St. Joseph and Grand Island Railway

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The St. Joseph and Grand Island Railroad (SJ&GI) had its start as the St Joseph and Denver City Railroad which, after several changes of destination, was completed as the St Joseph and Western (SJ&W) between St Joseph and Hastings, Nebraska in 1872.

Seven years later, the Hastings and Grand Island Railroad was built between its namesake cities and promptly sold to the SJ&W, giving that railroad a connection to the Union Pacific Railroad at Grand Island.

The SJ&W ran into financial difficulties, eventually falling into bankruptcy in 1884. The Union Pacific brought the railroad out of bankruptcy in 1885, reorganizing it as St Joseph and Grand Island Railroad.

The SJ&GI became an essential part of UP's system, providing a connection from the transcontinental mainline to the eastern Kansas area, and UP undertook several steps to improve it. In 1914 a connection was made between the UP mainline at Gibbon and Hastings, providing a more direct route than through Grand Island. Also, a connection was made between Marysville and Topeka on the SJ&GI in 1906, from whence the UP's Kansas Pacific mainline gave access to Kansas City.

Today, the portion of the SJ&GI between Hastings and Marysville remains a core part of the UP mainline, seeing dozens of trains per day. The SJ&GI exists east of Marysville as far as Hiawatha, KS, although it is little used, and a short stub exists at Grand Island to serve a nearby power plant.

The railroad had a practice of naming stations along its route alphabetically. This has resulted in a string of towns in Nebraska being situated in alphabetical order, starting with Alexandria in the east and ending with Newark in the west.^[1]

References[]

• Nebraska State Historical Society^[usurped!]
• St. Joseph & Grand Island Railway