Author Description

This volume traces the history of the Boston & Maine Railroad's Lexington Branch, a line northwest of Boston that operated from 1846 to 1981. It began as a country short line, grew into a high-capacity railroad with dozens of daily passenger trains, and reverted in the end to one where the train crews knew the passengers by name and made sure none missed their stops. Explored are its creation, growth, and decline, how it was operated, and what it meant to the "Minuteman towns" of Arlington, Lexington, Bedford, Concord, and Billerica. Passenger traffic on it was always more important than freight, and what was needed to implement its once-intensive schedules is described in detail. The Branch's creation in the 1840s was a byproduct of a most unlikely industry: the shipment of natural ice from Boston to tropical ports as distant as Calcutta. There was corporate intrigue. Begun as a local enterprise aimed just to link West Cambridge and Lexington with Boston, in the 1870s it became a pawn in contests among regional railroads. That its services were once vital is unquestionable. In 1900, Arlington saw 60 steam trains daily, Lexington 44, and Bedford 28. Fierce competition arrived that year in the form of a parallel street railway. The Branch outlasted the trolleys by decades, but the automobile eventually proved to be its undoing. Although it survived until commuter trains began receiving public subsidies, that was not enough to save it. Its right-of-way from West Cambridge to Bedford is now the popular Minuteman Bikeway.