History
The Kentucky Improvement Company was chartered in December 1866 and renamed January 1, 1870 to the Eastern Kentucky Railway. The first section, from Riverton south to Argillite, opened in 1867. Further extensions took it to Hunnewell by 1870, Grayson in 1871, Willard by 1874 and Webbville in 1889. At Hitchins, between Grayson and Willard, the line junctioned with the Elizabethtown, Lexington and Big Sandy Railroad, an east-west branch of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway.
The Consolidated Southern Railway was a plan in the 1880s to extend the EK south as part of a through line to Hickory and Statesville, North Carolina, also using the never-built Norfolk and Cincinnati Railroad and part of the Chester and Lenoir Railroad.
The EK went bankrupt in 1919, and the part south of Grayson was reorganized in 1928 as the Eastern Kentucky Southern Railway. That company stopped operations in January 1933, and the tracks were removed soon after.
The EK is featured in the children's book A Ride with Huey, the Engineer (1966) by Jesse Stuart.
Due out in September 2007 will be the book "Eastern Kentucky Railway" by Terry L. Baldridge.
Read more about this topic: Eastern Kentucky Railway
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