1907 - S.A.L. Great Coal Road

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Roanoke Times - July 26, 1907

S.A.L. GREAT COAL ROAD

   Richmond, Va., July 25. -- Thomas Fortune Ryan and his associates 
in the world of finance have on foot a plan to make the Seaboard Air 
Line one of the greatest coal-carrying roads in the country by 
opening up an enormous coal field in Virginia and connecting it with 
the Seaboard Air Line by means of a 200-mile railway line, now being 
built and known as the South and Western Railway.
   The news comes with peculiar force at this time, when persistent 
rumors of a receivership for the Seaboard Air Line are abroad when 
the earnings of that road have fallen to so low an ebb that for the 
last six months not even fixed charges have been paid by freight and 
passenger traffic.
   From a reliable source comes the information that 1,000,000 acres 
of coal lands have been purchased by the Clinchfield Coal Company, 
holding company for the syndicate, in which Messrs, Ryan, Blair, of 
Blair & Co.; Norman B. Reame and George L. Carter, of Virginia, who, 
nominally heads the syndicate and is President of the South and 
Western Railway, planned the scheme and engineered the deal.
   The road which now has its terminus in Russell county, Val, is 
being pushed rapidly and will cost when completed to Marion, N.C., 
$50,000,000, where connection will be made with the Seaboard.
   The South and Western will open one of the richest and most 
extensive coal fields in the world, and with unlimited capital behind 
the undertaking it is predicted the Seaboard Air Line will lead all 
the roads of America as a coaler.
   The present plan is only the beginning of the Clinchfield Company 
scheme for the connection with the Seaboard Air Line, being 
completed, it is the purpose of Mr. Ryan, it is said, to extend the 
road north to the Great Lakes by way of the Ohio river, where it will 
connect with the Detroit, Toledo and Ironton Railway.

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- Ron Davis, Roger Link