N&W in 1903 -- Deepwater

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GREAT UNDERTAKING OF BUILDERS OF DEEPWATER
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Where It Will Go, and Its Identity Matters of Much Comment
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Believed by Contractors That the Road Will be Built at Once -- Big Financial Concern Furnishing the Money
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    The Deepwater railroad, which is being constructed from the Fayette county coal fields to -- nobody knows where, is one of the  most puzzling railroad propositions which the country has ever known, and rumors as to its purpose and destination fly thick and fast.  Whether it is an independent road, a branch of the Wabash, or an extension of the C. & O., N. & W., or Seaboard Air Line, no one who is in a position of authority has yet said.
    The work of construction upon the line is nevertheless being pushed rapidly, and no matter where it goes, or what it is, it is assured that the road is to be built.
    "If the Deepwater railroad contractors finish up the task they have undertaken within the next two years as per contract, they will break all records for quick railroad building in this section," said a contractor who has been over the ground, and who has a bid for a portion of the line which has not been let.  "Still I believe they will do it.  The money is ready for them whenever a specified portion of the line is completed, and they know it and they are going to put out every effort to complete the work within the time limit.  The section through which the Deepwater runs will in the next few years be the busiest in West Virginia."
    The financing of the road is being done through Morton, Bliss & Co., of New York, and there is no doubt but that there is plenty of money back of it.
    The right-of-way through Fayette, Raleigh, Wyoming and Mercer counties has been nearly all secured, and work is going on at a lively pace all along the line.
    There are half a dozen camps on Lower Loup Creek in Fayette county, and nearly a thousand men are at work there now.  One cut 85 feet deep is now being made, and there are a number of high trestles to build.  A tunnel will be driven at the famous Jenny's Gap for the possession of which the Deepwater fought the C. & O.   A number of other tunnels are necessary, and there is much heavy work for the contractors.

Bluefield Daily Telegraph
September 1, 1903

Gordon Hamilton
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