Halfway Brook

The Erie Canal
“Here we stop to view an old familiar sight, two boats passing a canal lock.

“Our illustration presents a scene at once charming and romantic. Tourists frequently indulge in short trips on the ‘raging canal.’

“A few days passed aboard one of these boats will afford lots of fun and make many a new acquaintance.

“The route traversed by this canal is located along the richest and most beautiful portions of the empire State, and the traveler never is sea sick, is seldom out of sight of land, and in case of great storms, he can jump ashore and put up at any landing for the night.”
—Summer Excursion, 1881, p. 57.

The Ramapo Valley
“There are few more romantic localities than that part of the Valley of the Ramapo which is traversed by the Erie Railway. Elevn lakes, perched high on the mountains…send their tumbling outlets into the valley and form the stream known as the Ramapo River. There are forty of these lakes within few miles of the spot where the Erie Railway enters the valley…

“The railroad presents the ever varying scenery of the valley to the tourist for a distance of 16 miles. The river courses meadows and ravines, tumbles over rocky bottom, and spreads out here and there into beautiful lakes.

“Fixed ledges of lofty rock, and huge piles of enormous boulders tower above and lie along its borders. No region is more interesting historically.”

General Washington stood upon the summit of Torne, “a bold mountain beak, near Ramapo Station… while the American troops were quartered in the valley during the Revolution, and surveyed the movements of the British fleet in the New York Harbor.”—Summer Excursion, 1881, p.88.

“After leaving Lackawaxen you continue to follow the course of the Delaware in its tortuous and picturesque windings among the mountains, and are ever greeted with new and charming scenes, at some places intensely interesting.

“At Callicoon, where the train next stops, a scene of remarkable beauty occurs, which is only equalled by that of the famous Starucca Viaduct, which you witness after leaving Hancock and Deposit, and when near Susquehanna, at which last-named station the train stops for dinner. Continue reading →

“Here the artist has sketched an old-fashioned country scene in one of the wildest portions of the Delaware Valley traversed by the Erie Railway.

“The old covered bridge is of a style frequently seen in that region, which, by the way, is the scene of many of the most stirring incidents in Fenimore Cooper’s famous novel, The Last of the Mohicans.”
—The Erie Railway Tourist, 1874, p. 6.

It is at Lackawaxen that the Delaware and Hudson Canal, connecting the coal regions of Pennsylvania with the Hudson at Kingston, crosses the Delaware River, spanning it by an aqueduct, as represented in the accompanying engraving.—The Erie Railway Tourist, 1874, p. 7.

The rapidity and voracity with which the iron horse quenches his thirst from one of these enormous goblets which, brimming full, await him at various intervals on his wild careering across the country, are all but incredible to those who have not seen him partaking.

Parched and thirsty, he pauses for a moment or two to refresh himself with the cooling torrent which pours itself into his enormous jaws at a fearful rate, when lo! before apparently all the passengers have alighted or embarked, his thirst is slaked and he is off again.—The Erie Railway Tourist, 1874, p. 9.

The next post series features images and ads from the Erie Railway brochures, 1874 to 1889.

“The train speeds over the landscape, along mountain sides, through valleys, over bridges, and across broad meadow lands with the speed of a winged charger, pausing only at long intervals, and then pushing on again farther than before, seemingly grudging its few lost moments of unavoidable delay.

“The traveler meanwhile ensconced in his cosy drawing-room or easy-chair, protected from dust and cinders, looks out upon the rapidly-changing landscape with undisguised delight as in a varied picture of town, city, hamlet, forest, and farm-land it passes before him.

“Here, from amid all the luxurious surroundings of a first class hotel, he looks out alike upon nature’s wildest haunts and the cultivated homes of man, and wonders the while at the changes and improvements that man’s genius and energy have wrought. Hour after hour brings him many miles nearer his goal, and lo ere daylight has departed the wonderful journey has been accomplished.

“It has been to him one continued, unwearying scene of entertainment and enjoyment…”—The 1874 Erie Railway Tourist, pp. 20–1.

“There is no Railway Company in the country which provides better accommodations for its patrons, or which keeps its passenger equipment in better condition, than the Erie Railway.

“The Drawing-room and Sleeping Coaches which are attached to Express trains, both west and east, are, as is shown in the illustrations given, perfect paragons of beauty and models of comfort and luxury.

“Indeed, the entire passenger equipment of the Erie Railway is unsurpassed, and contributes in no small degree to the wonderful growth and increase of its passenger traffic.”—The 1874 Erie Railway Tourist, p. 21.