A portion of the great double-track Susquehanna River bridge of the
Baltimore & Ohio—a giant among American railroad bridges
“In summer the brakemen have pleasant enough times of railroading”
A famous cantilever rapidly disappearing—the substitution of a new
Kentucky river bridge for the old, on the Queen & Crescent system
By the beginning of the Civil War, there was a well established business, a business established with admirable foresight. Such men as Adams, Wells and Fargo, and Benjamin F. Cheney, one of the founders of the American Express Company, said that the express business should be kept within narrow limits—so within narrow limits it has been kept, and to-day when Harnden’s suitcase has developed into a business paying luscious dividends on more than a hundred million dollars of capital stock, there are five great companies: the American Express Company, the Adams Express Company, the Wells, Fargo Express Company, the United States Express Company, and the National Express Company. The interests of these companies are closely interwoven—for instance: while the National Express Company is operated as a separate business, it is absolutely controlled by the American Express Company. In addition to this Big Five, there is a cluster of smaller companies, such as the Great Northern Express Company, of J. J. Hill’s system, the Southern Express Company, the Long Island Express Co., and two thriving carriers in the Dominion of Canada. These in turn are more or less closely affiliated with the larger companies.
The express companies no longer force a man to bring his shipment to their offices. In every considerable town, there are whole fleets of wagons that reach to the outermost limits, both for collection and for distribution. In this service the automobile truck has begun readily to displace the older type of horse and wagon. The wagon service brings the express package, no matter how small or how large, to a central distributing depot, where all are gathered together and sent, in through railroad cars, to their destinations, being handled very largely as we have seen the L. C. L. freight handled in the great transfer houses of the railroads. The express company guarantees the safe delivery of the package that is entrusted to its care. This package may be of the smallest sort imaginable, or it may be a consignment of a million dollars in specie. In either case, the express company still accepts the entire responsibility.
If there are whole brigades of delivery wagons in the cities there are also whole platoons of special cars owned by the railroads and dedicated to the express service. This brings us to the crux of the express question—its relations to the railroad. These are embraced in voluminous contracts and subcontracts—which are generally placed among the secret archives of all the companies that subscribe to them. The Interstate Commerce Commission, at Washington, has had, however, access to most of these contracts and of them it has said:
“The contract between an express company and a railroad company usually provides that the express company shall have the exclusive right to operate upon the lines named for a definite term of years; that all matter carried on passenger trains, except personal baggage, corpses, milk cans, dogs, and certain other commodities, shall be turned over by the railroad company to the express company; that the railroad company shall transport to and from all points on its lines all matter in charge of the express company; that special or exclusive express trains shall be provided by the railroad company when warranted by the volume of express traffic; that the railroad company shall furnish the necessary cars, keep them in good repair, furnish light and heat and carry the messengers of the express company as well as all necessary equipment; that the railroad company shall furnish such room in all its depots and stations as may be necessary for the loading, unloading, and storing of express matter; that the express company may employ during the pleasure of the railway any of the agents of the latter as express agents and may employ the train baggage-men as its messengers.
“The express company, on its part, agrees to pay a fixed per cent of its gross receipts from handling express matter; to charge no rate at less than an agreed per cent of the freight rates on the same commodity—usually one hundred and fifty per cent; to handle, free of charge, money, bonds, valuables, and ordinary express matter of the railway.”