Citizens Street Railroad Co. - circa 1880's Unissued Railway Stock Certificate

Railroad Stock. Small but charming vignette of horse drawn street car. Rare and popular state. Unissued. Scarce! The Memphis Street Railway Company was a privately owned operator of streetcars (trams) and trolleybuses in Memphis, Tennessee on roughly 160 route miles of overhead electrified cable and rails between 1895 and 1960. The longest of the rail lines reached from downtown to Memphis National Cemetery near Raleigh.

The Memphis Street Railway was created in March 1895 through the merger of several smaller systems including the Memphis & Raleigh Springs Railroad, East End Street Railway, Citizens Street Railroad and City & Suburban Railway. In 1890, when The Citizens Street Railroad of Memphis, Tenn., suffered a financial setback, Mr. Albert Merritt Billings of Chicago, bought the company for over $2,000,000. Billings placed electric power on the roads and the company became a great success. Billings recruited Mr. Frank G. Jones from Iowa to operate the company as vice-president. At its peak the interurban operated nearly 77 miles of trackage, 51 one of which was double-track. Service lasted until the 1940s when operations were abandoned in favor of buses.

Memphis, then only 44 square miles (smaller than San Francisco), could be traversed easily with frequent service to within blocks of any corner in the city. Fares included a free transfer. Read more at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memphis_Street_Railway_Co