeke. It was always affiliated with the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR), but was taken over by the PRR in 1920. In 1968 it was absorbed into Penn Central. The track between Delmar and Hallwood, Virginia on the main branch and for 1.2 miles south of Kings Creek on the Crisfield Branch is still in use, but the rest is abandoned.
History
Concept and planning
Shortening the trip between Philadelphia and Norfolk had been a goal of many businesses dating back to the early 19th Century. In 1825 people travelled from Philadelphia by boat to dover and then by coach overland to Seaford, switching back to steamer to Norfolk. Later the Delaware Railroad (DRC) replaced the coach with rail. Later the DRC was connected to Wilmington, but it still did not succeed as expected.
The idea of a railroad on the Eastern Shore of Virginia dated back to the 1853 when the North and South Railroad was chartered by the Virginia legislature. It never initiated construction and in 1878 the Peninsula Railroad of Virginia acquired the rights. In 1882 the NYP&N was created by consolidating the unfinished Peninsula Railroad Company of Maryland, the Peninsula Railroad of Virginia, The Eastern Shore Railroad Company (of Virginia) and the New York and Norfolk Railroad Company to create a railroad from the existing southern terminus at Pocomoke City to Norfolk.
The rail line to Pocomoke City had been built in stages, first by the Delaware Railroad, then by the Eastern Shore Railroad (ESR) and finally by the Worcester and Somerset Railroad (W&S) (which became the Peninsula Railroad Company of Maryland in 1880). The Delaware Railroad was only allowed to construct a rail line within the state of Delaware. After it reached Delmar in 1859, the 1835 charter of the ESR was revived and in 1866 - after the disruption of the Civil War - the ESR extended the line to Crisfield, Maryland where steamers connected it to Norfolk, as another attempt to shorten the route between Philadelphia and Norfolk. The W&S built a branch from a point on the ESR at Kings Creek, called New town Junction (later Peninsular Junction), to Pocomoke City in 1871 to try and serve more residents on the Eastern Shore.
Other companies consolidated into the NYP&N held rights but had built no rail. The Peninsula Railroad Company of Virginia was incorporated on March 12, 1878, and it was given all the rights given to the earlier North and South Railroad Company that had been incorporated on January 24, 1853. The Eastern Shore Railroad Company (of Virginia) was incorporated on April 23, 1867, and the New York and Norfolk Railroad Company was organized in Virginia on March 15, 1872.
The NYP&N was the vision of William Lawrence Scott, an Erie, Pennsylvania coal magnate, who wanted to build a shorter railroad route to the coal wharves of Hampton Roads by utilizing a ferry line across the Chesapeake Bay and a railroad line up the Delmarva Peninsula to the industrial north. His plan was to continue the rail line from Pocomoke City to Cherrystone, VA and use an innovative rail ferry - as opposed to unloading the rail cars - to reach Norfolk. He had the railroad incorporated in Maryland on April 10, 1880, and in Virginia on January 24, 1882. Scott enlisted engineering help from Pennsylvania Railroad Vice-president, Alexander J. Cassatt, who saw the merits of the plan and took a hiatus from PRR to work on the new line.In 1899 Cassatt returned to the PRR as its 7th President. Cassatt surveyed the line on horseback, designed ferries and wharves, and acquired the foundational railroads by purchasing the ESR in 1883 and the two Peninsula Railroads in 1884.
Construction
Work on the line south of Pocomoke City, and on a new bridge across the Pocomoke river, began in April 1884. Operations south to Drummondtown began in August and the railroad make brisk business shipping sweet potatoes. The line to what would become Cape Charles, just south of Cherrystone, was completed on October 25, 1884, and was perhaps the only line in the world ballasted with oyster shells. Along with it came the construction of a telegraph line and the dredging of the harbor at Cape Charles to allow barges in. Two weeks later the first passenger steamer, the Jane Moseley, left Cape Charles for Norfolk and the first through train ran on November 17, 1884. The steamers ran from Cape Charles to both Norfolk and Old Point Comfort. The next year the railroad started using barges, or car floats, to carry railroad cars to Norfolk via Port Norfolk (Portsmouth) where cars transferred to tracks owned by the Seaboard and Roanoke Railroad.
19th Century Expansion
In 1886, they expanded steamer service to directly connect Cape Charles to Richmond, Virginia via the James River.
In 1890, the Baltimore, Chesapeake and Atlantic Railway built a railroad that connected to the NYP&N at Salisbury, Maryland and extended west to the Chesapeake at Claiborne, Maryland. That same year they purchased the Wicomico and Pocomoke Railroad (W&P) and consolidated it into one line. The W&P, which predated the NYP&N, also connected to the NYP&N at Salisbury but it extended east to the Atlantic at Ocean City.
In 1896, the railroad purchased several tracts of land at Pinners Point and other waterfront locations in Portsmouth and later built 0.71 miles of railroad there. The Southern Railway, Norfolk and Carolina and Atlantic and Danville bought adjacent land and together they built a massive rail transfer facility.
Reorganiation
Following an 1898 plan and vote, the company was reorganized without foreclosure or changing its name on January 24, 1899. As a result, the Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad, which had been an early investor in the NYP&N, sold all of its interest in the company. At the same time the company got a boost shipping meat and ammunition south for the Spanish-American War.
20th Century Expansion
In 1903, the NYP&N built a second track parallel to the existing one from Princess Anne to King's Creek.
In 1910 the line was extensively upgraded. The entire line was double-tracked with new interlocking switches and signals, many of the old wooden bridges were replaced with concrete culverts, a new shop was constructed at Cape Charles as was a concrete bulkhead (the 3rd of its kind in the country) and a concrete pier for coal. This allowed them to run heavier trains and so they purchased larger engines to run them. The railroad opened new stations at Mears and "Greenboat", a new depot in Lecato; made improvements to stations in Salisbury and Crisfield and expanded the rail yards at Delmar and Cape Charles.
Cape Charles Railroad In September 1910, the Cape Charles Railroad (incorporated March 24, 1906) a subsidiary controlled by the NYP&N, began building a rail line from a point just east of Cape Charles, which became known as Cape Junction to Cape Charles Point. It opened the line to Townsend by December 1, 1910, and to Kiptopeke on March 8, 1912. This was the furthest south any railroad ever reached on the peninsula. The NYP&N purchased the Cape Charles Railroad's property, works and franchises on November 12, 1917.
Pennsylvania Railroad Merger
The NYP&N was always affiliated with the PRR which would eventually take control of it. In addition to the influence of Cassatt in the early uears, the PRR financed construction of the rail line and the NYP&N served as a feeder for the PRR.Staufer, Alvin F., Edson, D. William, and Harley, E. Thomas. Pennsy Power lll. Staufer. In 1908 the PRR purchased a controlling share of the NYP&N's stock. In 1918, the PRR merged the NYP&N's operations and traffic departments into its own, making it into a division of the PRR with its own corporate entity. In 1921 it took over operations with a 999-year lease and in 1922 it converted the railroad into the "Norfolk Division" of the Pennsylvania Railroad. When the PRR reorganized in 1930, The Norfolk Division became part of the Delmarva Division.
In 1940, the United States Army built Fort Winslow just south of Kiptopeke and the following summer, the PRR laid track into the fort.
Passenger service Through the first half of the 20th century, several trains a day ran along the train line. From the 1920s to the 1950s, the PRR operated the day train, the Del-Mar-Va Express, and the night train, the Cavalier. At peak levels in the mid-1940s, the company also operated southbound, the Furlough, and an additional night train, the Mariner, in addition to unnamed local trains. Northbound the PRR added the Sailor, the Mariner night train, and an unnamed local train.
In 1926, the Easter Shore Transit Company was the first interstate bus line permitted to run the same route as the NYP&N. It ran between the Virginia state line and Salisbury, MD and it was the first of many that would pull transit passengers from the railroad.
The PRR began to scale back passenger service in 1949 when they closed several stations on the line, including Kiptopeke, Townsend, Capeville, Bayview, Weirwood, Keller, Melfa, Hopeton, Bloxom and Mears. The passenger ferry service from Cape Charles, run by the separate New York, Philadelphia and Norfolk Railroad Ferry Company, was shut down on March 1, 1953, when their ferry failed its Coast Guard inspection. The ferry between Kiptopeke and Little Creek, run by a separate company, remained. By 1957 all that remained of the train service was a once-a-day Philadelphia–Cape Charles train. In 1958, passenger rail south of Delmar ended.
Ferry service
The original ferry crossing was 36 miles. Both passenger and freight ferries existed. Up to 30 freight cars could be loaded on flat barges pulled by a tugboat for the trip. The original passenger ferries, Cape Charles & Old Point Comfort, side-wheeler paddle steamers, could hold an entire train on their two tracks. In 1889 the New York the first propeller-driven ship, 200 feet long, 31 feet beam was built for the run to Norfolk, and in 1890 the Pennsylvania, a larger vessel (260 feet long, 36 feet beam) was added. In 1907 the Maryland was built with the same dimensions, and the last ship was the Virginia Lee.
Because the NYP&N had trouble getting other railroads to interchange with it, it orchestrated the creation of the Norfolk & Portsmouth Belt Line Railroad in 1898, to serve as a "neutral" terminal switching company and interchange rail cars between the various competing railroads near the Elizabeth River.
In 1920 the operation of the ferry was transferred to the PRR, just as the rail lines were. 1926 the NYP&N built the Little Creek Extension and acquired tracking rights over Norfolk Southern Railroad from the Little Creek inlet, which cut the crossing distance to 26 miles.
n 1933, the Virginia Ferry Corporation, of which the PRR owned half, began running ferries between Kiptopoke and Little Creek.
In 1934 the New York, Philadelphia and Norfolk Railroad Ferry Company was incorporated, as a wholly owned subsidiary of the NYP&N (itself owned entirely by the PRR), to take over ferry operations from the railroad, which it did in 1935.