Station: Port Inland, MI

Port Inland was the headquarters of the Inland Lime & Stone Company and was completed in 1930. [MPN] The company had a quarry about seven railroad miles northeast of here on the Schoolcraft/Mackinac county border. Aggregate was brought south from the quarry to the port via an electric power industrial railroad, which interchanged with the Soo Line (later WC/CN) at Inland Junction. This industrial railroad was dieselized at a later date.

Photo Info: Inland Line and Stone electric locomotive is photographed between Port Inland and Soo Junction in July, 1981. The train is loaded and heading south to the port. [Neil Plagens photo, Mark Andersen collection]

Notes

Time Line

1929. The railroad leading to the Inland Lime and Stone Co. harbor site is completed, according to Frank Heinz, sub-contractor on the railroad project. A village of camps has spung up in the wilderness near Seul Choix, and the buildings are now ready for occupancy and meals will be served at the camps. A water supply for the camps was secured by a local well dweller, who succeeded in getting a flowing well for the convenience of the settlement.

The railroad will be completed May 15 and will extend from the dolomite formation to the harbor site, and will be used first in transporting stone used in the harbor construction work. The dolomite has been selected in preference to other rock in the district because it is a tougher stone and has better lasting qualities in water and weather.

The new quarry will be used permanently by the Inland company, and the dolomite will be utilized for lining open hearth furnaces of the company's steel plants at Indiana Harbor, also to supply the market for road stone and other construction jobs where it is in demand due to its French co-efficient of wear. [EDP-1929-0430]