Information Sheet

 

 

R         Phillips, L. N.

863                  Letter, 1871.

                                    One folder.

 

 

 

This is a holograph letter dated 31 March 1871 from L. N. Phillips in Dubuque, Iowa, to D. Lansing in New York, New York.  In the letter Phillips tries to interest Lansing in the St. James and Little Rock Rail Road Company and lead mining opportunities in Missouri and Iowa.  In­cluded is a hand-drawn map of existing and proposed rail lines.

 

In this letter L. N. Phillips informs D. Lansing, Esq., that C. C. Simmons of St. Louis has procured the charter for the St. James & Little Rock Rail Road Company, a proposed north-south trunk line from St. James in Phelps County, Missouri, to Little Rock, Arkansas.  According to Phillips, Simmons had been “at Washington last winter to get grant of lands for this road.”  Also, Simmons had sold a half interest in “West Iron Mountain” near Salem in Dent County, Missouri, to Crawford and Scott of the Aetna Iron Works in Pennsylvania.  He was also seeking a charter amendment to allow an extension of the St. James & Little Rock north from St. James to meet the proposed St. Louis and Fort Scott “air line” railroad.  Phillips planned to go to St. Louis “in 3 or 4 days” to meet with Simmons.  Including a hand-drawn map of the proposed lines in the body of his letter, Phillips assured Lansing that “no route on the continent crosses greater agricultural and mineral wealth,” and the road would “connect great Iron fields in South Mo. with the north Mo and Iowa coal fields,” thereby developing “a great freight business and Iron City where it crosses the Mo river.”

 

Phillips was also promoting “355 acres of Lead land crossed by a Cave discovered west of Dubuque,” and 5,000 acres of lead lands in Missouri “for $2.00 per acre perfect titles, that are now not known as Lead bearing grounds.”

 

According to records maintained by the Missouri Secretary of State, the St. James & Little Rock Rail Road was granted charter R34 by the Missouri Legislature, but was inactive by 1889.

 

 

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