website watertownhistory.org
ebook History of Watertown,
Wisconsin
C M & St P Railroad Depot
1910
1855
07 26 THE
RAILROAD DEPOT
Probably the
best depot building now in the state may be seen in the city of Watertown. It is finished, and last week after careful
inspection, was accepted by the railroad company, and is now ready for
use. It is a brick building one hundred
and fifty feet long, with an exterior width of forty feet, and substantially
built. The ticket department is
admirably arranged, having three rooms, one for delivery, one for ladies, and
one for gentlemen. Directly over these
rooms, in the second story, an office has been fitted up for the use of clerks,
engineers, and any other purposes to which it may be convenient to put it. The remainder of the building is for storing,
and the reception and delivery of goods.
Mr. P. B. Basford is the builder of this depot, and we know of no better
place, or more gratifying evidence of the perfectly satisfactory manner in
which he has fulfilled his contract, and to say that on offering the building
in a finished state for examination to the company, it was immediately accepted
without reservation or delay. Everything
was so well done as to call forth an expression of hearty thanks and entire
satisfaction on the part of those into whose [hands it] has now passed.
FIRST BRICK DWELLING. It may not be uninteresting to remark, that Mr. Basford put up the very first brick dwelling ever built in
Watertown, some ten years ago, and may now be seen as perfect and solid as
the day on which it was completed. He is
one of our most extensive builders, and the monuments of his enterprise are now
scattered all over the limits of the city, to which every year makes new
editions. WD
1873
1873, Tornado damage. The blast slightly raised the roof of the St. Paul Depot building,
but it fell back to its place without doing much harm beyond loosening a few
bricks and brackets.
1890
09 25 THEFT AT THE DEPOT
On Monday
last two eastside boys were fined $5.00 and costs by Justice Stacy for stealing
a box of raisins out of a freight car at the St. Paul depot. WG
1895
09 25 NEW CHICAGO, MILWAUKEE & ST. PAUL ROAD
DEPOT (1)
Mayor Moak
"felt" of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Road moguls in regard
to the much-mooted and almost-worn-out question of a new depot for our city,
something which no one will deny is sadly wanted. General Manager Earling
in reply said the company had but recently talked over its affairs in Watertown
and had decided that a new depot must be erected there. He assured the mayor that this was not idle
talk, and that he was desirous of being quoted to our citizens to the effect
that the first new depot built in 1896 by his company would be at Watertown . .
. WR
1896
05 13 NEW CHICAGO, MILWAUKEE & ST. PAUL ROAD
DEPOT (2)
Alterations preparatory to the erection of the
new St. Paul railway station are going on.
The freight and telegraph offices have been removed to the building
north of the depot, and the work of tearing down the old Sleeper elevator and
the old depot is nearly finished.
The Watertown News, 13 May 1896
1897
1898
06 01 FLOWER
BEDS
Agent Webb of
the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway is very proud of the flower beds
which now adorn the lawns of the depot grounds.
The plants are from the greenhouses of Mrs. C.
T. Lotz and the work of laying out the beds was
done under her supervision. The effect
produced is artistic and attractive. WR
1900
07 20 THEODORE ROOSEVELT STOPS IN WATERTOWN
C. M. & St. P. Ry. train passing through here
at 9:12 Wednesday morning had on board Gov. Theodore Roosevelt, of New York, on
his return home from the meeting of the republican clubs in Minneapolis. A large crowd was at the depot to greet him,
and a number had the pleasure of shaking hands with him. He carried on a conversation with Lieutenant
Col. Solliday and Surgeon F. C. Moulding
about the Spanish American war. He wore
a “rough rider” hat, and looked every inch a soldier. WG
1976
12 13 TRAINS JUST PASS WATERTOWN BY
The
following article about train service in Watertown, appeared in Sunday's issue
of the Wisconsin State Journal.
The article was written by Charles Fulkerson of the State Journal
staff and was accented with three pictures in the Journal.
WATERTOWN
- Richard Seivert pushed the frigid switch handle
with his padded mittens, spreading a snow crusted rail.
A
hopper car rolled through the switch, its screeching wheels drowning out the
bleating horn of a diesel.
It
was 1 p.m. and Seivert, 26, was nearing the end of
his work day on a four-man switch engine crew operating out of Watertown.
He
trudged to the station to meet engineer Brian Reynolds, 27. The two joked about a beer commercial
featuring a railroad crew, and then Seivert turned
momentarily serious. "My own
feeling is the railroads aren't going downhill.
Some day the United States is going to realize
the railroad is the only way to go," he said earnestly.
But for
Watertown, a manufacturing city of 15,000 on the Jefferson-Dodge County line,
the railroad stopped being the only way to go years ago, and for passengers it
became no way to go in 1972 when the last passenger train stopped here.
In
1855, when the predecessor of the Milwaukee Road arrived here, Watertown was
the second largest city in Wisconsin and according to local historian, James Rothschadl, city fathers had "really grandiose
plans" for turning Watertown into the capital and metropolis of the state.
In
1859, the North Western Railway reached Watertown from Chicago, and the city's
bustling future as a rail hub seemed assured.
But
in their rush to get the railroads to Watertown, city fathers had underwritten
bonds for the Milwaukee Road's predecessors and when the early railroads went
broke, the creditors turned to the town officials for their money.
"For
many years,"Rothschadl explained,
"Watertown didn't have a functioning city government." The public officials the town did have
meetings seldom and in secret to dodge the creditors and their warrants. The lack of stewardship- probably hurt the
growth of the town, Rothschadl speculated.
The
Milwaukee Road established a variety of railroad shops and rail mills employing
more than 100, but by the turn of the century the railroad had moved the shops
elsewhere, and Watertown's importance as a rail center was on the decline.
Today,
trains are still numerous in Watertown. But, explained Jim Scribbins
of the Milwaukee Road's corporate communications department, few of them
stop. "Practically all of the
trains that pass through Watertown do exactly that. They pass through.
However,
Scribbins called Watertown, "a relatively
important place on our railroad."
The
L-shaped, stucco station at the junction of the Milwaukee Road and North
Western Railway tracks is manned around the clock by a train operator who
forwards written instructions to passing train crews and handles initial
billing for freight customers in Watertown.
An
ancient brick freight house south of the station once served as headquarters
for a freight agent and three clerks.
But the freight house has been abandoned; its windows are shattered and
trees are growing in the tracks behind the building.
STATION
OPERATOR
Lewis
R. Manthey has worked in Watertown since 1955 and for
many years he sold tickets to the Hiawathas bound for
Minneapolis and Seattle.
But
the last Hiawatha passed through Watertown more than five years ago. Now Manthey's only contact with passengers and passenger trains
is a cursory inspection of the wheels on the four daily Amtrak trains that roar
through Watertown, leaving only swirling snow behind.
The Milwaukee Road station built in
1926 is headquarters for Manthey [Mange],
signal maintainer, Ken Bornitzke and
two switch engine crews that work out of Watertown. In activity, it is a Grand Central
compared
to the sleepy North Western station a quarter mile away.
10 11 1926
<> New Union Depot Will Be
Opened On October 20
The new union passenger station at the junction of
the North Western and Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul railroads in this city
will be opened to the public on Wednesday, October 20. The station will be known as Watertown.
On and after October 20 at 1 a. m. the station of
the Milwaukee railroad at the foot of Fifth Street will be closed and all passenger
trains will discontinue stopping owing to the opening of the new station at the
Junction.
Last
spring the North Western removed the station agent from Watertown and 23 other
stations in Wisconsin. The North Western
division manager concluded that the small town agent was excess baggage for the
railroad. "We just don't need
people to do work in those stations anymore," he said.
William
Konitzer, the agent forced to leave Watertown,
sympathized with the railroad which claimed to be losing money. "But the personal touch is lost this
way, and who could put a price on the personal touch?" Konitzer
asked.
The
Northwestern still sends a train down to Watertown five days a week from Fond
du Lac, but the tracks south of the city to Johnson Creek are snow covered and
no longer used.
The
North Western's Chicago connection from Watertown via Fort Atkinson and
Janesville, once thought to be a boom for the town, was torn up last year. The railroad has no plans, however, to tear
up the tracks between Watertown and Johnson Creek, said James McDonald of the NorthWestern's public affairs office.
Manthey
estimated that an average of 25 freight cars daily are dropped off and picked
up in Watertown by the Milwaukee Road.
The city also is a junction point between the mainline and a branch that
runs west to Waterloo, Sun Prairie and Madison.
Many
cars dropped off in Watertown contain feed and corn syrup. A malt company in Waterloo is a big rail
customer. A Watertown scrap dealer ships
his product by rail and a furnace manufacturing company occasionally sends
oversized furnaces out on rail flatcars.
Scribbins said
the-railroad has no plans to centralize further the duties done by station
operators and agents and apparently the jobs in the Watertown station are secure. He ranked Watertown in importance as a
mainline station behind La Crosse and Portage.
"The
railroad is damn important to the community," said Paul Kehrer, president of First State Savings and Loan
Association and active in a drive to get passenger service restored. In terms of the city's economy, he said,
"the future of Watertown being on the mainline of the Milwaukee Road has
to be real important." WDT
12/13/1976
![Manthey [Mange], signal maintainer](http://www.watertownhistory.org/images_07/WHS_018_526.jpg){kind=link}
Cross References:
Chapter on C. M. & St. Paul Railway
Freight office, malt house in distance
Nancy Merriman: Since my dad was a trainmaster on the CMStP, I had a train pass. Every few months I was allowed
to travel to Watertown to stay with my grandmother, Emma Peterson. I played with my Peterson cousins, spent time
along the Rock River, shopped for goose liver sausage at Fendts,
shopped at Busse's, swam at the pool, and watched the
tennis players below her home on Harrison Street. Now when I travel to MN, I
stare longingly at the area where the station once stood and wish we could stop
once again.
History of Watertown,
Wisconsin