And yet more on the Milwaukee & St. Louis Air Line

All notes below from: Annual Report of the Milwaukee Grain & Stock Exchange

The Milwaukee and St Louis Air Line Railroad Company was organized during the year and consolidated with a company owning a partially graded road from this city to the Illinois State line and the balance of the route surveyed to Varna 111 156 miles from Milwaukee where it enters the La Salle Coal basin and forms a continuation of an already completed road extending to St Louis The prospects are favorable for an early construction of this important line 01 railroad

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LUMBER The lumber trade of Milwaukee has steadily increased during the last four years with the improved railway connections between this city and the southwest The most important outlet in that direction however is looked for in the construction of the projected Milwaukee and St Louis Air Line Kailroad in which our lumber merchants and the vast lumber interests developed by the building of the Wisconsin Central Railroad are equally interested The Western Union Railroad has given our lumber trade access to a limited portion of Northern Illinois and Iowa but the inadequacy of the rolling stock of that road and the unfortunate lack of harmony that has existed between it and connecting lines has greatly retarded business during the past year A more direct connection between Milwaukee and the Iowa Division of the Chicago and Northwestern Railway would be of the greatest advantage to our lumber merchants because it would open to thein an immense region totally bare of pine timber and at the same time put au end to the ruinous discrimination which the Milwaukee and St Paul Railway is now forced to make against Milwaukee in competing with the Chicago and Northwestern Railway for the transportation of lumber from the northern part of the state to competing points in the southwest This connection which can be accomplished by the addition of a short link to the Kenosna and Rockford branch of the Chicago and Northwestern Railway is annually becoming more essential to the latter road because of the increasing grain trade between Milwaukee and its lines in Iowa and now that the Northwestern has acquired so large an interest here this connection will become a necessity at no distant day

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OJ Sale Esq President of the Chamber of Commerce Milwaukee Sir As the official year of the Chamber of Commerce is drawing to a close the Committee on Commerce and Manufactures desire to lay before you a report of some of the subjects which engaged their attention during the year and to make some suggestions for the future The Committee had their attention called early last summer to the proposed air line of railroad to St Louis passing through some of the most valuable coal fields in Illinois and correspondence was entered into with the gentlemen in Illinois who were working in the interest of the enterprise in that state Through the Committee these parties were brought into communication with the representative owners of the Milwaukee and Northern Illinois Railroad Company and after considerable negotiation and with the active aid of a sub committee of this body a combination of the whole interest was effected under the name of the Milwaukee and St Louis Air Line Railroad and upon a basis which promised to result in the speedy completion of this desirable link in our railroad connections The financial panic of last fall temporarily checked this prospect but we have good reason to believe that the work will soon be actively resumed and carried to completion The question of increased storage facilities for grain in this city was taken up by the Committee and representations made to the different roads having termini here showing the urgent need of more elevator capacity While unable to state any direct result from these efforts the Committee are glad to know that at least one large elevator is at length being built by Angus Smith & Co for use by tho Northwestern Railroad and it is confidently expected that the Milwaukee and 8t Paul Railroad will also largely increase its warehousing capacity this season