France
In 1878, the French government took over ten small failing railway companies and established the Chemin de Fer de l'État. The company absorbed the Chemins de Fer de l'Ouest in 1908. In 1938, the French state took 51% ownership of the newly formed SNCF merging of France's five main railways (100% in 1982).
Read more about this topic: Railway Nationalization
Famous quotes containing the word france:
“Intellectuals can tell themselves anything, sell themselves any bill of goods, which is why they were so often patsies for the ruling classes in nineteenth-century France and England, or twentieth-century Russia and America.”
—Lillian Hellman (1907–1984)
“While learning the language in France a young man’s morals, health and fortune are more irresistibly endangered than in any country of the universe.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“Springtime for Hitler and Germany,
Winter for France and Poland.”
—Mel Brooks (b. 1926)