Chicago-New York Electric Air Line Railroad Co. - 1908 dated Railway Stock Certificate - Very Important in Railroad History
Inv# RS2638 Stock
Maine
New York
Northern Bank Note Company, Chicago. Rare! The Chicago – New York Electric Air Line Railroad (CNY) was a proposed high-speed electric air-line railroad between Chicago and New York City in the early 20th century. At roughly 750 miles (1,210 km) it would have been over 150 miles (240 km) shorter than the two primary steam railroads on that route, the New York Central Railroad and Pennsylvania Railroad. The promoters' vision proved wildly optimistic and, in the end, only a short interurban route in the vicinity of Gary, Indiana was built and operated. It was the most ambitious of several such proposals at the dawn of electric railroading, all of which ended in failure.
The trade magazine Railway Age critiqued the project at the time it was announced in July 1906 and gave this damning judgment: "Speaking seriously, for the moment, about this fraudulent investment scheme one is in doubt whether to wonder most at the gigantic effrontery of the perpetrators, the gullibility of the poor dupes who will flood the mails with their subscriptions, or the carelessness if not cupidity of the newspaper publishers who seem to sanction the swindle by giving it publicity."
The Air Line scheme was not the first proposed high-speed electric railway in the USA. In 1893 Dr. Wellington Adams promoted a 252-mile (406 km) Chicago–St. Louis route with a maximum operating speed of 100 miles per hour (160 km/h). Adams believed the new railroad could be built in a year for $5.5 million ($187 million adjusted for inflation). Trade publications ridiculed the proposal, and it went nowhere. Read more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_%E2%80%93_New_York_Electric_Air_Line_Railroad
A stock certificate is issued by businesses, usually companies. A stock is part of the permanent finance of a business. Normally, they are never repaid, and the investor can recover his/her money only by selling to another investor. Most stocks, or also called shares, earn dividends, at the business's discretion, depending on how well it has traded. A stockholder or shareholder is a part-owner of the business that issued the stock certificates.
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