LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Cotton Belt
built 636 days ago
The Stuttgart & Arkansas River, extending east and south from the Cotton Belt main line at Stuttgart, north of Pine Bluff, a distance of 35.47 miles, was incorporated on November 21, 1888. The first section, to DeWitt, was finished in 1888-89, while the remainder, south to Gillett, was completed in 1892, at a total cost of $250,000. Within a few months after opening for business, the S&AR's debt exceeded its earning capacity, and a receiver--the Cotton Belt's S.W. Fordyce--was appointed by the bankruptcy court on January 27, 1893. As an independent line, the S&AR never made a profit, and on January 3, 1901 was sold to the Cotton Belt in order to settle claims of creditors.
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The Cotton Belt 819 is the pride of Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Here this great locomotive was lovingly restored, and today it travels the rails once again to bring back memories of a bygone era.
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The Southern Pacific Company gained control of the St. Louis Southwestern system on April 14, 1932, but the Cotton Belt continued to be operated separately. The Southwestern of Texas was leased by the St. Louis Southwestern on March 1, 1954, and merged into the parent company on January 19, 1984. The St. Louis Southwestern doubled its size in May 1980 when it began operating the former Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Company track from Tucumcari, New Mexico, through Dalhart to Kansas City and St. Louis. This trackage, part of the Golden State Route, was subsequently purchased from the estate of the Rock Island. In 1992 operations of the Cotton Belt were consolidated with those of the Southern Pacific Transportation Company.
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The oldest company to become a part of the Cotton Belt dates back to 1855. The Little River Valley & Arkansas Railroad (27 mile route), which operated a narrow gauge line from New Madrid to Maiden, Missouri, began as the New Madrid and West Prairie Road Company on February 22, 1855. The Little River Valley owned two locomotives, two passenger cars, and thirty freight cars.
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These two railroads formed the Lufkin and Dallas Branches of Cotton Belt. The lumbering country of east Texas was within reach of Lufkin, the far southern extension of the Cotton Belt. In the first decade of the Twentieth Century, the territory between the Trinity and Sabine Rivers was undergoing intensive development, with the largest pine lumber mill of all being built at Kennard, some thirty miles west of Lufkin.
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American Cotton Producers convened a "Blue Ribbon Committee" of leading cotton scientists from across the Cotton Belt to address the question of cotton yield decline. This group concluded that, "clearly a significant problem exists with current cotton yields - best characterized by stagnant yields, which have become increasingly variable and highly unstable in recent years."
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Cotton Belt