Z 2026.000
YAZOO AND MISSISSIPPI VALLEY RAILROAD RECORDS


Biography/History:

The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad began as two independent railroad companies; the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad and the Louisville, New Orleans, and Texas Railway. The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad was built in the mid-1880s by the Illinois Central Railroad, under the direction of its president, Jim Clarke. The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad was intended to be a 115-mile line between the Mississippi Delta and Jackson, Mississippi.

The Louisville, New Orleans, and Texas Railway was a holding company for several smaller companies that had obtained divisional charters to construct a rail line from Memphis, Tennessee, to New Orleans, Louisiana. The Louisville, New Orleans, and Texas Railway was completed in August of 1884, and it operated for six years. However, the Louisville, New Orleans, and Texas Railway Company was facing possible bankruptcy by 1892. The owner, Collis P. Huntington, decided to sell the entire railway to the Illinois Central Railroad in the fall of 1892.

Shortly after acquiring the Louisville, New Orleans, and Texas Railway, the Illinois Central Railroad decided to consolidate its Yazoo and Mississippi Valley and Lousiville, New Orleans, and Texas railway lines. The newly merged railway became the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad Company, and it was chartered on October 24, 1892. The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad was controlled by the Illinois Central Railroad through the Mississippi Valley Company. However, the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad Company maintained separate accounting records, and it was not included in the accounting records of the Illinois Central Railroad until 1924. The Illinois Central Railroad began to abandon small sections of the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad in 1935, and this continued through 1978. The Illinois Central Gulf Railroad, formed in 1972 by the merger of the Illinois Central and Gulf, Mobile, and Ohio railroads, continued to operate sections of the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad until 1999. The Illinois Central Railroad merged with the Canadian National Railway in late 1999.

Scope and Content:

This collection consists of two general accounting journals of the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad Company for the years 1924 and 1930. The detailed daily entries record monies paid during the year for various operating expenses of the railroad and its customers. Those expenses included such diverse items as candy for vending machines, livestock injuries on rights-of-way, railroad track and boxcar rentals, and maintenance costs.

Series Identification:

  1. General Journal. 1924. 1 bound volume.
  2. General Journal. 1930. 1 bound volume.