How much did Guilford pay for D&H?

I was told that Guilford purchased the entire D&H- trains, tracks, real estate- for $500,000 in cash. Can anyone help verify this? I'd be curious to know how a half-million buys a railroad.

-otto-

I'm pretty sure that's a correct figure.

Thas correct, and when they placed it into bankruptcy, they tried to buy it back.

$500,000 is correct. NS had to sell it fast so they could pursue the purchase of Conrail from the US Government. This was later nixed in 1985. On top of that the D&H was losing millions of dollars and was surrounded by a monopolistic Conrail making it essentially a worthless property.

Guilford was the only one who had any interest in the property - and at that only because GTI hoped to use it as a lever to expand to Chicago, Detroit & St. Louis as a condition of the NS-CR merger. Fortunately wiser thinking prevailed and CR became a public company instead.

NYC27 wrote:$500,000 is correct. NS had to sell it fast so they could pursue the purchase of Conrail from the US Government. This was later nixed in 1985. On top of that the D&H was losing millions of dollars and was surrounded by a monopolistic Conrail making it essentially a worthless property.

Guilford was the only one who had any interest in the property - and at that only because GTI hoped to use it as a lever to expand to Chicago, Detroit & St. Louis as a condition of the NS-CR merger. Fortunately wiser thinking prevailed and CR became a public company instead.

how and when did CP Rail enter the picture if the property was essentially worthless?

After Guilford ran it into bankruptcy, the courts appointed the NYS&W to operate it. NYS&W made a bid on it, but CP out bid them, so CP now owns the D&H.

Guilford declaring the D&H bankrupt in 1988

What did CP pay for the D&H, I seem to recall it was also an incredibly low price but a quick search didn't find an answer.

Um, Josh...the answer is in the first two posts in the thread...

Dave Becker

I asked how much CP Rail had paid, not how much Guilford paid.

I remember being at East Deerfield right after the D&H fiasco, and seeing all kinds of stuff rolling in on road and rail, everything that said D&H had a spray painted line through it. the big G cleaned it out!

joshuahouse wrote:I asked how much CP Rail had paid, not how much Guilford paid.

I believe it was several million, I am sure by now they are glad they bought it.