Robert Withers
In 1827, a group of Baltimore capitalists feared their city would be
left out of the lucrative East Coast-to-Midwest trade that other eastern
cities were developing; thus, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was
chartered. Political pressure kept the B&O out of Pennsylvania at
first, and so track crews
headed for what is now West Virginia,
building mountainous routes with torturous grades to Wheeling and
Parkersburg. Eventually the B&O financed and acquired a spiderweb of
branch lines that covered much of the northern and central parts of the
Mountain State. This book takes a close look at the line's locomotives,
passenger and freight trains,
structures, and, most importantly, its
people who endeared their company to generations of travelers,
shippers, and small Appalachian communities.
