Union Station served the residents of Chatham, New York, from 1887 to 1972 as a passenger station and until 1976 as a freight station. It was the final stop for

Harlem Line The Metro-North Railroad Harlem Line, originally chartered as the New York and Harlem Railroad, is an commuter rail line running north from New York City to Wassaic, in eastern Dutchess County. The lower from Grand Central Terminal to Southea ...

trains. It had originally served trains of the

Boston and Albany Railroad The Boston and Albany Railroad was a railroad connecting Boston, Massachusetts to Albany, New York, later becoming part of the New York Central Railroad system, Conrail, and CSX Transportation. The line is currently used by CSX for freight. Pass ...

, then the

New York Central Railroad The New York Central Railroad was a railroad primarily operating in the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The railroad primarily connected greater New York and Boston in the east with Chicago and St. Louis in the Midw ...

and the

Rutland Railway The Rutland Railroad was a railroad in the northeastern United States, located primarily in the state of Vermont but extending into the state of New York at both its northernmost and southernmost ends. After its closure in 1961, parts of the ...

. It served as a junction for service that radiated to

Rensselaer, New York Rensselaer is a city in Rensselaer County, New York, United States, and is located on the east side of the Hudson River, directly opposite of Albany. As of the 2020 census, the city population was 9,210. Rensselaer is on the western border of ...

, to the northwest;

Hudson, New York Hudson is a city and the county seat of Columbia County, New York, United States. As of the 2020 census, it had a population of 5,894. Located on the east side of the Hudson River and 120 miles from the Atlantic Ocean, it was named for the rive ...

, to the southwest;

Vermont Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...

, to the northeast, and

Pittsfield, Massachusetts Pittsfield is the largest city and the county seat of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the principal city of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area which encompasses all of Berkshire County. Pittsfield� ...

to the east and

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, to the south. The building is listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

and currently serves as a branch office of the National Union Bank of Kinderhook. Though it no longer serves as a train station, the rail line alongside it is still a very-active mainline for CSX

freight rail Rail freight transport is the use of railroads and trains to transport cargo as opposed to human passengers. A freight train, cargo train, or goods train is a group of freight cars (US) or goods wagons (International Union of Railways) hauled ...

between Selkirk Yard, south of Albany, and Worcester, Massachusetts.

History

Before the station house was built, rail service to Chatham began on December 21, 1841, when the first portion of the Albany and West Stockbridge Railroad was put into service between Greenbush (east of Albany) and Chatham. The Harlem Extension of the

New York and Harlem Railroad The New York and Harlem Railroad (now the Metro-North Railroad's Harlem Line) was one of the first railroads in the United States, and was the world's first street railway. Designed by John Stephenson, it was opened in stages between 1832 and ...

was built to Chatham by 1869. By late 1870, a series of company mergers led to the formation of the Boston and Albany Railroad (B&A). In 1881, the B&A hired Henry Hobson Richardson to design several stations for the railroad. Richardson died unexpectedly in 1886 and the remaining station design work was transferred to the Boston-based architecture firm of Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge. They designed the Chatham Station, which was opened for service along the B&A's Boston to Albany line in 1887. The

Richardsonian Romanesque Richardsonian Romanesque is a style of Romanesque Revival architecture named after the American architect Henry Hobson Richardson (1838–1886). The revival style incorporates 11th and 12th century southern French, Spanish, and Italian Romanesque ...

building features a Dutch gable roof with wide eaves and

colonnade In classical architecture, a colonnade is a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature, often free-standing, or part of a building. Paired or multiple pairs of columns are normally employed in a colonnade which can be straight or curv ...

porticos that extend out east and west along the tracks over the low platform. The walls are made of lightly colored rusticated stone, with window and door frames, sills and

lintel A lintel or lintol is a type of beam (a horizontal structural element) that spans openings such as portals, doors, windows and fireplaces. It can be a decorative architectural element, or a combined ornamented structural item. In the case of w ...

s of contrasting

brownstone Brownstone is a brown Triassic–Jurassic sandstone that was historically a popular building material. The term is also used in the United States and Canada to refer to a townhouse clad in this or any other aesthetically similar material. Type ...

. A prominent bow window faces trackside and once was used as part of the stationmaster's office. The

(NYC) took over the B&A in 1900. The station house was originally staffed by a ticket agent, but the ticket office was closed by the NYC in 1960. The last passenger service to Chatham on the east-west B&A route was daily 'Beeliner' (Budd Rail Diesel Car/"RDC") service between Albany and Boston, in 1965. The station remained as an active station for passenger service south along the NYC's Harlem Line until March 20, 1972. Under the aegis of

Conrail Conrail , formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do busin ...

, the station was closed in March, 1976 when freight operations from

Ghent Ghent ( nl, Gent ; french: Gand ; traditional English: Gaunt) is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the East Flanders province, and the third largest in the country, exceeded in ...

to Millerton were terminated. Conrail utilized the station for storage in the mid-1970s. In 1977, the freight railroad attempted to sell the station and surrounding land for $85,000. Passenger service on the Rutland Railroad from Chatham to Bennington ended in 1931, with freight service continuing until 1951. Tracks north to North Bennington, Vermont were abandoned in 1951 and dismantled shortly afterward. The removal of the last NYC Harlem Line trackage south of Church Street followed 29 years later, in 1980.

trackage remains in place and is currently used by

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

. The line was single-tracked by Conrail in the late 1980s. Chatham Union Station was listed on the

on May 1, 1974.Columbia County Listings on the National Register of Historic Places
/ref> In addition to active freight service, Amtrak's '' Lake Shore Limited'' long-distance passenger train between Chicago and Boston passes through Chatham without stopping. The station-house was beautifully renovated and reopened in 1999 to serve as a branch of the National Union Bank of Kinderhook. Currently, the

Harlem Valley Rail Trail The Harlem Valley Rail Trail is a paved rail trail on an abandoned portion of the New York and Harlem Railroad, north of the hamlet of Wassaic and easily accessible by train, one mile north of the start at the Metro-North Railroad Harlem Line ter ...

Association has plans to extend its trail along the right-of-way in front of the site of the former station. As of September 2016, $3.5 million was appropriated to the HVRT association in Dutchess & Columbia counties to complete this project. Once completed, the HVRT will contain 46 contiguous miles of path between Wassaic and Chatham.New York Central Railroad Employee Timetables, Harlem Division, 1971-1972

References

External links

*
Chatham, Former Terminus of the Harlem Division, Photos Then and Now
{{National Register of Historic Places in New York Former railway stations in New York (state) Railway stations in the United States opened in 1887 Railway stations closed in 1972 Railway stations closed in 1976 Chatham, New York Former Rutland Railroad stations Chatham, New York Railway stations on the National Register of Historic Places in New York (state) Railway stations in Columbia County, New York Richardsonian Romanesque architecture in New York (state) National Register of Historic Places in Columbia County, New York 1887 establishments in New York (state) 1972 disestablishments in New York (state) Transportation in Columbia County, New York

History

See also

References

External links