CNE location mystery.

Just got this postcard which was mislabeled. It appears to be on the CNE with an identifying feature of "Lions Head".
The card was mailed in 1906.

The milepost appears to be "B 1??" for Boston? Also, there is a 2-position semaphore to the left of the milepost.

A geographic feature "Lions Head" is between Chapinville and Lakeville, but the geography of the ROW does not look right.

My question is:
Did the CNE have mileposts prefaced with "B" & would 140 miles or so from Boston be near Lakeville?

Question - are my eyes deceiving me, or does the writing on top read "N.E. Railroad"? When the NY&NE was merged into the New Haven in the 1890s, it was renamed the New England Railroad. The NY&NE mileposts were referenced from Boston. Much of the NY&NE was cut through mountains, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was actually somewhere along that route.

I agree, thine eyes deceive thee not. That's a capital N written with a Victorian flourish, and not a C. As for the milepost, if my eyes are also not deceptive, it appears to be a B with three digits below, although it's tough to interpret. Lakeville, MA via Middleboro is only 36.77 miles from South Station in Boston according to an old Official Guide.

Now, if I'm wrong,* there is/was also a Lakeville in the money (i.e., NW) corner of CT, located on the original CNE.

PBM
* Hey, first time for everything!

Lakeville, Mass., was on the Old Colony RR and the land around there looks nothing like the rugged hills in the picture... just gentle hills. Lakeville, Conn. is in serious hill country but it was indeed on the CNE, not the NY&NE. The only places I can think of where the NY&NE ran through that sort of topography was around Bolton Notch (between Hartford and Willimantic), and maybe on the Waterbury-Hawleyville portion of the mainline, but the latter was before my time.

Waterbury to Hawleyville was approximately MP 152 to 172. Based on how steep the hills are I wonder if it could be near a river, maybe the Housatonic crossing in Newtown?

Hi
Too bad that the milepost is not a little clearer , but to me it looks like B 114 miles . If that is what my eyes are seeing , then the location is East Hartford, Ct . Attached is map , and closeup of location . Pat.

I think the photos show between Waterbury and Hawleyville. That line was always single track and had a large pole line alongside. Both are evident in these photos. The pole line remained for many years after the track was torn up and I think there were even some crossarms that that the "D" and "M" to designate the wires for the dispatcher's phone and the message line.
Noel Weaver

If that is what my eyes are seeing , then the location is East Hartford, Ct

But have you ever been to East Hartford? The topography there doesn't match the photo at all.

It appears that the rail is 78# - the joint bars have their bolts pointed in the same direction.

If I'm not too mistaken, the mainlines had 107# rail installed around the time the card was posted -1906. So this would be a secondary line.

Other clues are the lower quadrant 2 position semaphore - very odd location, posted on the outside of a curve in a very rural area. Approach to a station?

The communication poles are pretty packed with wires - that suggests a fairly active line.

I can verify personally, this type of topography is in the Litchfield Hills of CT. I was hoping it was (as identified) as being on the Naugatuck Railroad above Waterbury since it looks very close to what is there now between Waterbury and East Litchfield.

But, it is possible it is on the CNE (Satan's Kingdom?).

Also - the card was postmarked Waterville CT and was addressed to Lakeville CT. It is NOT the W&W for sure. I think the sender of the card wasn't too accurate in the railroad's name.

Mysteries, mysteries.

Do you think I should try the NHRHTA board????

CannaScrews wrote:It appears that the rail is 78# - the joint bars have their bolts pointed in the same direction.

If I'm not too mistaken, the mainlines had 107# rail installed around the time the card was posted -1906. So this would be a secondary line.

Other clues are the lower quadrant 2 position semaphore - very odd location, posted on the outside of a curve in a very rural area. Approach to a station?

The communication poles are pretty packed with wires - that suggests a fairly active line.

I can verify personally, this type of topography is in the Litchfield Hills of CT. I was hoping it was (as identified) as being on the Naugatuck Railroad above Waterbury since it looks very close to what is there now between Waterbury and East Litchfield.

But, it is possible it is on the CNE (Satan's Kingdom?).

Also - the card was postmarked Waterville CT and was addressed to Lakeville CT. It is NOT the W&W for sure. I think the sender of the card wasn't too accurate in the railroad's name.

Mysteries, mysteries.

Personally I don't think it's on the CNE. There *is* indeed a mountain called Lion's Head near Lakeville that would have been visible from the CNE. However, the topography is wrong for the CNE through Salisbury. The reason the railroad was built through that area in the first place is that Canaan, Salisbury and Lakeville are all in a fairly broad, level valley in the Taconic Range. There's nowhere I can identify on the old topo maps (see here: http://historical.mytopo.com/quad.cfm?q ... &series=15) where the CNE would be cut into the side of a steep hill and Lion's Head would be visible in the distance.

My guess? Someone in Waterville, who was familiar with Lakeville, mailed a picture of some other hill with the same name as the one in Lakeville.

I agree the topography looks like the upper Naugy-- but the problem is the milepost. What is B? Boston? Beacon? Bridgeport? The Naugy isn't long enough to be 100+ miles from anything.

This is a long shot, but there's a possibility that this location is not in Connecticut at all.

I located a postcard on eBay that depicts a section of the Rutland running through "Lion's Head" near Gassett, Vermont (in the Chester area). It's by no means identical to the above photo, but the topography is similar; I'm wondering whether it's facing in the opposite direction on a fairly long curve. Here's the link: http://www.ebay.com/sch/sis.html?_nkw=G ... 0568013637

This might solve the mystery of the "B" on the milepost: the mileage is indecipherable, the "B" could be Bellows Falls or (less likely) Burlington.

Combining two earlier posts: if the mileage on the milepost reads 114, that matches the distance from Burlington to Gassetts. Today, by Route 7, it's 106 miles. Have we solved the mystery or added to the complexity?

PBM

PBM

Forget the Naugy, there was no place on the Naugy where they had pole lines of this nature with four crossarms loaded with wires. The signal was probably a distant switch indicator of which the New Haven had many in years past most if not all of them are gone today.
Noel Weaver

There are still bases of the distant signals on the Naugy around East Litchfield & Watertown (North of Chase Bridge), but as mentioned above, the topography does not match.

As for the 4-armed poles, doesn't Employee Timetables have the layout of the wires on the poles?