ditional railroads partakes so much of the character of the inevitable that the pointing it out can hardly be called speculation.
     The F. E. & M. V. road (Northwestern) must build west to some point on its Superior branch; the Missouri Pacific must have a connection with its Crete and Hastings branches. The Rock Island must make for itself a southern connection by closing up the gap between its Nebraska line and Topeka, and also shorten its Denver route by building from Lincoln to Fairbury or Nelson. These are developements (sic) that will be the legitimate and inevitable outgrowth of the present situation. Besides these there is little room for doubt that the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul will enter Lincoln at an early date either over a line of its own, or, more probably by traffic arrangements with the Rock Island.

     More than any other great railroad system the Burlington seems to have been built with an especial eye to the business to be derived from agriculture. The management would seem to have calculated wisely on the future developments of a country which afforded scarcely any business when it was first entered by the road and to have foreseen that each succeeding year would bring a larger business--a business that will be undiminished when mines are exhausted and forests have been cut away. With this end in view that territory was selected which promised to be the richest in agricultural products, and the inevitable result was that Nebraska was selected as the Burlington's especial field of operations. Not only is this ruling principle seen in the preemption of Nebraska by the Burlington, but in its selections of its routes within the state for almost invariably, instead of following the easy grades of the streams, lined on each side by hills and waste land, it has selected the middle of the rich table-lands where for hundreds of miles along its right of way scarcely an acre of rough or unproductive land is to be seen.
      The result of this course is that the volume of this road's business is increasing immensely from year to year; and as Lincoln is the center of the system west of the Missouri the stream of products of the farm pouring east through Lincoln and of supplies flowing west through Lincoln and from Lincoln pays every year a greater amount of toll to this city.
     The round house, offices and yards of the Burlington in this city give employment to about 1,000 men, including the train crews which have their residence here.

     HAVELOCK.--This suburb is where the great shops of the Burlington Railroad are located. These shops will be, when the present plans are completed, the largest west of Chicago. The plans call for fourteen buildings covering 100 acres. At present three of these have been finished at an expense of $300,000. They comprise a machine and construction shop 100x140 feet; blacksmith and boiler shop 80x200 and a power house 55x140. The smoke stack is 125 feet high, the water stand pipe 100 feet high and fourteen in diameter; 800 men are at present employed and when all the machinery is in there will be 1,000.
     Two hundred acres of ground have been set aside here for freight transfer and will be entirely shut out from public communication.
     The last year has been one of very little activity in railroad building. Most of the Burlington's extensions have been outside the state but in territory directly tributary to Lincoln. These have been as follows: On the Deadwood line from Roachford to Deadwood, 23 1/2 miles; on the Hot Springs line from Minnekahta to Hot Springs, 13 miles; on the Newcastle line from Reno westward to Gillette, 48 miles; on the Culbertson extension from Beaverly to Wauneta, 23 1/2 miles. Total 108 miles.
     The Burlington has 3,097 miles of railroad west of the Missouri River and 2,213 miles in this state. There are practically three parallel lines running entirely across the southern third of the state from east to west, and connected by a system of north and south branches that gridiron the whole territory. Three nearly parallel lines have been started through the north half of the state in a northwesterly direction, one of which has been extended into Black Hills and into the coal and oil fields of Wyoming.
     On these lines thirty-three passenger trains, thirty regular freight trains and about as many extras move into and out of the city daily; making a total of about 100 trains in and out every twenty-four hours.

© 2002 for the NEGenWeb Project by Pam Rietsch, Ted & Carole Miller