Texas Railroad History - Tower 113 - Hyatt
A Crossing of the Texas & New Orleans Railroad and the
East Texas & Gulf Railway
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"Why did the ET&G cross the T&NO? To get to the other side."
-- Jimmy Barlow
Left:
This snippet from a 1958 USGS topo map shows the sawmill communities of Hicksbaugh
and Hyatt, the latter of which is on the highway (now US 69) between
Warren (3 miles north) and Kountze (14 miles south.) Hyatt was also a
stop on the Texas & New Orleans (T&NO) Railroad, which is depicted
running north / south a short distance west of the highway. The map provides no specific evidence of the East Texas &
Gulf (ET&G) Railway which connected to the T&NO near Hyatt in the
1920s. |
The Sabine and East Texas (S&ET) Railway was founded in 1880 and soon
completed a line from Beaumont south to
Sabine Pass and north to Rockland. The impetus for building north was to capture lumber
mill business in the forests of east Texas. Mill products would be
shipped out on the S&ET via trunk line connections at Beaumont, and via the Gulf
port at Sabine Pass. In late 1882, the railroad
was acquired by the T&NO which had recently been
purchased by Southern Pacific (SP.) T&NO was acquiring railroads in Texas
and Louisiana to
integrate into its operations; the S&ET was one of the first. Towns began to pop up along the T&NO's newly acquired
SE&T tracks at lumber mill
sites. Hyatt was one of these towns where a sawmill
had been built by two nephews of William Marsh Rice (who later founded Rice
Institute, now Rice University, in Houston.)
In 1917, the Lodwick Lumber Co. built a mill about
four miles east of Hyatt at
a place they named Hicksbaugh, a combination of the two owners' last names. [Note:
Instead of "Lodwick," the Handbook of Texas
uses the name "Loderick," following the spelling used by S. G. Reed in his
well-known scholarly tome
A
History of the Texas Railroads (St. Clair Publishing, 1941.) However,
"Lodwick" is the spelling
the company used in legal documents filed in a 1947 U.S. Tax Court case.] The Lodwick Lumber Co. chartered the ET&G to
provide a connection to the T&NO at Hyatt. Like most sawmills, the company
also operated logging trams to bring raw logs to the mill.
Right: This story in
The
Clifton Record of August 10, 1917 states that the ET&G
headquarters was
at Hicks, an unidentified location that one source claims was merely a
signpost in the forest (which might explain why it can't be found!) The
headquarters was more likely at Hicksbaugh, not Hicks.
The
ET&G was chartered in August, 1917. Reed's book says "operations began in October, 1917,
but it was not extended further." In the book
Texas Railroads: A Record of
Construction and Abandonment (Texas State Historical Association, 1981)
author Charles Zlatkovich lists 14.6 miles of ET&G construction from
Hicks to Wurtsbaugh completed in 1917 based on construction records of
the Railroad Commission of Texas (RCT.) In subsequent years, Zlatkovich
reports a corresponding 14.6 miles of abandonments:
5.0 miles, 1918, Hyatt to Hicks
6.0
miles, 1925, Hicksbaugh to Wurtsbaugh
3.6 miles, 1934, Hyatt to Hicksbaugh |
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Hicks has not been found on maps; it was most likely
just a logging camp in the forest accessed by a tram line. It's unusual that the
construction and subsequent abandonment of a tram line would have been reported
to RCT, but this particular tram line appears to have been a direct extension of
the ET&G tracks from Hyatt. It's possible that Lodwick management was unsure of
whether the tram extension would be considered part of the ET&G tap line.
By definition, a tap line was simply a chartered and incorporated
common carrier railroad (the ET&G) owned by a lumber company (Lodwick) that
moved logs inbound to the mill and wood products outbound to interchanges with
trunk line railroads (the T&NO) while also serving the population along
the route. There were financial advantages that made it worthwhile for a lumber
company to operate its railroad as a common carrier but that status also imposed
certain legal obligations: fares had to be posted and charged, and all customers
paid the same fares for equivalent service on a non-discriminatory basis. Thus,
Lodwick Lumber had to pay the ET&G for moving logs, supplies, outbound mill
products and employees, even though both companies had the same owners.
Since there was eventually an interlocked crossing of the T&NO at Hyatt, the
implication is that Hicks must have been west of the T&NO because the other
locations served by the ET&G (Hyatt, Hicksbaugh and Wurtsbaugh) were all east of
the T&NO. A 1925 T&NO employee timetable (ETT) notes the
interlocked crossing at Hyatt as the "ET&G Tram Crossing".
This is consistent with idea that the reason the ET&G crossed the T&NO at Hyatt
was for lumber tram access to Hicks. Thus, the 14.6 miles of construction
reported by Zlatkovich resulted in a line that went from Hicks to Hyatt to Hicksbaugh to Wurtsbaugh. Most likely the initial segment was
between Hyatt and Hicksbaugh to provide T&NO access
to the mill, the purpose for chartering the ET&G. An extension from
Hicksbaugh south to Wurtsbaugh, site of another sawmill with the same owners,
was undoubtedly the next segment built. The last segment was the tram extension
between Hyatt and Hicks.
One problem with this theory of ET&G development
is that RCT records list abandonment of the Hyatt to Hicks segment in 1918.
Presumably this would have eliminated the T&NO crossing and the need for an
interlocker. Yet... on April 17, 1923, a cabin interlocker was commissioned at
Hyatt as Tower 113 by the RCT with a 4-function mechanical plant. Based on
similar lumber tram situations, there was probably a lever for derails on each
of the two tracks, and two levers for signals (home and distant) on the T&NO.
The ET&G did not need signals; its trains always stopped at the diamond so that
a crewmember could enter the cabin to clear the ET&G derails and set STOP
signals for any approaching T&NO trains. The crewmember would reverse the levers when
his train's crossing was
complete. But the question remains... why would there be an interlocked crossing
of the T&NO at Hyatt in 1923 if the line from Hyatt to Hicks was abandoned in
1918?
Right: This 1917 RCT map provided by the Texas
Transportation Archive shows the route of the ET&G between Hyatt and
Hicksbaugh (orange highlight.) The "Non-Common Carrier" extension
(blue highlight) south from Hicksbaugh to Wurtsbaugh was a lumber tram
authorized to carry logs and company items (equipment, supplies,
employees) but nothing else, nor were any fares charged. This lends
credence to the supposition that the track from Hyatt to Hicks was a
similar "Non-Common Carrier" tram line that was a direct extension of
the ET&G common carrier tracks between Hyatt and Hicksbaugh.
The map is dated 1917, but the location for Hicks does not appear on the
map nor is any construction shown west of the T&NO. The tram line to
Hicks was probably the last track laid, and there might have been some
delay after completion of the other segments. The map could have been
drawn during the delay period. Reed says "operations began in October,
1917" but that doesn't imply that the entire 14.6 miles was operational.
it might only have been the track between Hyatt and Hicksbaugh, the
principal segment for which the ET&G was chartered.
The map labels the T&NO and other railroads in
numerous places along property boundaries. Much of this land had been
granted to the railroads by the Legislature as an incentive for building rail lines
in Texas in the
aftermath of the Civil War. |
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In 1922,
Railway Age reported the
ET&G with the following 1921 construction activities:
First Track: Hyatt to Wurtsbaugh, 9.6 miles. Other
Important Work Under Construction: A line projected from Hyatt to Hicks, 7.8
miles.
How to make sense of this report? Reed, Zlatkovich and the August, 1917 charter point to the ET&G
construction occurring in 1917 and covering more than the 9.6 miles between
Hyatt and Wurtsbaugh. It looks as if the Railway Age
editors misunderstood the information they had, thinking a "projected"
Hyatt-to-Hicks segment was to be built in 1921, hence it must have been a
continuation of "First Track" construction from Hyatt to Wurtsbaugh in 1921. But
the year was wrong -- their information was a few years stale. RCT's database has ET&G
entries for 14.6 miles of construction and 14.6 miles of abandonment. It
does not show additional mileage rebuilt from Hyatt to Hicks, nor does
it show the rebuilt tracks eventually abandoned.
From the
beginning, it seems unusual that the five miles between Hyatt and Hicks was
officially abandoned in 1918, perhaps only a year after construction, i.e. not
merely that operations on the line had ceased, but that the track had been
abandoned with enough formality to be reported to RCT. Unfortunately, the RCT tower archives maintained at DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist
University are of no help regarding Tower 113. The file is sparse, containing only a simple map dated April
13, 1923 showing two lines crossing at a right angle. To the east, the ET&G line
is labeled "to mill". The T&NO line to the south is labeled "to Beaumont." There are no
labels on the lines to the north and west. The map was drawn
four days before the interlocker began operation.
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The Mystery is Solved
Left: Aerial
imagery from 1930 reveals an interesting rail junction at Hyatt. The
highway (red arrow) parallels the T&NO tracks (green arrows) which cross
two diamonds about 200 ft. apart. The south diamond (purple circle) is
the crossing of the ET&G main line (yellow arrows.) This is
known to be the ET&G main line because it continues east (off the image) to Hicksbaugh.
To the west, this line presumably went to Hicks, but the available 1930
imagery does not extend far enough west to show any indication of where
Hicks might have been (and by 1930, the track had been abandoned for twelve years.) The ET&G also has a connecting track (blue
arrows) to the T&NO supporting movements to and from the south toward
Kountze. The imagery suggests it was a double-track connector, i.e. a
siding paralleling the connector between the main line switches.
At the north diamond
(light brown circle) the T&NO crosses an unknown rail line (pink arrows)
which is undoubtedly a tram line. The imagery in both directions shows it meandering
into the forest, serving no populated areas nor any sawmills. This unknown
tram line has a connecting track (orange arrow) to the ET&G line to
Hicksbaugh. The switch
for the tram line to access this connector is located very close to the T&NO diamond and sits
adjacent to a structure (magnified inset image) large enough
to cast a noticeable shadow. A 1925 T&NO ETT states that a train
order office was open at Hyatt daily between 9:00 am and 6:00 pm. This structure
is undoubtedly the office, and surely it was also the "cabin" for Tower
113. The interlocker was decommissioned in 1927, but the
office remained intact, at least through 1929 where a T&NO ETT lists it
with 8:30 am to 5:30 pm office hours.
The conclusion is that the impetus for Tower 113 was
not the ET&G line to Hicks, a line
that RCT records show had been abandoned five years before Tower 113 was
commissioned. The impetus for Tower 113 was a different ET&G tram line (pink
arrows) that crossed the T&NO very close to a switch for the
connecting track to the ET&G main line to Hicksbaugh. This tram line was not
reported to RCT because lumber companies were not required to report
tram construction. |
To summarize, the interlocker installed at Hyatt in
1923 only indirectly pertained to the 1917 ET&G
construction. There's no evidence that the ET&G actually crossed the T&NO at
that time, and arguably, there's an inference that it didn't since no interlocker
was installed for another 5.5 years (although 1917 was just before RCT began to
address the issue of tram line interlockings; the first actual tram line to be
interlocked was in late 1919 at Trinity.)
Whether Hicks was west of the T&NO or not is irrelevant because
even if there was a crossing of the T&NO to reach Hicks, it
was not the crossing subsequently interlocked by Tower 113.
The 1918 abandonment of the line to Hicks had no bearing on the eventual
development of Tower 113. Instead, Tower 113 was established to interlock a
different tram line built by the ET&G that
crossed the T&NO about 200 ft. north of where the ET&G had crossed at some
earlier date.
The construction of this other tram line was not reported to RCT.
Tram lines weren't supposed to be reported to RCT, but in rare instances, they
were because the owner -- always a lumber company -- was planning to have them
reclassified as common carrier tap lines (e.g. see the
Trinity Valley & Northern.) There were several
interlocked tram crossings in Texas (e.g. at Devers,
at Trinity, near Magnolia, at
Cruse) but the tram line construction for
none of them was reported to RCT. With no RCT reporting, the other
tram line could have been built at any time, but most likely it was in the
1921-22 timeframe since it was interlocked in 1923. The T&NO was a busy line; it
would not have wanted all of its trains forced to stop because the crossing at
Hyatt was not interlocked.
The
construction report in Railway Age in 1922 was
an accidental red herring. The construction it described occurred in
1917, not 1921, and it had no bearing on Tower 113.
Right: The 1923
Official Railway Guide (ORG) carried this timetable for
passenger operations on the ET&G. The 1917 map shows the track from
Hicksbaugh heading southwest to reach Wurtsbaugh (six miles distant) as a "Non-Common Carrier"
line. The advertised service to Wurtsbaugh in the ORG was Sunday only,
and may have been "non-common carrier", i.e. no fares charged for
passengers. Likely, the only people traveling between Wurtsbaugh and
Hicksbaugh were company employees or invited visitors.
Below: Even a tiny
railroad like the ET&G could have a train robbery! (Austin
Statesman, May 3, 1920)
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The Tower 113 cabin
interlocker only lasted about 4 years. The 1928 RCT Annual Report states that Tower
113 was taken out of service at an unspecified date in 1927.
Operations at the Lodwick mill were also winding down about this time, and the
mill completely ceased operations in 1928. The ET&G continued serving the small population of Hicksbaugh
until it was completely abandoned in 1934 as reported (at
left) by
Railway Age on February 17, 1934. The T&NO line lasted much longer but was
abandoned in the 1990s. |
Jimmy Barlow adds the following in an email dated May
12, 2017:
It just so happens that I had a dear and longtime friend who spent some
of his childhood in nearby Warren. His name was Jess Harper (1914 - 2012) and his
dad worked for the Lodwick Lumber Co. Even in his 90s Jess was sharp as a tack!
Here is my summation of emails he
sent c. 2005.
Although ET&G freight trains ran the length of the
line, their passenger trains only served Hicksbaugh and Hyatt, 3.6 miles
apart. But a law required all railroads that provided passenger service
to do so over a minimum distance of six miles. So once a day, ET&G's
little train -- in reality a modified T-model Ford on railroad wheels --
ran EMPTY from Hyatt to Hicks and back
(Hicks being nothing more than a signboard beside the track) which made
a total run of exactly 6.0 miles!
I can't find Jess's
emails now; I don't think he mentioned what year(s) he witnessed this. But I found Jess's story
amusing.
Amusing, indeed!
