American Brass was the biggest customer in Torrington and the local spent much of the day just switching this one customer. The casting shop was close to Prospect Street and is gone, the rod mill was seen from High Street and I think at least a portion of it is still around. There were more sidings around Summer Street although the line itself crosses Summer Street on a bridge there was at least one track that crossed Summer Street at grade to service probably the casting shop. Incidentally American Brass had a nice stone office building just down the grade from Water Street not too far beyond the railroad crossing and this building is still there and used for something. The most fascinating operation to observe in Torrington when the local was not switching around the area was the powerhouse operation which could easily be seen from the walkway on the Prospect Street Bridge. They had a huge coal pile for the powerhouse, the local brought up cars of coal on a daily basis and they had a crane with a mechanical shovel to move the coal around the area after being unloaded from hopper cars. It was interesting to stand there and watch this continuous operation. American Brass generated enough electricity for their entire Torrington operations from this powerhouse including all the shops plus the office and maybe more as well. For water they built the Stillwater Reservoir which is along the Norfolk Road (I think it is 272 today, years ago it was 49). This facility is still there and I think it might be owned by the City of Torrington. The dam is still called the "Brass Mill Dam" and the road to the dam is Brass Mill Dam Road. Dwan and Company, Iffland Lumber and Hotchkiss Brothers all have been in business for a long, long time and were railroad customers for many, many years. Maybe they could return if decent service could be provided. Hendy Machine (the switch was close to the Litchfield Street crossing) is long gone but they were once a very good customer. Turner and Seymour was another good customer in the south end of Torrington. Turner and Seymour was the only outfit in Torrington to have their own switch engine but I never saw it. Between Turner and Seymour and Albert Street the main track had a track on both sides for a fair distance and the local would often stop there and sort out their cars rather than do it up in the station area where there were more problems with crossings this area was known as the "railroad plains. When I was a little kid, real little) I would see them working over the crossing at Albert Street which at that time had a warning bell and a flagman for protection. Albert Street was the first crossing in Torrington to lose the flagman to automatic flashers and for many years it was the only crossing in Torrington so protected. Litchfield Street had a flagman. Water Street, Church Street and Pearl Street all had manually operated gates which lasted up until the passenger trains came off in December, 1958. North Elm Street also had a warning bell and a flagman and a year or so before the passenger trains came off they abolished the flagman and made it a stop and protect for all trains, passenger and freight. The Allied Grocery concern was somewhat newer customer in Torrington opening maybe around the time we moved from Torrington to Waterbury in 1951. The team track was a stub end track that ended close to the Church Street Crossing and functioned as a public delivery track. Some railroads called these tracks town tracks and some called them bulk delivery tracks but on the New Haven they were known as "team tracks". Torrington Company was another customer which located between Forest Street overhead bridge (the only OH bridge in Torrington) and North Elm Street, they existed until maybe the 1990's or so but I don't know how much business they provided for the railroad in their last years. The end of the line in Torrington was the Wadhams Company which delat with coal, oil etc and was just north (railroad east) of Newfield Road crossing and the main track ended at that location after the line to Winsted was abandoned in 1963. There is probably more to this story, I did this from memory.
A little more about American Brass is probably in order, they had big operations in three locations in the Naugatuck Valley, Waterbury was the biggest and also the location of their headquarters on Meadow Street across from the railroad station, Torrington and Ansonia were also big operations. Their switching was conducted differently at all three locations. In Torrington they contracted with the New Haven for all their swithing and the local did that job seven days a week at one time later reduced to a Monday - Friday affair. Waterbury they had two fireless steam engines that lasted until the late 50's, 0-4-0 T's and they had a very neat whistle on them. One was used around the Freight Street plant and the other one was at the South Plant around South Main Street. They even had their own yardmaster in Waterbury to run their operation, it was that busy. Ansonia was switched by the New Haven using the Derby switcher which up until at least the 1960's was a 24/7 operation. They had other industries that they switched in the Derby/Shelton/Ansonia area as well as handling switching moves involving set outs and pick ups from the Waterbury and Maybrook freight trains. The train crews loved the Derby job but the engine crews did not love the job and they ducked the job as much as they could if one of the regular men on that job happened to take a day off. The Waterbury spare boards were responsible for covering the jobs in Derby. Winsted in the 1950's was badly on the skids even at the time of the 1955 floods and the flood damage between Torrington and Winsted was not very bad or they probably would not have rebuilt the line between Torrington and Winsted after the 1955 flood. The last train to Winsted ran in 1963, I have the B/O when the line was taken out of service. The New Haven took up the track themselves using an American Crane and gondola.
Chase and Scovill were the other two that made up the "big three". Chase had a plant on North Main Street that was served by the Connecticut Company and Connecticut Railway and Lighting until buses were substituted for trolley cars in Waterbury in 1937 but their biggest plant was in Waterville and was right next to the railroad track for the Naugy. They had a fireless steam switcher there as well. Scovilll had big facilities in the east end of Waterbury and this was served by the Dublin Street Switcher that worked five days a week, on weekends they also got switched by one of the other switchers in Waterbury Yard. Scovill also had a plant in Oakville that stradled the Waterbury - Watertown line, I don't recall whether the railroad served that plant or not, it was smaller than the others. As for the Watertown Branch, I don't know much about it except that the railroad had a siding off that branch to serve Princeton Knitting Mills, they got a car of oil from time to time. I think Watertown might have had a lumber yard but I am not sure. I rode the line a number of times but today everything is long gone.
Noel Weaver