The Underground World: A mirror of life below the surface

by Thomas Wallace Knox

THE HOOSAC TUNNEL.

In 1848 a company was chartered to construct a railway between Troy and Greenfield. Three years later the work was begun, and the directors voted to expend twenty-five thousand dollars in making experiments upon the proposed tunnel. An enormous machine was constructed and set to work in the winter of 1852. It was expected to perform wonders, and it did; but they were all the wrong way. The chief wonder was, that the machine, so carefully constructed, at such great cost, could do nothing whatever.

According to the description, it was “designed to cut a groove around the circumference of the tunnel thirteen inches wide and twenty-four in diameter, by means of a set of revolving cutters. When this groove had been cut the proper depth, the machine was to be run back on its railway, and the centre core blasted out by gunpowder, and split off by means of wedges.” This wonderful engine was not all that fancy painted it. It cut a very smooth and beautiful hole into the rock for about ten feet. Then it became deranged, and then—it never smiled again. Its cutting days were over, and when it was withdrawn it was quickly discarded and sold for old iron.

Another boring machine of the same sort, which was to cut a hole only eight feet in diameter, was tried at the other end. That, too, made a most glorious failure. Its failure was even more brilliant than that of the first machine, for it never succeeded in cutting a single inch of rock.

Different engineers have tried their hands and their skill on the Hoosac Tunnel. In 1854, the legislature of Massachusetts appropriated two millions of dollars to the Troy and Greenfield Railway, and in the following year they were at work in earnest.

CROSSING THE HOOSAC MOUNTAIN.

General Haupt, who became famous in the late war as a bridge-builder, attempted to pierce the Hoosac Mountain; but after several years he abandoned the work, and the whole property of the company was transferred to the State of Massachusetts. When the state took possession it began work on its own account, and in 1868 the legislature appropriated five millions of dollars, and made a contract with Walter and Francis Shanly, of Canada, for the completion of the tunnel. They began work in the following March, and there is very little doubt of their completing the tunnel.

In 1870 I made an excursion up the valley of the Connecticut as far as Greenfield, and there took the railway train to the Hoosac Mountain. At the east side or end of the tunnel I abandoned the cars, and took to a six-horse coach. I managed to obtain a seat near the driver, a burly, moon-faced fellow, who collected fifty cents extra for the privilege of riding near him. He treated everybody on the outside as politely as though he were king of the Cannibal Islands, and we were his subjects. For downright impudence, with a good deal of rudeness to the bushel, I will back an American stage-driver against any other man in the world.

Soon after dinner we drove away from the station, and after the horses had given us a little circus exhibition on their own account, which threatened to overturn us and break half a dozen necks, we climbed slowly up the valley skirting the edge of a forest, whose leaves were tinged with the varying colors of autumn. Our progress up the eastern face of the mountain was slow, but when we came down the western side the case was different. On the upper part of the mountain there is a long and comparatively level stretch of ground, on which there are many fine farms, and a general appearance of prosperity. Approaching the western face of the mountain, we overlooked the flourishing town of North Adams, and a region of country spread out before us like a beautiful panorama. I have looked from mountains in many countries, but rarely have I gazed upon a landscape more beautiful and more attractive than this. It is not grand—awfully grand—in its character, like many other landscapes, but there is an air of beauty about it which makes it charming in the extreme.

The road winds, in a sort of zigzag, down the side of the mountain, and our horses went at a good speed. The coach swung from side to side, and the baby of a feminine passenger screamed as if a dozen pins were being driven an inch or so, into its arms and legs. Down, down, down the mountain we went, and soon we were inside the busy town, and were driven up in front of the Wilson House. There I concluded to remain, and take my point of departure the next day for the tunnel.