Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad Co. - Stock Certificate

Early Stock with 6 vignettes. On July 26, 1856, the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Rail Road was formed as a consolidation of the Fort Wayne and Chicago, Ohio and Indiana, and Ohio and Pennsylvania Railroads. Extensions opened west to Warsaw September 28, Plymouth November 10, Englewood, Illinois (south of Chicago) on November 29, 1858, and Van Buren Street in Chicago on December 25, 1858. On January 1, 1859, trains started running to Chicago, with a terminal at the future location of Union Station. The part west of Plymouth was built with rails removed from the New Portage Railroad. From the early days, the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) had been involved with the project, supplying funds. Once the Fort Wayne Railroad Bridge at Pittsburgh was finished in 1857, trains began to run through from Philadelphia. In 1858 the PFW&C began using the first Union Station in Pittsburgh, shared with the PRR. On July 1, 1859, the PFW&C defaulted on its debts, and was sold at foreclosure on October 24, 1861. It was reorganized as the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway February 26, 1862. The Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway was a major part of the Pennsylvania Railroad system, extending the PRR west from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, via Fort Wayne, Indiana, to Chicago, Illinois. It included the current Norfolk Southern-owned Fort Wayne Line east of Crestline, Ohio, to Pittsburgh, and the Fort Wayne Secondary, owned by CSX, from Crestline west to Tolleston in Gary, Indiana. CSX leased its entire portion in 2004 to the Chicago, Fort Wayne and Eastern Railroad (CFE). The remaining portion of the line from Tolleston into Chicago is now part of the Norfolk Southern's Chicago District, with a small portion of the original PFW&C trackage abandoned in favor of the parallel lines of former competitors which are now part of the modern NS system.