Hoosac Tunnel

The Hoosac Tunnel (also called Hoosic or Hoosick Tunnel) is a 4.75-mile-long (7.64 km) railroad tunnel through the Hoosac Range, which is an extension of Vermont's Green Mountains. The tunnel's east portal is in Florida, Massachusetts (42°40′31″N 72°59′53″W / 42.675163°N 72.997938°W / 42.675163; -72.997938), the west portal is in North Adams, Massachusetts (42°40′32″N 73°05′29″W / 42.675447°N 73.091376°W / 42.675447; -73.091376). Work began in 1851 and was finally completed in 1875. At the time of completion, it was the second longest tunnel in the world (after the 8.5-mile-long (13.7 km) Mont Cenis Tunnel through the French Alps). It was the longest tunnel in North America until the completion of the Moffat Tunnel in 1928, and remains the longest transportation tunnel east of the Rocky Mountains.

Tunnel history

The tunnel project was originally proposed in 1819 as a canal to connect Boston to Upstate New York via the Deerfield River on the east of the Hoosac Range and the Hoosic River on the west. That project was shelved, and later reborn as part of the new Troy and Greenfield Railroad. The tunnel took over 20 years to complete, and cost $21,000,000 by the time of completion. The project was nicknamed 'The Great Bore' by critics of the day, including future Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who said he'd like to "wall up a dozen lawyers at one end of the tunnel and put a good fee at the other."

The first chief engineer of the tunnel project was A.F. Edwards. In 1854 the state of Massachusetts provided $2,000,000 in credit to Edward Wellman Serrell and Company, which began work in 1855. In 1856 Herman Haupt took over as chief engineer.

The Western Railroad, which ran a southern route through Springfield and Pittsfield, opposed the Hoosac Tunnel and its northern route through the state. They successfully lobbied to block state funding of the tunnel in 1861, which bankrupted Haupt, and temporarily stopped the project. Haupt had excavated 4,250 feet (1,295 m), or about a fifth of the distance at that point. He left in 1861 and became a Union Army railroad engineer and general in the American Civil War.

In 1862 the Troy and Greenfield Railroad defaulted on its loan from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, which foreclosed on the mortgage and took control of the railroad, including the tunnel project. The state sent engineer Charles Storrow to Europe to study modern tunneling techniques, including the use of nitroglycerine and compressed air. In 1863 the state restarted the project and made Thomas Doane the chief engineer.

In 1868 the state congress appropriated 5 million dollars for the completion of the project. Canadian engineer William Shanly (sometimes spelled Shanley) and his brother Francis took over the project from the state, and remained through the completion of tunnel boring. The final chief engineer was Bernard N. Farren, who took over on November 19, 1874 and completed the final work, including enlarging sections of the tunnel, reinforcing weak areas with arching, completing drainage systems, and completing the east tunnel facade.

The first train passed through the tunnel on February 9, 1875. Regular service via the tunnel between Boston, MA and Troy, NY began in 1876. The tunnel and Troy and Greenfield Railroad were bought by the Fitchburg Railroad in 1877. The Boston and Maine Railroad bought the Fitchburg Railroad in 1900.

The last regularly-scheduled passenger train passed through the tunnel in 1958. Today the tunnel is part of the Guilford Rail System and is used to transport freight.

Connections to the west

The Troy and Boston Railroad and its Southern Vermont Railroad and Troy and Greenfield Railroad opened in 1859 from Troy, New York, on the New York Central Railroad and Hudson River Railroad, east to North Adams at the west portal of the tunnel.

The 1863 state buyout of the Troy and Greenfield Railroad opened the way for competition through the tunnel. The Boston, Hoosac Tunnel and Western Railway was organized in 1877 to build from near the Massachusetts/Vermont border, where state ownership ended, parallel to the Troy and Boston Railroad to near Johnsonville, New York and then west via Schenectady to Rotterdam Junction on what became the New York, West Shore and Buffalo Railway in 1880. The line was being planned as a part of the Delaware and Hudson Company's system, and as part of the Erie Railway system via the Delaware and Hudson Company's Albany and Susquehanna Railroad. East of Greenfield, the east end of state ownership, the BHT&W would have built its own line to terminal facilities at Winthrop.

Due to the competition between the two companies, various challenges were made. In late 1878 the T&B attempted to evict the BHT&W from the roadbed of the abandoned Albany Northern Railroad between Hart's Falls and Eagle Bridge. The BHT&W lost that in court, but continued to use the right-of-way. The case lasted until late 1881, when it was overturned. In May 1879 a frog war was feared at Hoosick Junction, where the BHT&W was to cross the T&B's Troy and Bennington Railroad. In July of that year Cornelius Vanderbilt, who owned the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, acquired a controlling interest in the T&B, threatening to build a branch to Saratoga Springs unless the BHT&W/D&H alliance was ended. In November an appeals court ruled that the application to cross the Troy and Bennington was improperly made to the Troy and Boston, and the T&B claimed that the improvements including a stone bridge were forfeit.

The first train ran over the full BHT&W to Mechanicville, New York on December 6, 1879, and revenue service began December 20, with general offices at North Adams. In 1881 the BHT&W was being planned as part of a larger system west to Oswego and Buffalo. That line was not built, but the BHT&W opened an extension west to Rotterdam Junction on the New York, West Shore and Buffalo Railway. The New York Central and Hudson River Railroad took over the NYWS&B in 1886, and in 1887 the Fitchburg Railroad bought both the T&B and the BHT&W, as well at the Troy and Greenfield Railroad including the tunnel, ending the rivalry.

Tunnel deaths

195 lives were lost during construction, leading to the nickname "The Bloody Pit." Many were lost due to the unstable nature of nitroglycerine.

One of the bloodiest accidents occurred while digging the tunnel's 1,028-foot (313 m) vertical exhaust shaft, called 'Central Shaft.' On October 17, 1867, a lighted candle in the hoist building ignited naptha fumes which had leaked from a 'Gasometer' lamp, triggering an explosion. The hoist caught fire and collapsed into the shaft. Four men near the top of the shaft escaped, but thirteen men working 538 feet (164 m) below were trapped. The pumps were also destroyed, and the shaft began to fill with water. A worker named Mallory was lowered into the shaft by rope the next day; he was overcome by fumes and reported no survivors.

Construction technology

File:Eastern Portal, Hoosac Tunnel.jpg

Eastern Portal in c. 1910. The failed first tunnel is at left.

The tunnel construction project required excavation of 2 million tons (1,800,000 metric tons) of rock. On March 16, 1853, "Wilson's Patented Stone-Cutting Machine" (a tunnel boring machine) was used; it failed after excavating 10 feet (3 m) of rock. Tunnel builders resorted to hand digging, and later used the Burleigh Rock Drill, one of the first pneumatic drills. Construction also featured the first large-scale commercial use of nitroglycerine and electric blasting caps.

Digging the Central Shaft also allowed workers to open 2 additional faces to excavate: once the shaft was complete in 1870 workers dug outwards from the center to meet the tunnels being dug from the east and west portals. Engineers built a 1,000-foot (305 m) elevator to hoist the excavated rock from the Central Shaft.

One of the many engineering challenges posed by the project was lining up the four tunnels that were being dug: the east and west portal tunnels, and the two tunnels dug outward from the central shaft. Engineers cleared a path through the forest over the mountain, and strung a straight line from the east to west portals, through "sighting posts" on the east and west peaks of Hoosac Mountain. Repeated surveys verified the line ran true between the posts, and steel bolts were installed at fixed intervals along the line.

On December 12, 1872 workers opened the east portal tunnel to the Central Shaft-dug tunnel, which were aligned within nine sixteenths of an inch (1.4 cm), a tremendous engineering achievement at that time. On November 27, 1873 the remainder of the tunnel was opened to the west portal tunnel.

Lewis Cuyler of the Hoosac Tunnel Museum Society described the project as the 'fountain-head of modern tunnel technology.'

The American Society of Civil Engineers made the tunnel a Historic Civil Engineering Landmark in 1975.

Notes

Hoosac is an Algonquian word meaning 'place of stones.'

External links

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References

Online

Literary

The Story of the Hoosac Tunnel. (March 1882). The Atlantic monthly,. Volume 49, Issue 293
The Hoosac Tunnel Tragedy (November 16, 1867). The Defiance Democrat (Ohio), p. 1.
Hampson, Rick (August 24, 1980). Tunnel a Wonder of the 19th Century. Chicago Daily Herald. p. 42.
Fighting for Eastern Traffic, New York Times January 2, 1879 page 5
Railroad Rioting Feared, New York Times May 25, 1879 page 1
The Hoosac Tunnel Route, New York Times July 5, 1879 page 1
Railroad Methods, New York Times November 26, 1879 page 1
Railroad Management, New York Times December 7, 1879 page 1
First Train Over the Boston, Hoosac Tunnel and Western, New York Times December 21, 1879 page 2
A Great Railroad Project, New York Times April 11, 1881 page 1
Boston, Hoosac Tunnel and Western Victory, New York Times October 5, 1881 page 2
A Pinprick of Light, The Troy and Greenfield Railroad and its Hoosac Tunnel, by Carl R. Byron. The New England Press, Shelburne, Vt. 1975. ISBN 1-881535-17-7