Trolley Tuesday 1/11/22 - The London & Port Stanley Railway

As much as I would love to, dear reader, tell you about the mostly-unknown-yet-fascinating history of London's tram network, that will actually have to wait for another few months (plus comedian Jay Foreman already covered it in a more succinct and funny way than I ever could). Instead, the "London" we're looking at today is much smaller as it is London, Ontario, a city of about 300,000 people on the shores of Lake Erie. Its closest port town, Port Stanley, was once connected to London by way of a 25-mile electric interurban railroad that was near and dear to many local Ontarians. On today's Trolley Tuesday, let's brush back the sands of time and narrow our scope as we look at a much smaller electric railway in-between the likes of Montreal and Toronto, but no less important: the London & Port Stanley Railway!

Steam Rooted in Ontario

An 1833 steamboat advertisement between Port Stanley,
Ontario and Chippewa, Niagara Falls.
(Central Elgin)

    Few electric railway routes can claim to be in its region from the very beginning, but the London & Port Stanley Railway (L&PS) actually was, as its route dated all the way back to the beginnings of Ontario railways in 1853. Back then, track gauge was 5-foot broad gauge (Canadian standard at the time) and the line between London and Port Stanley was built concurrently with the local Great Western Railway that connected London to Niagara Falls. While under construction, the L&PS and the Great Western eventually switched to standard gauge (4'8.5") and once finished, the first passenger train ran to Port Stanley on July 5, 1856. Despite only being 25 miles long, the line to the small town of Port Stanley held a position in very high regard: facilitating logging and coal trade between Canada and the United States across Lake Erie. For the first fifty-nine years of its existence, the L&PS was powered by steam and eventually interchanged with many railroads, including the New York Central, Grand Trunk Western, Pere Marquette, and Canadian National, especially in the intermediate town of St. Thomas, ten miles north of Port Stanley.

Electrification Comes Very Late

A Pere Marquette 2-6-0 mogul is hired to raise the wire on
the London & Port Stanley Mainline, 1916.
(Driftscape)

    After the turn of the century, the city of London (who owned the L&PS line) decided to wholly operate the railroad and get more local bang for their buck. The man behind this idea was then-mayor Adam Beck (1857-1925), who decided to combine the local railroad with his own background of forming and promoting the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario (which ran the hydro-electric plants at Niagara Falls). Beck set his plan into motion in 1914 by leasing the line to the LP&S for 99 years and using the revenue that generated to electrify the line with 1500V DC wire. With the steam locomotives now gone, Beck eagerly anticipated the summer holiday-goers that would now use the interurban line to trundle down to Port Stanley and treat it like Coney Island. (Con-eh Island? No? Nobody? Aww...) Needless to say, the gamble worked and by the 1920s, the L&PS earned a reputation both as an important international freight link and a dependable passenger railroad.

A modern day map shows the locations of London Station,
the L&PS Yard, and the shops in London, Ontario...

...while this map shows the modern-day locations of the St. Thomas station,
the intersection with the major NYC railway station, and the current-day
Elgin County Railway Museum.
(Halton County Radial Railway Museum)

A Useful Railway for London

Coney Park by Lake Erie, with the L&PS interurbans at left.
(Insiders Blog - St. Thomas Ontario)

    Over the next couple decades, the London & Port Stanley carried generations of Londoners and Port citizens, hundreds of thousands of people, between their respective towns, whether they were summer excursionists looking for a good time at Port Stanley or ferry passengers from the US looking to connect with a mainline train to Toronto. Stanley Beach became the railway company's own Coney Island, as by the 1920s the area boasted a casino, an amusement park with a boardwalk and Ferris wheel, two theaters, a bowling alley, mini-golf, and even a dance pavilion that eventually hosted jazz legends like Count Basie, Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong, and Johnny Downs (who later became the pavilion's house band in the 1950s). However, while the L&PS was enjoying success, their reputation was not always the best in the minds of local Ontarians, who often nicknamed the line the "Late & Poor Service", "Lost & Presumed Sunk" and "Lean, Push & Shove", among others. Nevertheless, despite freight train delays and spotty service, the L&PS continued to serve its respective towns dutifully throughout WWI and the Great Depression.

Notable Interurban Cars

LP&S No. 8 leads a five-car train through the St. Thomas NYC diamond
on a sunny July 7, 1946. The steam locomotive's road is unknown.
(Halton County Radial Railway)

Inside the L&PS shops in 1915, showing how the cars originally had
fancier gold lining along with their stately stained-glass arched windows.
(Komoka Railway Museum)

    Throughout its existence, the London & Port Stanley's main interurban cars of choice were a set of motor and trailer cars built by the Jewett Car Company between 1915 and 1917. Many of these cars were derived from designs Jewett was already building back then, including the fanciful wooden (later steel) bodies wrapped in Pullman Green, the rounded streamline-ended roofs, and the nimble 60-foot length and round ends that could handle tight street corners with ease. Cars were grouped by type based on their numbers, with odd-numbered cars referring to trailers and even numbers referring to motors. The first cars (Nos. 1-10) were built in 1915 for the lines opening, with the trailers (Nos 1, 3, 5) built by the Preston Car Company of Preston, Ontario, the first two motors (Nos. 2, 4) built as normal coaches, and the second order of motors (Nos. 6, 8, and 10) built as Steel Combines. The steel combines had modified roofs that incorporated some motifs from the New York, Westchester & Boston and the South Shore, as they featured bulbous front ends with flat and skinny roof middles, with the pantographs supported by a thin clerestory.

Due to an unfortunate mishap with a short circuit, No. 8 burst into flames
and is seen here at the Canadian Car & Foundry's work tracks in Montreal, Canada.
Thank goodness she was made of steel, though.
(Halton County Radial Railway Museum)

Milwaukee Electric Railway & Light No. 1129, as preserved
at the Illinois Railway Museum in Union, Illinois, USA, in 1994.
(Illinois Railway Museum)

    Joining these fleet of cars much later were secondhand stragglers from across the lakes. Motors No. 16 and 18 were ex-Milwaukee Electric Railway & Light parlor cars Nos. 102 and 106 (originally 2, "Menominee" and 1, "Mendota") that were sold to the L&PS following the railway's downsizing in 1941. Trailer No. 21 (ex-TMER&L 1129) and No. 23 (ex-TMER&L 1110, originally Parlor Car No. 3, "Waubeesee") also came to the railway around the same time. Due to the line's status as a freight interchange, of course the L&PS also rostered a few electric locomotives. These early GE boxcabs were numbered L1, L2, and L3, and generated a mighty 1,000 horsepower from their four GE 251A motors. They were most often seen holding up the passenger trains on their single-track mainline, along with "express motor" No. E1, beginning in 1915 and lasting until the end of electric service.

L&PS No. L2 at work in 1959, switching at London Yard.
Behind it is flanger car "FA-1", made out of a caboose.
(Bill Thomson)

Back to the Freight-ture

A rebuilt No. 8, now missing her arched stained glass windows, crosses
Bridge Street with unrebuilt No. 14 in tow to Port Stanley, 1956.
(Halton County Radial Railway)

    Despite the L&PS's historic, varied, and stylish beginnings to its history, its downfall is more straightforward and nonetheless tragic. Following its peak in World War II, when its passenger numbers peaked at 1.1 million people by 1943, it was the the wily automobile that spelled trouble for the interurban's futures. An unintended but completely foreseeable consequence of wartime production was the increased availability of automobiles, which was felt on both sides of the border as interurban railways dropped like flies. The once proud "Coney Island of the North", Stanley Beach, slowly phased out operations until only the bandstand, now the "Stork Club", remained as a solid stop for legacy jazz acts, and soon passenger numbers dwindled as more and more Ontarians depended on the car instead of the interurban car. 

This rare first-person shot shows the view of No. 8s motorman, as the interurban car
was used for switching and local freight as late as 1962, five years after the end of passenger service.
(Halton County Radial Railway Museum)

In this modern-day shot, two CN diesels haul some industrial
cars en route to St. Thomas, on the modern CN Talbot Subdivision.
(Jason Noe)

    Despite this, the city of London attempted to recoup what revenue was lost on leasing the LP&S mainline back to the company by buying the company outright in 1950, turning the interurban into a municipal transit line. Nonetheless, the attempt proved all but useless, as on February 1, 1957, the city of London announced it was discontinuing passenger service on the LP&S after that date. Many were saddened by the loss of their once-proud interurban, but by February 2nd, the lights went out for the last time and that brought an end to electric operation on the railway. The line was then sold from the city to Canadian National in 1965, and with it came the LP&S' former lines, industrial sidings, and facilities as the line between London and St. Thomas became the CN Talbot Subdivision. Many of the interurban cars were sold off to private organizations or scrapped, while the ex-Milwaukee cars were sold as summer lodges.

Museum Pieces

A very happy L&PS No. 8 is proud to represent the Halton County Radial Railway, as it
poses outside of the museum's Grand River Railway Shop in 2019.
(Halton County Radial Railway Museum)

The interior of No. 8 at the same time, showing the beautiful seats and restored stained glass windows.
(Halton County Radial Railway Museum)

LP&S No. L1 is among some odd company, on display at the
Elgin County Railway Museum in St. Thomas, Ontario.
(Railway City Tourism)

    Today, nine cars carry on the legacy of the London & Port Stanley interurban in varying states of restoration. Two of the ex-Milwaukee cars, Nos. 21 and 16, have returned stateside and now have a new loving home in the Illinois Railway Museum of Union, Illinois, USA, since 1955, where they have been restored back into their Milwaukee colors. Of the original fleet, Nos. 3, 4, 8, and freight locomotive L2 are now preserved at the Halton County Radial Railway of Rockwood, Ontario, a town north of Guelph and almost 90 miles away from their original home. Nos. 4 and L2 were originally donated to the London Public Library Board in 1956, but while No. 4 was eventually sold to become part of the Ossawippi Express Restaurant in Orillia, Ontario. L2 was stored until it was sold to the Toronto & York Division of the Canadian Railway Historical Association between 1972 and 1986. Both equipment was later reunited at the Halton County Radial Railway between 1997 and 2013. And finally, in terms of hometown heroes, Nos. 14 and L1 form part of the Elgin County Railway Museum in St. Thomas, Ontario, keeping the spirit of the L&PS on home tracks. 

The Modern Port Stanley Terminal Rail

The modern Port Stanley Terminal Rail's excursion service.
(Ontario's Southwest)

    As for the home tracks themselves, it continued as a freight interchange branch for Canadian National until 1982, when the line from St. Thomas to Port Stanley was abandoned following a washout at Union. At the time, the line was in a derelict state and local groups were already meeting to purchase the railway and bring back what was once before. Out of this came the Port Stanley Terminal Rail Inc (PTSR), a company intended to buy the line between Port Stanley and St. Thomas. By mid-1980, volunteers were already hard at work restoring the old line by cutting down tall grasses, digging up mud- and asphalt-covered tracks, and figuring out the governmental red tape keeping the line from operating. In 1987, the PTSR was finally granted a Provincial Railway Charter (equivalent to the British Light Rail Act), the first since 1927, bringing trains back to Port Stanley once more. Dressed in a malachite green and black livery, their new diesels and excursion trains carry well over 25,000 passengers a year with trains departing and arriving at the nearby Elgin County Railway Museum. The line between St. Thomas and London continues to be operated by CN. 

Thank you for reading today's Trolley post, and watch your step as you alight on the platform. My resources today included the Port Stanley Terminal Railroad of Port Stanley, Ontario, the Halton County Radial Railway Society of Milton, Ontario, the Elgin County Railway Museum of St. Thomas, Ontario, "Electric Lines in Southern Ontario" by William E. Miller, and the credits under each photo caption. The trolley gifs in our posts are made by myself and can be found under “Motorman Reymond’s Railroad Gif Carhouse”. On Thursday, we finally break into Toronto as we look at a brief overview of the history of the Toronto Transportation Company! For now, you can follow myself or my editor on Twitter, buy a shirt or sticker from our Redbubble stand, or purchase my editor's self-developed board game! It's like Ticket to Ride, but cooler! (and you get to support him through it!) Until next time, ride safe!