Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant passages that can help answer the question.
Query: What years did the Holyoke Street Railway operate?
Operated by the Holyoke Street Railway Company, abbreviated on livery as the Hly. St. Ry. Co., the streetcar system begin operation on September 24, 1884, consolidated with the Amherst and Sunderland Street Railway in 1907, and ceased operations as a streetcar operator in 1937.[5] Regular bus operations began in 1921, and soon after the incorporation of the Pioneer Valley Transit Authority in 1977, the company began serving as a contract operator. This service continued until 1987, when a dispute between labor and management led regular bus service to an abrupt end, with would-be passengers still waiting at stops, on July 1, 1987.[2][1]:611 After four years of inactivity and with a municipal school bus contract failing to pass negotiations, the company liquidated its assets and had dissolved by 1991.[3][6]
The electrification of old horse trams came within less than a decade for the Holyoke Street Railway and in Massachusetts as a whole. When the railway's first electric cars appeared in 1891, at the time about a third of all street railway lines in Massachusetts had electric overhead systems. However by the turn of the century not only were these cars commonplace in the Holyoke system, they comprised more than 99% of such streetcar lines in the Commonwealth.[27]
The Flats is a neighborhood in Holyoke, Massachusetts located to the east of the city center, adjacent to the downtown. Although it lies at one of the lowest elevations in Holyoke, its name derives not from topography but from the brick tenement "flats" which characterized its architecture throughout much of its history. Historically the area has also been associated with the name Depot Hill, as it was the location of the city's first freight and passenger railway stations; passenger service was restored at Holyoke station in 2015, following a period of absence after 1967. A section of the neighborhood between Lyman and Appleton Street to north and south respectively, and between Race and Bowers Street to the east and west is also known as Depot Square. Today the area features the Holyoke Innovation District, Canal System, Hadley Falls Company Housing District, Marcella Kelly Elementary School, and of residential, commercial, and industrial zoning.
In 1888, William Loomis, one of the Company's directors, took ownership of the Holyoke Street Railway Company. In the following years, he purchased of "cow pastures with scenery" on the side of Mount Tom. In 1894, Loomis constructed an open-air stage there, which attracted many patrons. The next year the trolley line was extended up to that point. In 1897, Loomis applied for and was granted a charter with the state for building a "pleasure resort." A dance hall, open air restaurant, switchback railway and merry-go-round were constructed. A unique cable railway was created to take visitors to a new building at the summit of the mountain. It was from this building President William McKinley stated that the view from Mount Tom was the most beautiful in the world.
Mountain Park, located on Mount Tom in Holyoke, Massachusetts, was originally built as a trolley park by the Holyoke Street Railway Company. Trolley parks were built just outside populated areas to encourage trolley usage on weekends. The Holyoke Street Railway company created two attractions, Mountain Park toward the base of Mount Tom, and a large house on the summit of the mountain.
Following an extended period of discussion over the specific location of the tracks, work commenced in the laying of line in April of 1897, and by June of that year the first trolleys were operational.[35] While Stockbridge remains notable among founding figures of the street railway, his role as president of the company was limited to its first year, a greater credit was due to Walter D. Cowles, a member of the board and subsequent president of the company, whose family stored the streetcars in car barn facilities on their grounds in the railways earliest years.[41][42] In 1897 the railway began to see competition from the Northampton and Amherst Railway, later known as the Connecticut Valley Street Railway,[1]:632, as it connected Northampton to Amherst, through Hadley. Despite outcry from the Amherst & Sunderland Street Railway and its interests, by the end of 1897 the competitor had been given access and some consideration was given to franchise.[43] In response to this, the railway would attempt to expand its own holdings in Hadley, building a new line through Mill Valley to the Hadley border in the following year.[44]
The loose association between the Amherst and Sunderland system and Holyoke's became official when in 1907 the company moved to buy all stock of the Amherst company, consolidating it with the acquired Hampshire system to create the Amherst and Sunderland Division of the Holyoke Street Railway. In the next several years the HSR would further develop the Orient Springs stop in West Pelham as a picnic ground,[48] as well as construct new infrastructure such as permanent stops, the last of which stood at UMass Amherst from 1911 until 2012 when it was razed by a contractor.[49] The car barn on the Cowls property was maintained until the North Amherst route switched to bus service in 1928.[42] The only extant structure related to the Amherst division today is the former South Amherst Car Barn which first entered service in 1917. Increasing competition from buses and cars would lead this structure to serve for less than 15 years, with all Amherst & Sunderland rail service ceasing in 1932.[1]:630 The facility was sold to the town government in 1934, and has been used as the Amherst Department of Public Works offices and garage since.[14]
The North High Street Historic District is a historic district encompassing part of the downtown area of Holyoke, Massachusetts. When first added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986, the district encompassed North High Street, between Dwight and Lyman Streets. This part of High Street was built between 1850 and 1885, and is lined with masonry buildings in Italianate and Second Empire styles. In 1992 the district was extended southward, adding three blocks of High Street between Dwight and Essex Streets. This expansions encompasses the growth of Holyoke during the height of its commercial success, between 1880 and 1930; it also includes the separately-listed Holyoke City Hall. The district was extended a third time, in 2008, adding a complex of three buildings at Dwight and Maple Streets that now houses the Holyoke Health Center.
, digital exhibit, Wistariahurst Museum , maintains HSR collection including ephemera, Holyoke Public Library , Flickr , incomplete, covers 1950-1974, Canadian Public Transit Discussion Board
In 1887, William S. Loomis, a former partner in the Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, approached the railway's board of directors proposing that their line from City Hall and Maple Street be extended further into Elmwood. Loomis had previously purchased a large tract of land there which he planned to develop into a streetcar suburb. His calls for expansion were rejected however by the railway company, but ultimately working with connections from his time as a newspaper magnate, he would buy a controlling share in the company. Upon purchasing this stock, Loomis began working on the laying out of additional tracks along with roads on his own land, the former Horace Brown Farm which would become the blocks around modern-day Elmwood Avenue, as well as Laurel Street/Brown Avenue across Northampton Street. During his time with the railway Loomis would serve as treasurer as well as general manager of the company, and is generally credited as a key figure in the expansion of the railway system to the two other neighborhoods, Oakdale and Springdale.[22][23][24]
The Mount Tom Railroad, also known as the Mount Tom Railway, was a funicular mountain railway on the northeast slope of Mount Tom in Holyoke, Massachusetts which was operated by the Holyoke Street Railway from 1897 until 1938. Built in 1897, the railway quickly gained national fame when it was visited by President William McKinley who remarked upon the beauty of the mountainside. It was closely identified with the Summit Houses which adorned the mountaintop with the most ornate first two designed by local architect James A. Clough.[52][53][54] At the foot of the railway sat Mountain Park, which connected the cable railway with the Holyoke Street Railway system.
Prior to 1847, the area that is now Holyoke was a sleepy agricultural area of West Springfield. In that year, investors from Boston purchased a mill privilege on the Connecticut River, on which they proceeded to develop the industrial sites that fueled the growth of the city. By 1880, Holyoke was one of the nation's major producers of paper products, and had a population of more than 10,000. Many buildings on High Street in the 1986 district boundaries date to this period of rapid growth, which was completely built out by 1880. Between 1880 and 1930 the area northeast of the early cluster of commercial buildings was developed, spurred by the construction of City Hall in the 1870s, and by the extension of streetcars line for the Holyoke Street Railway in the latter half of the 19th century.
Another feature that typified railways in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was trolley parks; in the years immediately after the electrification of the system, Loomis purchased a large lot on the southeastern side of Mount Tom and in 1894 purchased a post-and-beam stage for performers there. In 1895 the railway was extended to this site, and by 1897 the area was officially chartered at Mountain Park.
The Holyoke Street Railway Company held its first meeting on February 12, 1884,[5] with a charter granted by the Office of Secretary of the Commonwealth Henry B. Pierce on June 11, 1884.[15] According to the company's articles of association, it began with capital of $25,000 (≈$692,000 in 2017 USD) with 250 shares of $100 each issued, and was authorized to operate as a horsecar rail system in South Hadley and Holyoke. The company's first president was William A. Chase, and its first board of directors included two members who would later become mayors of Holyoke, Franklin P. Goodall and George H. Smith.[16]
As a transportation system, the railway also held at least one unprecedented piece of technology prior to its numerous competitors in the early 20th century- thermite welding. During the 1890s in Germany, Hans Goldschmidt developed the modern process for exothermic welding for railways. This process, now an international standard in railway construction, was first used commercially in tram lines in Essen, Germany in 1899. Over the next several years other cities including Leeds and Singapore would adopt this construction method,[28] and in 1904 its inventor would open the Goldschmidt Thermit Company offices in New York City.[29] While development of this process continued, an engineering student at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, George E. Pellissier (1878-1961)[30][31], followed Goldschmidt's work closely and approached the Holyoke Street Railway proposing that they use the new thermite process for their own lines. Soon after the railway ordered 160 joints to be placed on an approximately mile-long tract of rail on Main Street, and on August 8, 1904 Holyoke became the first rail line in the United States to lay track with the process.[9] That same year Hartford would join the ranks as the second in country.[32]
While Hartford would be met with some issues due to what was later described as a rushed installation, the Holyoke installation served as a proof-of-concept for the advantages of the method. With thermite welding, a small crew of unskilled laborers with no prior knowledge of welding or specialty metalwork could be sent out with a crucible, pre-made molds, and a set amount of thermite. For railway companies the new technique would lead to a more reliable and inexpensive method of laying down new tracks that would make future system expansion more practical than bolted or welded separate joint techniques used up to that time.[32][29]
While routes have changed in the decades since the railway's closure, the PVTA continues to provide bus service in Holyoke as well as all other municipalities previously covered by the former carrier's services.[64] Due to several recessions in the 1980s, the railway's former amusement park Mountain Park shuttered the same year as buses ceased, in 1987. This year coincides with the Railway Company's closure however the two were unaffiliated by that time; Louis Pellissier Sr. had sold the amusement park to the Collins family of Lincoln Park in 1952, they assumed operations the following year until its closure.[65][66]
The Amherst and Sunderland Street Railway was an interurban streetcar system that operated in Amherst, Sunderland, Pelham, Granby, and South Hadley, Massachusetts. From 1897 until 1932, trolleys operated between Sunderland, the Massachusetts Agricultural College (now UMass Amherst), and connected with the Holyoke Street Railway's system at "The Notch" after 1902. This rail line, providing freight and passenger service,[37] was built by the short-lived Hampshire Street Railway specifically to connect the other two systems; the Hampshire Street Railway would lease the line to the Holyoke railway in 1905, which ultimately consolidated with it, along with Amherst & Sunderland, in 1907. After the merger the name was kept as a legacy and lines to the north of the Holyoke Range were referred to as the Amherst and Sunderland Division of the Holyoke Street Railway. While the HSR would continue operations in Amherst as a bus carrier, after trolley service ceased in 1932 the A&S name was dropped altogether.[1]
No complete Holyoke Street Railway tram is known to exist today, however the Shore Line Trolley Museum's "Preserved North American Electric Cars Roster" (PNAECR) survey states the wooden cabin for one such car remains in Holyoke in the private collection of James Curran at The Wherehouse banquet hall.[71] Additionally four of the railway's Wason open-air cars were sold and repainted for the Blue Hill Street Railway of Canton in 1909, however fate of that livery remains unknown.[72]
In the years following 1887, the neighborhood was developed further when William S. Loomis purchased a large tract of land to the southeast of Northampton and South Street. With plans to develop this plot into residential tracts, he approached the board of the Holyoke Street Railway, at that time operating a small system of horsecars, who promptly rejected his calls for extending their lines to Elmwood. Through the cooperation of allies and purchase of company stock, Loomis purchased a controlling interest in the company, and immediately moved forward with plans for this construction. The neighborhood would see considerable growth in the following years when these lines were electrified, offering accessible mass transit between the area and many of the factories in which its residents worked.
The system rapidly expanded its service capacity; in 1884, the system had 2 cars and 5 horses operating a line between Main Street in Holyoke and South Hadley Falls, by 1886 this had expanded to 3 other routes in Holyoke and the livery totaled at 15 cars and 56 horses.[5] At the time it was commonplace for patrons to keep lumps or cubes of sugar in their pockets for often ornery horses.[17] In its earliest years it met some resistance from Hampshire County commissioners and South Hadley selectmen, threatening to withdraw from South Hadley Falls in 1886 due to policies related to taxation and maintenance of roads and a former bridge connecting Holyoke across the Connecticut River.[18] The following year, it was proposed the company stop every other car on the South Hadley route on the Holyoke side of where the Vietnam Memorial Bridge stands today, to halve taxes paid for use of the bridge there at that time.[19] Public opinion on the South Hadley side of the river remained largely in favor of the company, however one writer for The Republican compared the ordeal to "child's play" due to lack of compromise by either.[20] Some consensus was eventually reached during the construction of the bridge's successor, the Hadley-Holyoke Bridge by engineer Edward S. Shaw, as the railway company's lawyer would work with Hampshire and Hampden county commissioners to negotiate the bridge's width and location of the railway tracks.[21]
The first railroad station in Holyoke had opened in 1845, followed by the H.H. Richardson-designed Connecticut River Railroad Station in 1885. Though passenger service to Holyoke ended in 1966, the 1885 depot is still extant. The opening of the new station returned passenger rail service to Holyoke for the first time in 49 years, and to the Dwight and Main streets site for the first time in 130 years.
The original horsecar trolley, operated by the Springfield Street Railway, opened in 1877 from Main Street in Springfield to Elm and Park Streets, via Main Street and the old toll bridge at Bridge Street. It was later extended via Westfield Street to (Upper) Church Street. Electrification was completed in 1892-3, and the river crossing was moved to the original North End Bridge. Over the years, extensions were made to the Holyoke Street Railway (via Riverdale Road, 1895), Tatham (1896) the Woronoco Street Railway (in Westfield, 1899), the Connecticut border via Riverside Park (now Six Flags New England) in Agawam (1900), Feeding Hills (1902), and eventually the Suffield Street Railway in Connecticut (making the Hartford-West Side Line possible, 1905).
Today their former headquarters serves as the main facilities of the Holyoke Department of Public Works, now known as the Pellisier Building, for the family which owned and managed the system in its final decades.[13] A second car barn of the Amherst and Sunderland Street Railway division functions as facilities for the town of Amherst's own Department of Public Works.[14]
In the history of American railroad engineering, the system was the first in the United States to make use of exothermic welding, better known as thermite welding, to lay track for regular use.[8][9][10] Railway engineer George E. Pellissier would not only be the first in the country to implement this now-standard operating procedure, but would further develop Hans Goldschmidt's welding process for the street railway, subsequently serving as an engineer and superintendent for the inventor's Goldschmidt Thermite Company before returning to Holyoke as an assistant general manager.[10][11][12]