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A history of early traction in the Sunshine State is the topic of Streetcars of Florida’s First Coast by Robert W. Mann. The bulk of the book is devoted to Jacksonville, where electric streetcar service began in 1893. Much smaller sections of the book cover St. Augustine, Fernandina Beach, Palatka, and Green Cove Springs. Most sections are well illustrated with numerous b&w photos as well as timetables and posters. Leading off is the largest city covered in the book, Jack- sonville, and we start off with the various horse-drawn street lines before moving on to electric streetcars. At its peak Jacksonville boasted about 60 miles of streetcar trackage, and numerous other operators were vying to enter the market. Alas, Jacksonville’s last streetcars operated in 1936. The section on St. Augustine covers the city’s system that ran under wire from 1907 until 1930, a mere 23 years, although there were horse-drawn cars for many years prior. The Fernandina Beach section weighs in at two pages and, alas, there are no photos of the operation that ran from 1902 until 1916, and only in the summer. Moving on to Palatka, we find that its street system was never electrified — only horse cars here, and that service ended in 1907. The final section is Green Cove Springs, another horse-only city. The photos are nicely reproduced and the text is easy to read, with many stories sprinkled within the historic narrative. The softcover book measures 6"×9" inches with 224 pages and costs $19.99 from History Press at
www.historypress.com. Ship- ping charges may apply. Speaking of traction, Streetcars of Amer-
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ica by Brian Solomon and John Gruber is a neat little book providing a capsule history of transit systems across the U.S. and Cana- da. The book contains dozens of photos, most of them in color, illustrating many traction operations from yesteryear and today. The introduction gives a brief overview of the de- velopment of the streetcar and urban transit. The first chapter is devoted to eastern U.S. streetcars systems including those of Boston, New York, New Jersey Public Transit, Phila- delphia, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Washington, Birmingham, and New Orleans. The second chapter moves to the Midwest with coverage of Chicago and St. Louis, although other cit- ies are represented in the photos. West coast coverage in the third chapter focuses on San Francisco and Los Angeles, as well as their surrounding areas. Toronto and Montreal dominate the book’s fourth chapter on Ca- nadian lines. The book concludes with a one- page synopsis of modern streetcar systems followed by an extensive listing of places to visit, including not only museums but historic operations such as Muni’s F-line in San Fran- cisco. The softcover book measures 5"×9" and contains 64 pages. It is available for $9.95 (plus $3.50 shipping for one or two books; free shipping for three or more) from Shire Books at
www.shirebook.com. It can also be ordered through booksellers such as Amazon.
Book Review
The Long-Island Rail-Road Company: A His- tory 1834-1965 by Robert C. Sturm; Long Is- land Sunrise Trail NRHS, P.O. Box 507, Baby- lon, NY 11702-0507;
nrhs-list.com; 180 pages,
28 MARCH 2015 •
RAILFAN.COM
8.5"×11", hardbound. $49.95 plus $3.00 ship- ping (NY residents add $4.57 sales tax). Serving New York City, the Long Is- land Rail Road has moved commuters westward into (or at least towards) the Big Apple every workday morning since 1836. This book documents the history of the rail- road from its hum- ble beginnings to its current day op-
erations as part of the Metropolitan Transit Authority. We start out with the railroad’s charter and
early construction, first to Jamaica and then on to Hicksville, Farmingdale, Yaphank, and on to Greenport at the eastern end of the Island, reached in 1844. We get a glimpse of what the early motive power might have been — stan- dard Baldwin 4-2-0 locomotives with interest- ing names like Fanny and Old Henry Ruggles. The book then detail’s the LIRR’s immedi-
ate struggle to survive between 1850-80. As a one-way railroad, there was no bridge traffic to support operations, while rapidly changing technology was requiring large capital invest- ments. A huge blow to the railroad was the loss of Boston service (which was done with a steamer connection at Greenport but was replaced by the all-rail route that would even- tually become the New York, New Haven & Hartford). Meanwhile, the largest city on the line and the railroad’s terminus, Brooklyn, was threatening to throw the LIRR out of the city due to the nuisance caused by the rail- road’s street running. Competing railroads were also being built. Things take a dramatic turn for the better
in Chapter Three, when Austin Corbin was placed in charge of the LIRR in 1881. Corbin set out to trim costs, both through labor re- ductions and operations cutbacks. He also merged the LIRR with his own New York & Manhattan Beach Railroad, which eliminated duplicate equipment. Parlor cars were intro- duced on trains in 1883. At the same time, Corbin’s ambitions stretched beyond Long Island; he contemplated bridges that would take his railroad directly into Manhattan and envisioned Montauk (on the south “fork” of the east end of the Island) as a shipping point for goods to Great Britain. Corbin’s untimely death in 1896 ended the ambitious plans. The years immediately following Corbin’s
death make up Chapter Four and cover the Pennsylvania Railroad’s takeover of the LIRR. The reasons for the PRR investment into the LIRR are discussed, as is the tunnel- ing under the East River, the rise of Penn Sta- tion in Manhattan, the electrification of the LIRR west of Jamaica, and the establishment of Jamaica as a transfer point to and from points east. This chapter is well illustrated with photos of the changes in equipment and infrastructure (such as power plants). By Chapter Five the LIRR is really be-
ginning to make a difference in population patterns, and local train service is growing rapidly. Population growth (and the introduc- tion of the automobile) are causing congestion
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