Attempts to enter Chicago, first over what is now known as the "Pandhandle Route," and later over the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chi cago were successfully blocked by nvals and it was not until 1883 that it secured an entrance into the western metropolis over the Chicago and Atlantic Railway. Under succeeding man agements, the road, in spite of the enormous financial obligations which hampered it, was operated as a paying and successful property until the panic of 1883-84. The obligations ac cruing because of its purchase of the Chicago and Atlantic and Pennsylvania coal properties led the road to still further embarrassment and finally to another receivership in 1893. Two years later, the company was reorganized as the Erie Railroad Company and assumed possession of the property on 1 Dec. 1895, which it has since operated.
The Erie Railroad is to-day a great modern highway, its main line extending from Jersey City, N. J., to Chicago, Ill., a distance of 999 miles. Within the last few years this main line has been double-tracked and it is now known as a *low-grade line," for example, between Jersey City and Salamanca, N. Y., a distance of 414 miles, the ruling grade has been brought down from 0.65 to 0.2 per cent. The present ruling grade is said to be lower than that of any other railroad running from Pittsburgh, Buffalo or the Ohio State line to New York city. Between Marion, Ohio, and Hammond, Ind., the ruling grade of the Chicago and Erie has been re duced from 0.55 per cent west bound and 0.5
east bound to 0.2 per cent in each direction.
The following is the official statement of gross operating revenues and operating expenses and taxes for the past five years— operating revenues 1911, $56,649,908; 1912, $56,492,369; 1913, $62,647,359; 1914, $60,983,574; 1915, $66, 436,719; the operating expenses for the same period were 1911, $40,245,301; 1912, $42,508,253; 1913, $46,146,760; 1914, $43,224,007; 1915, $45, 670,748.
A pioneer as a trunk line, it was also the first railroad to adopt what are now universal methods — among these the running of trains by telegraph, the use of a printed time table, the running of Sunday trains, emigrant trains, and special service for suburban passengers, the use of parlor cars, the establishment of dining rooms along the line, the establishment of spe cial milk trains, the running of a newspaper special train (this being done in 1842). It was also the first road to run an excursion train of the modern type with a brass band and a re duced round trip fare, the first road to use a bell cord to signal from the conductor to the engineer, the first to build up local industries by furnishing to manufacturing companies the use of switching and terminal tracks, a custom now so universal, and in more modern days, the first road to adopt all-steel baggage, express and postal cars, and is the only railroad in the world operating a triplex or "centipede" locomotive.