Abraham, George, and Todd

1862: Abraham Lincoln Authorizing the Transcontinental Railroad

In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed The Pacific Railroad Act, authorizing the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific railroads to build what was to be the nation's first transcontinental railroad and telegraph line.

In 1864 a private railroad car was built for the President, but Lincoln was unable to use it while he lived, and the ornate style of the car was not to his liking. This car was then to become his funeral car and a replica of it is another of the Lincoln items on display at the Union Pacific Railroad Museum in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

Many of the original furnishing from that car are numbered in the Lincoln collection - a walnut desk, bookcase, a reclining chair, a portion of the silver service, a mirror, four oil paintings and two davenports, one extra-long for the president and capable of being converted into a bed.

1865: George Pullman

Mr. Pullman's third attempt at a rail passenger car was completed. His patented and revolutionary concept in traveling became reality in The Pioneer. It was a passenger car never before imagined, being two and a half feed higher and a foot wider than any other car. It was designed for passenger comfort with more elegance in every aspect than any existing carriage. However, being oversized, it was prohibited from movement as the tracks did not provide sufficient clearance for its safe passage.

Mr. Pullman, a longtime friend of the Lincoln family, offered the widowed Mary Todd Lincoln and her son Robert Todd the use of the railroad passenger car that was fifty years ahead of its time. To accommodate this wider car for the funeral train, all clearances between Washington D.C. and Springfield Illinois were hastily modified for Pullman's larger car. This single action changed from what could have been Pullman's "white elephant" into what rapidly became the most sought after series of cars of the era. Within a few years, all the nation's railroads were adapting to the ten-foot wide and fourteen-foot high railroad car Pullman built in 1865, and which remains the standard in the United States even today.

1910: A year of change for the Pullman Company

President Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln had four sons, with only Robert Todd living to maturity. Robert Todd, a lawyer, was counsel to corporate interests including the Pullman Company. After Mr. Pullman's death in 1897, The Pullman Company operated for two years before electing the longtime friend of Pullman to the position of company president.

Robert Todd became the president of the Pullman Company in 1897 and resigned in 1911, for reasons of health, but remained as chairman of the board. During this time, the Pullman Company was in technological turmoil. They suddenly changed from the 60 foot varnished wood railroad cars to the eighty foot, riveted-steel design. The new technology of the time was electric lighting, so the new cars required the addition of electrical wiring, switches, switchboards, generators, and batteries. Wood and steel trucks were replaced with massive structural steel castings. It was September of this year that Coach 895 was manufactured for the Western Pacific Railroad at an original cost from the Pullman company of $13,624.50.