Detroit and Pontiac Railroad

The Detroit and Pontiac Railroad is a defunct railroad which operated in the state of Michigan during the mid-nineteenth century. It was the sixth railroad to receive a charter from Michigan, then a territory, and the second, after the Erie & Kalamazoo, to actually operate trains.

The first attempt to connect Detroit and Pontiac by railroad had come in 1830, when the Michigan Territorial Council granted a charter to the Pontiac and Detroit Railroad.[1] This was the first such charter granted both in Michigan and in the region.[2] Nothing came of the Pontiac & Detroit, so in 1834 the state granted a new charter to the Detroit and Pontiac Railroad. After four years the D&P began operation over a modest 12-mile (19 km) line, spurred on by a $100,000 loan from the state. The railroad finally reached Pontiac in 1843, thirteen years after the state first granted a charter for that purpose.[3]

On April 21, 1855, the D&P was consolidated with the Oakland and Ottawa Rail Road to form the Detroit and Milwaukee Railway and ceased to exist as an independent company.[3]

Notes
  1. Farmer (1884), 893. Some accounts erroneously call this first company "Detroit & Pontiac." See, e.g. Burton (1922), 682.
  2. Farmer (1884), 893.
  3. Baxter, 528.

References
  • Baxter, Albert (1891). History of the City of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Munsell & company.
  • Burton, Clarence Monroe; William Stocking; Gordon K. Miller (1922). The City of Detroit, Michigan, 1701-1922. Detroit: S. J. Clarke.
  • Farmer, Silas (1884). The History of Detroit and Michigan. S. Farmer & Co.
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