Cambridge Springs (formerly Cambridge) was a railroad station for the Erie Railroad in Cambridge Springs, Crawford County, Pennsylvania, United States. Cambridge Springs station was on the Main Line's Meadville Division, which was the section of the line between Salamanca, New York, and Meadville, Pennsylvania. The station was located from Manhattan and the Barclay Street Ferry, which connected to Pavonia Terminal in Jersey City, New Jersey, and from Hoboken Terminal in Hoboken, New Jersey. For nearly three decades, the station had connections to the Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway, which was a trolley line that connected the city of Erie and Meadville. Modern Erie Railroad station signage denoted the station as "Home of Alliance College," a local private university that closed in 1987.
Service to Cambridge Springs began in October 1862, with completion of the Atlantic and Great Western Railway to Meadville, a railway that originally went from Salamanca to Corry, Pennsylvania, until work was suspended in 1861 due to financial issues. The Atlantic and Great Western would later be completed in June 1864, with connection to the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton Railroad in Dayton, Ohio. Ownership of the line was transferred in 1880 to the New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio Railroad, a subsidiary of the Erie Railroad. Meanwhile, a trolley line was completed through Cambridge Springs from Meadville, which was completed on October 19, 1900. The trolley station was constructed in 1903. The new Meadville and Cambridge Springs Street Railway was extended to Linesville, Pennsylvania, where it connected to the Pennsylvania Railroad. In November 1912, the railway was merged with the nearby Erie Traction Line, becoming the new Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway.
Located near some mineral springs, Cambridge Springs became a popular place for people to visit. On October 26, 1912, President of the United States William Howard Taft visited Cambridge Springs to visit the mineral springs, coming from nearby Edinboro, Pennsylvania. A second benefit of being located on the main line, was that Cambridge Springs was halfway between New York City and Chicago. In 1904, the municipality was host to the Cambridge Springs International Chess Congress, an international chess tournament that was the first held in the United States since the turn of the 20th century. Sponsored by the Erie Railroad, the tournament was held from April 25–May 19. In October 1924, the halfway point was dedicated by Erie Railroad officials, with 175 members of the railroad attending a nearby convention and being hosted in nearby hotels.
However, the decline of railway service in Cambridge Springs began in 1912, with a series of accidents on the Northwestern Pennsylvania, which caused a big-money lawsuit. In December 1919, the company was forcibly sold to the Erie Trust Company, and in 1922, the company merged with the People's Incandescent Light Company, creating a monopolization of services in Erie and Crawford counties. After a bus line was established in 1925, the service on the trolley line continued to decline, and on September 1, 1928, services on the line through Cambridge Springs was terminated. Service on the Erie Railroad continued, even after it merged with the Lackawanna Railroad. Prior to the merger, the station saw only three stops daily, and by 1965, the last trains servicing Cambridge Springs, the Pacific Express and the Atlantic Express, marking the last passenger service to Cambridge Springs, were canceled.
The depot for the Erie Railroad, located at 302 Venango Avenue was demolished in 1964 after a deal was reached with the borough of Cambridge Springs and replaced with the Cambridge Springs Volunteer Firefighter Department building. The former Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway station, modeled to look similar to the Erie Railroad depot, continues to stand on Venango Avenue, along with the monument marking the halfway point, not far from the old depot site.
Construction and service
Atlantic & Great Western / Erie Railroad
The first railroad that was proposed through Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania, then named Cambridge, was the Franklin and Warren Railroad, a proposed railway by Marvin Kent in 1851. This new railroad, slated to go between Franklin, Pennsylvania, and Warren, Ohio, was surveyed on October 26, 1852 by officials of the Franklin and Warren, as well as executives from the Erie Railroad. Construction of the new railroad would commence in July 1853, about two months after construction began on the Erie and New York City Railroad, a long line through Salamanca, Dayton and Dunkirk, bypassing the city of Jamestown. Construction commenced on the Erie and New York City on May 19, 1853, but was abandoned on January 7, 1855 due to the funding being scant.
In April 1857, the Pennsylvania State Legislature approved the creation of the Meadville Railroad Company, which would construct a brand new railroad from Meadville, Pennsylvania, to nearby Erie, Pennsylvania. The company became official on July 13, 1857, and ten days later, the Pittsburgh and Erie Railroad turned over their rights to a branch so the Meadville Railroad could construct other branch lines, including the new Atlantic and Great Western Railroad, created in 1853 when the Franklin and Warren changed names. The railroad accepted the offer and looked for money with the A.C. Morton, a contractor, to construct the railroad. However, the company was unable to get money from a trip to Europe and the contract was voided. The Meadville Railroad would change its name in April 1858 to the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad as well.
On a second voyage to Europe in July 1858, executives were able to convince James McHenry to pay for the railroad, on the condition one of his engineers surveyed the new route. At the same time, José de Salamanca, a nobleman and banker from Spain agreed as well, donating $1 million (1858 USD) in bonds to the effort. In May 1859, the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad Company of New York was founded and agrees with sharing bonds between it and the Pennsylvania and Ohio equivalents. This also buys the Erie and New York City Railroad, which had been abandoned for four years. Construction of the Atlantic and Great Western begins in May 1860, with the first piece (Salamanca–Jamestown) opening on September 11. On May 7, 1861, the railroad was extended to Corry, Pennsylvania.
However, that summer, the finances were too little and construction was suspended. After a third trip to Europe for funding, the three companies merged in March 1862, allowing funding to continue to construct the railroad once again starting in the fall. Construction reached Cambridge in 1862, and on October 27, the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad was completed through to Meadville. This marked the first railroad through Cambridge, and by 1864, there were four trains daily that passed through but did not stop at Cambridge, two westward express night and day trains as well as two eastern. By the next year, a mail train from Cleveland to Salamanca and vice versa was stopping at Cambridge, one at 10:52 am westbound and 1:52 pm eastbound. On April 3, 1866, the borough of Cambridge was established as a separate entity from Cambridge Township.
In 1873, the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad, now under the ownership of Jay Gould and other investors, bought two franchises for new railways that would fork off the main line in Cambridge. One of these proposed lines was the Pennsylvania Petroleum Railroad, a road out to Titusville, along with a route that crossed through Drake's Mill and Edinboro for moving oil to the ports in Erie from Titusville, which had become a big oil region after its discovery on August 27, 1859. However, the oil rush had died off, and though some grading had been done along modern-day Route 408 outside of Cambridge Springs, the railroads were abandoned. By 1889, ten passenger trains stopped in Cambridge, and as a result, over 80,000 people commuted to or from Cambridge that year. This estimate of over 80,000 yearly passengers remain stable, with the same number being reported in 1898. Although the new depot in Cambridge Springs was reportedly built in 1891 according to the Historic American Engineering Record, the report to the Interstate Commerce Commission recorded its construction date as 1914 due to track tie-ups during derailments, the Erie had to redo the track through Cambridge Springs, resulting in several places where the eastbound and westbound tracks would cross, reducing the problems for trains crossing at the odd angle through town. This resulted in the existing depot at Cambridge Springs being demolished and replaced with a new structure on Venango Avenue.
Trolley lines In 1891, the Erie Transit Company was chartered by the state of Pennsylvania as a brand new trolley line from Cambridge to the borough of Edinboro, connecting several local communities through the area. The line ran over the Erie and Edinboro Plank Road (currently Route 99), which was completed in 1852. Another line went through Cambridge, the Meadville Street Railway Company, which came into existence on February 29, 1896. This line was proposed to run from Meadville out to Cambridge and onto Edinboro, which opened on April 14, 1898. During this time, the borough of Cambridge changed into Cambridge Springs, and two more trolley lines had been proposed. One, the Meadville and Saegertown Street Railway was to run from Saegertown to Meadville, while the other, the Saegertown and Venango Street Railway ran along modern-U.S. Route 19 to reach Venango. There was a shift right after construction began on the Meadville–Saegertown line, which instead followed modern-day Route 86 and Route 198 to Saegertown. The first service of the line between Edinboro and Erie began on October 19, 1900, while the line that split off towards Meadville was completed in 1903.
By May 2, 1909, the new electrified railway had twenty-seven trains going through Cambridge Springs, serving as the connection to Meadville. A traveler who used the line from Cambridge Springs to Erie would expect a commute of about 85 minutes. However, On November 6, 1912, it was agreed that the two services would merge and become one operation, the Northwestern Pennsylvania Railway, providing direct service between Erie and Meadville.
1904 chess tournament
Cambridge Springs was the host of the first major chess competition held in the United States in the 20th century, with the competition being held at the borough's Rider Hotel, a majestic, six-story structure constructed from 1895–1897. The hotel, which became a large booster of traffic to Cambridge Springs for the mineral spring spas, held a major theater inside, and from April 25–May 19, 1904, an international chess conference was held. This chess conference, called a "congress", had sponsorship from several people, including the Erie Railroad, along with the owner of the hotel, William D. Rider. The Erie exploited the tournament, as the station agent at Cambridge Springs would be giving away informational booklets about Cambridge Springs, taking out full-page advertisements to sponsor the tournament, with the railroad in large capital letters. The tournament in itself was a major success, bringing many people from the United States and Europe, eventually won by Frank Marshall (1877–1944) in an upset over David Janowski.