1908 - S. & W. Will Add 10,000 Men

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Fri Mar 14 22:13:35 EDT 2008


Roanoke Times - March 14, 1908

S. & W. WILL ADD 10,000 MEN

Road Will be Completed This Year While Labor is Cheap, if Possible

Contractors asked to hurry work

Means Employment of Additional Laboreres

Means expenditure of $12,000,000 this year

McArthur Brothers, railroad contractors, of this city, have a
letter from the management of the South and Western railroad, asking
just how soon the contract which this company holds with the road can
be completed, and it is declared that 10,000 more laborers, all told,
will be put to work on the new line at once.
The South and Western railroad, owned by a syndicate headed by
George L. Carter and backed by Thomas F. Ryan, is to operate in
Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and North Carolina, and a large part of
the contract is held by McArthur Brothers, of Roanoke, which also
built the Virginia railroad, now almost completed.
The object of the company is to take advantage of the cheap labor
offered at this time, double the number of laborers at work on the
road, and rush the work to completion during the present lull in
general business.
It is further declared that the syndicate hopes to complete the
road and have it in operation before the first of next year, and in
doing this and expenditure of $12,000,000 must be made within this
time. This will not include purchases of equipment. The total cost of
the road will be about $50,000,000.
The situation along other railroads is daily becoming improved.
The Norfolk and Western has already found traffic over its various
lines to have greatly increased, and the fact that lake vessels in
the northwest are urgently in need of fuel, it is said, will further
augment shipments over all Virginia lines from the coal fields.
When the coal shipping season closed in November there was a
shortage of some millions of tons in the tonnage needed in the
northwest. The winter season has been severe and the consumption on a
large scale has continued until on February 1st, there was only about
a millions tons available. February was an unusually severe month and
the reports from the coal docks of the northwest show the fuel supply
has disappeared rapidly. For this reason the resumption of coal
shipments is to be started without delay.
Operators say many ore vessels which came down with their final
cargoes of ore last fall held them in their holds during the winter,
and are now being unloaded. The railroads are being called upon to
bring this ore to the furnaces and are encouraging the movement of
coals, to give them a back haul.

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- Ron Davis, Roger Link






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