Source: The Mining Journal
Marquette, Mi.
October 15, 1887
A Decided Contrast
Favors should be appreciated, and the Mining Journal trusts
that the people of the upper peninsula will fully appreciate
the accommodations which have been given them since the present management took control of both the DM&M and MH&O under
the name of the DSS&A Ry. Without waiting to be urged superintendent Watson and the other officials of the road at once put on a Sunday train to the copper country, giving the people
there means of access and egress seven days a week and seven
days mail service, something never known on the road before.
Hardly had this been done when a night train was placed on the
road, running from St. Ignace through to Houghton and only the
failure of connecting lines in lower Mi., to put on suitable
train service kept the train being run on Sundays as well as
during the week. This gave the people of the copper country,
so long shot in under of things, splendid traveling accommodations and they were not slow to appreciate the fact. At the
same time fine sleeping and parlor coaches were placed on all
through trains. The changes immediately resulted in sending
travel east via the straits ïnstead of by Chicago, the enterprise of the South Shore officials meeting with quick recognition.
Contrast the course pursued by the DSS&A with that which
has always been the policy of the C&NW in the treatment of the
upper peninsula. For years its peninsula division has been one
of the best, if not the best, paying portions of its entire system, yet this has never been recognized by any train service
worth speaking of for the convenience of the people of the peninsula. It has now only one train a day over the line, necessarily a slow train, stopping at every little hamlet. Passengers to Chicago have been compelled to ride on what is really
an accommodation train, and the journey has been a tedious one,
while there is no provision for local pasenger traffic whatever. Escanaba is sixty miles from Negaunee, yet any one from
this part of the peninsula having business in Escanaba must give
up two days time to get there and back, and even then have only
a few hours there which are available for business.
C&NW
DSS&A
Passenger
