Timetable: MCRR - McGraw Branch - Johannesburg Junction to Sweeney

This is a MC forest branch line in Otsego County.

Key: BB=Bascule Bridge | C=Coal | CS=Car Shop | D=Open > Day | DN=Open Day and night | DS=Dispatcher | DT=Double Main Track | EH=Engine house | F=Diesel Fuel | HI=Half Interlocked Crossing | I=Interlocked Crossing | J=Junction | LB=Lift bridge | N=Open at night | P=Passing Track w/40' car capacity | Q=Quarry | RH=Roundhouse # stalls | RT=Railroad Resort | S=Scales | SB=Swing bridge | T=Turntable | TC=Telegraph call | W=Water | X=Crossing | Y=Wye | Yard=Yard

Notes

[REF] = 1912 MC station list.

Time Line

1897. The McGraw extension of the Bagley branch of the MC is finished and connections made. This week the first products will be brought out to market. They will be bark and wood. Lumbering operations in the immense tract of timber will be started at once and the logs brought to Bay City. The contract calls for not less than 10,000,000 feet per year. [SAG-1897-0811]

1897. J.W. McGraw, who recently finished a four-mile extension of the Bagley branch of the MC into a large tract of timber owned by him, has purchased iron for two miles additional and will extend its road. A new city is being built on the road. It will be called Toledo, and an application for a post office will soon made to the department at Washington. [DFP-1897-0907]

1897. The MC has commenced hauling timber product from the McGraw branch in Otsego county. The extension is five miles in length and taps 100 million feet of standing timber, mostly hardwood. [CCA-1897-0916]

1898. William Kelly has secured a contract for extending the McGraw railroad branch in Chester township. [SAG-1898-1123]

1900. The McGraw Branch is built from Johannesburg Jct. 6.2 miles. It is extended4.8 miles from milepost 6.2 to Sweeney in 1910.

1900. J.W. McGraw has begun suit against the MC railroad claiming $10,000 damages. The plaintiff represents that he had a contact with the defendant to deliver loaded cars from his logging railroad to the company's Bagley branch of the Mackinaw Division, and was to receive so much per car, he using his own locomotives. He claims that the amount agreed upon was not paid to him. [SAG-1900-1022]

1906. April. The MC is extending its McGraw branch about three miles further southeast to get into some new timber owned by the Bigelow-Buell company. A camp is being built there and the territory is to be lumbered over this summer. [SCH-1906-0424]

1908. September 4. Forest fires are raging fiercely tonight. A MC worked extra forces getting timber out of the McGraw branch, running into the timber east of here, and it is stated by railroad men that the fire is spreading into the big timber around New Toledo, nine miles east of here. The syl (sic) is illuminated in every direction from the fires, which have become more menacing because of high wind today. [DFP-1908-0905]

1908. The entire northern section of the state is a mass of flames in the woods. On the McGraw branch four box cars were consumed. The entire country around Vanderbilt and west to Lake Michigan is a mass of flames. The big cedar swamp of the Salling-Hanson company is afire and nothing can be done to save it. The Buell interests on the McGraw branch of the MC had a strenuous time trying to save the camp and buildings and finally a shift of the wind helped them out but danger is by no means past. [GRP-1908-1017]

1911. July. Salling-Hanson's lumber camp on the McGraw branch of the MC burned yesterday. Foreman Chris Johnson is missing. He tried to save the papers in the office. He wrapped a pair of trousers about his head and started through the fire. The Michelson Lumber company's fire at Michelson set fire to 3,000 cords of wood which is a complete loss. [GRP-1911-0712]

1919. One mile of the McGraw branch is abandoned between Sweeney and Martindale. [MRL]

1921. March. Lumbering operations show signs of a boom after a long depression along the Mackinaw Division. Two branches are to be put in operation in the near future, the Batchleor Timber Co. of Bay City on the McGraw branch, and the W.G. Young company, also of Bay City, on the Blue Lake branch. [DFP-1921-0326]

1923. 3.2 miles of the McGraw branch is abandoned from Martindale to Jennings Branch Jct. [MRL]

1928. November. The MC is asking permission to abandon two branch lines in Otsego county. Both lines were built in 1903 for logging purposes. The McGraw branch extends about seven miles in Chester township while the Jennings branch is about the same length in Dover township. The main line (Bagley Branch) from which the two branches extend was built in 1897. [BCE-1928-1115]

1929. The remaining 6.8 miles of the McGraw branch is abandoned from Jennings Branch Jct. to Johannesburg Jct. [MRL]