The Paterson and Hudson River Railroad was a
railroad that operated in
New Jersey and connected the cities of
Jersey City
Jersey City is the second-most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, after Newark.[Paterson Paterson may refer to:
People
* Paterson (surname)
* Paterson (given name)
Places
Australia
*Paterson, New South Wales
*Paterson River, New South Wales
* Division of Paterson, an electoral district in New South Wales
*Paterson, Queensland, a lo ...]
. The railroad was started in 1833.
The company was the first in the United States to build
moveable bridges for rail, crossing the
Passaic River
Passaic River ( ) is a river, approximately long, in Northern New Jersey. The river in its upper course flows in a highly circuitous route, meandering through the swamp lowlands between the ridge hills of rural and suburban northern New Jersey, ...
and
Hackensack River.
Originally the Paterson and Hudson River Railroad used a troop of
horses to pull the cars along the rails. The first
steam locomotive
A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...
to operate on the line was called the ''McNeil'' and manufactured by
Robert Stephenson and Company then assembled by
Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works.
A decade after opening, the railroad's importance increased when the
Paterson and Ramapo Railroad was built connecting north Paterson to
Suffern, New York just over the state line. Travelers could use a combination of the two lines (and another transportation method for the between the two Paterson terminals) to travel between Suffern and
New York City faster than the
New York and Erie Railroad. The lines were eventually connected. In 1852, the New York and Erie Railroad leased the track rights of the P&HR and P&R and combined their lines into the "Union Railroad", which soon became the new New York and Erie Railroad mainline. Erie took ownership in 1953.
The first stations west of Bergen Junction along the line included "Germantown", "Hackensack" along the
Hackensack River (close to the present-day
Secaucus Junction and the former
Harmon Cove station) and "Boiling Spring" (at the site of the present-day
Rutherford station).
See also
*
Timeline of Jersey City area railroads
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Paterson Hudson River Railroad
Defunct New Jersey railroads
Railway companies established in 1833
Railway companies disestablished in 1852
Defunct public transport operators in the United States
Predecessors of the Erie Railroad
American companies established in 1833