The very first streetcar, which was drawn by four
gray horses, went up Walnut St. on Sept. 4,1859. One of the rails was too low at
9th St. and the car left the tracks. The passengers (The Mayor, Councilmen,
newspapermen etc) jumped off and lifted the car back on to the tracks. One child
hanging onto the platform fell off and was run over. Thousands of people
followed the streetcar to the end of its run. Going up hills with horse drawn streetcars could
be done only with the use of additional horse power provided by a special
hill-team of horses. Although reliant on horses and mules horsecars were a great
improvement over the omnibuses (glorified stagecoaches) that were used before. The last horsecar was on Nov. 2,1903.
If you would like to see some images of horsecars, click on the link
above. These images were, for the most part, before the postcard era so they are
all photographs.
For information on steam operated streetcars see the
image below of the steam Dummy and follow the link above. As with horsecars these are photographs.
By 1875 there were 14 separate lines with 1,000 horses pulling cars
over 45 miles of track. Beginning in 1889 electric streetcars began taking over
the transportation needs of the city. With electrification the streetcar system
grew to 228 miles of track by 1920 with over 100 million rides a year. The corner of 5th and Walnut was considered to be the
6th busiest corner in the country for street railway crossings in the early part
of the twentieth century. During peak traffic periods 380 streetcars per hour
entered this corner. The first non-post card image below show the streetcar
routes in 1911.
1911 Traction Company Routes
East End
Car at
Corner Harrison & Colerain.
Hamilton Ave. at North Bend
Not a postcard
Eastern &
Archer
High water cars used in
floods
Depot. College Hill car in shed
THE TRANSIT STRIKE OF 1913
On Friday, May 9, 1913 the conductors
and motormen of the Cincinnati Traction Company went on strike. The issues were
wages and recognition of the employees' union. Some men joined the ranks of the
strikers while others, fearing trouble, just stayed home. Firemen and engineers
did not strike thus electric power was not stopped. Strike breakers from other
cities were brought in to try and keep the cars running. It was on Monday, the 12th that the real effect
of the strike became apparent. All the interurbans, (cars from other cities),
refused to enter the city. The only car that ran undisturbed was the mail car.
Strike breakers tried to make a dash out of the Avondale Car Barn with two cars
but stalled when the trolley poles jumped the wires right in the middle of a
group of strikers. The cars were finally started and went down the street
followed by a car with four policemen and a mob of 200 angry strikers. The
tracks in front of the cars were strewn with rocks, planks, bricks, and trucks
faking engine trouble.
Some cars did manage to make it into the downtown area;
but one car was stopped as it left the Brighton Car Barn and set on fire. Two
other cars were stopped by a mob at Sixth and Sycamore Streets and set on fire.
One car was deserted by its crew in the downtown area and was demolished. Most
cars were stoned and many just turned back and went to the car barns. That night
no trolleys could be found on the streets.
On Friday, May 16th, as a car circled Fountain Square,
someone pushed a trash can in front of it. The car stalled when its fender
became mashed under the front wheels. The mob tried to board the car to work
over the motorman, but the policeman on board along with the passengers, and
other strike breakers locked the doors, and pulled down the shades. The crowd
was estimated to be about 10,000 people. They were finally dispersed by a fleet
of autos containing policemen, and many mounted policemen. This type of occurrence
happened all over the city that day. Many crews had to abandon their cars and
flee for their lives as unruly mobs, who had no connection with the strikers or
strikebreakers, attacked.
On May 17th car 642 of the Elberon line was stopped by
an obstruction in front of the Union Central Building, which was under
construction at that time. Suddenly from almost every floor of the building came
a barrage of barrels, cement blocks, and bags of cement. The crew had fled in
terror when the barrage had first started. Police on the ground fired their
pistols at the culprits. The construction crew huddled on a scaffold with
concrete going in one direction and bullets going in the other. When the
disturbance was over the streetcar had been reduced to rubble.
These are not postcards
Strikers parading
Walnut St. Between 5th & 6th
Chief Copeland protecting
car
Police protecting car
When the strike started the employees were making 23 cents per hour. The strike ended May 19th when the company agreed to recognize the union and an arbitration board was set up. This board met for one month and worked out an agreement that called for 23 cents per hour to start, 25 cents after two years, and 28 cents per hour after five years. The most important part of the agreement was that in the future there would be no work stoppage over any differences between the parties but, instead, would rely on an impartial Board of Arbitration to settle the problem.
Firemen dousing streetcar
Streetcar burning
5th and Walnut shortly after
set on fire during riot. mob was dispersed during strike
Strike!
I walk
Getting around during
streetcar strike
The two cards above are composite cards. The figures were cut out of one postcard and pasted on the background postcards, thus producing a comedic postcard.
1907 Warsaw wreck.
Price Hill
This accident occurred on New Years Eve of 1906. The street name on this postcard is in error. This was one of the worst Traction Company accidents that ever happened. The brake chain broke going down the long hill, and the brake shoes were in very poor condition. The careening streetcar swung into a curve, left the tracks, toppled over and struck a trolley pole. All the passengers were injured and two died, with nine of the injured being hospitalized. The Traction Company was not indicted because the court found there was no applicable statute to cover it.
This non-postcard image was taken in 1915 on Queen City Ave. It shows the high water cars used during floods. The motors in the center car are inside the car and the other cars that are pulled/pushed by this car have the seating raised above the water.
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Cincinnati conductors
2nd
St
You can generally tell the street car conductor from the motorman by the coin changer attached to their waist. The 2nd postcard shows a streetcar approaching Vine St. The Flach Brothers Grocery was located at 2 East 2nd Street.
The Hiawatha
Written on the back of this postcard it says,
"A double trolley pole used in Cincinnati. The only Canadian type
observatory car ever used in the U. S". In 1939 an attempt to revive
attendance on streetcars was made by introducing this open air observation car.
The old streetcar #1894 had its top removed at the window sill line. The seats
were terraced up a grade from the front so that everyone of its 46 passengers
would have an unobstructed view forward, upward, and to both sides. The card
above shows the Hiawatha stopping at the Fairfield Loop for those wanting to
take pictures.
Costing 25 cents the Hiawatha made three two-hour trips from 4th
& Walnut Sts. every evening and 5 trips on Sundays and holidays. The
Hiawatha was so successful a second car was built from car #1891 and named the
"Maketewah". Put in service in 1939 it serviced the eastern part of
the city while the Hiawatha serviced the western parts.
Streetcar
conductor
Motorman
Traction Terminals
Brighton
Station
Crossing at Eastern Ave & Delta
Sedamsville car-River Rd.
notice toll gate over streetcar
in high
water
The first card above is a John Street car at the end of the line on Quebec Road in South Fairmount. The second one shows the Westwood-Cheviot car at the end of the line in Cheviot. It cost 10c and you could transfer to any car line in the city. The third one shows one of the famous RED DEVIL interurban cars. They operated between Cincinnati and Detroit traveling at 80-90 mph and were built in Winton Place (see Kings Mill image below). The last card shows the interior of the Winchell Avenue car house. You can see one of the cars has a sign for the Ball Park. After a big game 50 cars were parked at old Redland Field to take the fans home.
STREET RAILWAY'S WINTON SHOPS
In the 1890s the Cincinnati Street Railway built an 8 acre facility next to Chester Park which they also owned. Built for the maintenance and reconstruction of its rolling stock, plus the manufacturing of its own cars. The layout above gives a rough picture of the park and shop. The 2nd non-postcard image shows a section of the interior.
The land directly across Spring Grove Avenue from
Chester Park was also owned by the Street Railway Company and was mainly used as
a storage yard. The view of the picture above shows Spring Grove Avenue (The
curved street in the lower left corner), Clifton Avenue crossing the Mill Creek
(lower right corner), the King Machine Tool Company on Clifton Ave. Directly to
the left of the King building on the other side of the RR tracks is the Winton
Place Depot. Chester Park is not shown on the left edge. Mitchell Avenue is
going from the left edge to the top-right corner.
Directly behind the King building (next to water tower), is the
Railway's storage house, which was larger when it was first constructed in 1912.
At full capacity it was able to store up to 374 cars. During the Winter the
Summer cars would be brought into this building, their bodies would be removed
from their trucks and closed car bodies would be mounted. In the Summer the open
air bodies would be installed.
In 1928 the Cincinnati Street Railway constructed the large
building seen in the center of the above image and in the two views below. The
second one was taken in the winter so the foliage did not block the view. The
third image is a rough layout of this plant. It was called the Winton car shop
and was used to repair and refurbish the company's rolling stock.
Winton Car
Shop-1928
1935
Plant Layout
In the first image above you can see parts of Chester Park in the background. The large domed building near the center was Hilarity Hall. You can also see parts of the roller coaster. As you can see from the layout there were only two doors for cars to enter the building. One at the top and one on the bottom. The transfer table, running the full length of the building, would pick up each car and move it to what ever stall it needed to be sent to. Cars were scheduled to be overhauled every 60,000 miles. They would first enter the sand blast room where all paint was removed and it was cleaned inside and out. It would then go to the wash room and then to the truck repair department where the body would be lifted off the trucks and placed on light shift trucks and moved to the various departments to be worked on. The large storeroom building was connected to the main building by underground corridors. When repairs were completed the car would go thru the paint booth. This operation took three days. The wheels and axles for the trucks were stored in the basement and were raised and lowered by heavy duty elevators. After a complete inspection the cars were ready for duty.
Interurban at Kings
Mill
The Dummy Car.
Just a nice
streetcar
The center postcard above shows a steam-powered car often refered to as a "steam dummy". This card is showing the car crossing the bridge over Crawfish Creek, at what is now Mount Lookout Square. This line started at Pendleton Avenue and went to Mount Lookout along Crawfish Road (now known as Delta Avenue), around 1888. For more information on these cars click on the link on top.
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Vine St. to Norwood
cars
Millcreek Valley Line
To Lockland
The streetcars shown in the first three cards were built in 1910. The car 1605 in the last image was built around 1905.
The first card shows another of the RED DEVIL interurban cars like the one shown above. Car 1709, in the second image, was built in 1907 and it has a Norwood destination on top. The 3rd image shows a Madisonville car with a Chester Park destination.
The 1st image above lists all the electric interurbans that came to Cincinnati. The second image is an article telling about the race that was held between a Red Devil and a plane.
Museum Streetcar
The image above is the interior of the streetcar that is on display at the Cincinnati Historical Museum
THE CINCINNATI SUBWAY
The proposed subway system that was never completed is a subject that I will expand on sometime in the future. The only postcard I have on the subject is this one. It shows the 1st ground level station that would have been reached after leaving the underground portion of the system. It was located on Marshall Avenue in Camp Washington.
Camp Washington station
