Prosperity
Extension to the coal fields did not result in immediate prosperity. Despite an increase in traffic, the additional cost of extending the railroad resulted in interest charges that dragged the railroad down. McCormick resigned as president in 1896, and an economic downturn in 1897 brought the railroad into insolvency. The owners decided to sell out to a group of New York financiers and local businesspeople, and B. Harvey Welch, a native of Hughesville, became president. This transaction eliminated the bond interest and put the railroad back on a reasonably sound financial footing.
After 1900, a lime-burning business began to develop on the south end of the lime, using local limestone deposits and coal shipped south from Bernice. In 1901, the Eagles Mere Railroad was leased to the W&NB for $5,000 a year. This proved to be a fortunate decision, for in that same year, Union Tanning decided to log large tracts of forest to the north and west of the line. Charles W. Sones contracted to do the logging, and built a sawmill at Kettle Creek, and a logging railroad to connect it with Eagles Mere. The lumber was shipped down the Eagles Mere Railroad to Sonestown and then over the W&NB; a narrow gauge rail was laid from Sonestown to Muncy Valley to allow Eagles Mere trains to haul bark directly to the tannery there. About this time, the Northern Anthracite Company built its Murray coal breaker two miles west of Bernice. The W&NB was given exclusive rights to serve it, operating via trackage rights over the Lehigh Valley to a new spur to the mine. At 169 feet (52 m) high, the breaker was the tallest structure in central Pennsylvania. When the Coal Strike of 1902 paralyzed many of the mines on the Reading, Northern Anthracite experienced a boom in business, and for a short while, the W&NB was shipping a thousand tons of coal per day to Halls for interchange with the Reading.
The rosy prospects of coal traffic proved illusory, however. After the strike ended, coal traffic rapidly fell off. A further blow occurred in 1906, when Sones' logging railroad (incorporated in 1904 as the Susquehanna and Eagles Mere Railroad) was extended to Masten and a connection with the Susquehanna and New York Railroad, owned by Union Tanning. The Laporte tannery closed about this time, and Sones' lumber traffic was diverted to move through Masten rather than Sonestown. The closing of the Muncy Valley Tannery in 1908 effectively removed Union Tanning's traffic from the railroad. However, wood products traffic was still generated at Nordmont. Sutton Peck Chemical had built a standard gauge logging railroad up Cherry Run and down Painter Run in 1900. Sutton Peck became Nordmont Chemical in 1904, and in 1908, it removed the Cherry Run–Painter Run line. A new line was incorporated by the chemical company as the Wyoming and Sullivan Railroad, and built several miles up Muncy Creek to continue supplying wood to Nordmont Chemical.
Read more about this topic: Williamsport And North Branch Railroad
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