1 fev 1864 ano - John D. Perry takes over

Descrição:

In 1864 John D. Perry takes over of the UPRW-ED from Thomas Durant. Perry immediately tried to strip power from Thomas Durant because he didn’t want the UPRW-ED being viewed as a subsidiary of the Union Pacific Railroad. He had shared the vision of Hallett for a second competing Pacific railroad with a route through Wyandotte (Petrowski p. 107). When Durant finally got to look at Hallett’s business record’s he found numerous errors. At the time of Hallett’s death Durant knew the work from Wyandotte to Lawrence wasn’t up to the standards of a Class I Railroad. Durant organized laborers to finish the route but Perry did the same and drove Durant’s men off the property.
Durant argued he held the contract for constructing the railroad and Perry claimed that because of Hallett’s death the contract was null and void (Petrowski, p. 109). Perry wanted all of Hallett’s interest making his two-thirds and leaving one-third for Durant. Left to resolve was how to settle with Mrs. Ann Hallett who was in Europe during the murder of her husband. Perry located her first and persuaded the release of all claims to her husband’s interests for $100,000. Ann Hallett was appointed administratrix of her late husband’s estate by Wyandotte County probate court on September 25, 1864. In Hallett’s Heirs V. Kansas Pacific Railroad Case 720, the court found for the plaintiffs: Hallett’s stock was put up as collateral for the loans which were advertised and sold for debts (Petrowski p. 109). Hallett’s 99,800 shares were appraised for a small amount as the Perry group manipulated this aspect of the settlement.
Durant sued Perry in New York courts to recover the money he’d invested. Durant claimed $440,000 while Perry said it was $44,000 (Petrowski p. 111). In this case, Secretary of the Interior John Usher, tried to bring about accommodation between Durant and Perry. Usher studied the account books of the UPRW-ED and determined Perry was the controlling body for the company but the stock was divided in thirds between Hallett, Perry and Durant. Usher recommended the two settle financial details among themselves lest the public find out the rail way was not being built and Congress cut funding. When they couldn’t agree Usher leaned toward Perry recommending only 30% control of the company stock to Durant with the rest going to Perry. Durant defiantly said he would have a bill introduced in Congress to give him full control (Petrowski, p. 115).
Perry dealt another blow to Durant by reaching accommodation with Fremont for $200,000, declaring the line was completed to Lawrence on April of 1865, and finally, asked the federal railroad commissioners to inspect the rail road (Petrowski, p. 116). In a twist to the story John Usher retired and was succeeded as Interior Secretary by Senator John Harlan of Iowa (Petrowski p. 120). The Senator was a close friend of Thomas Durant, and on May 15, 1865 wrote President Andrew Johnson that he couldn’t accept completion of the first section of the UPRW-ED from Wyandotte to Lawrence because it wasn’t up to the new standards.
In turn Perry met with President Andrew Johnson and got him to let General D. C. McCallum, the director and general manager of military railroad, to reinspect the rail line to Lawrence (Petrowski p. 122). McCallum accepted the condition of the rail and President Andrew Johnson endorsed the product from Wyandotte to Lawrence withdrawing his support for Harlan. Perry still couldn’t get the government to issue new bonds but remarkably found funding from his eastern friend at the Pennsylvania Railroad, Vice President, Tom Scott. This effectively ended Durant’s direct involvement with the UPRR-ED “branch” since Scott’s political influence in Washington was considerable (Petrowski, p. 124).
Collapse due to freshnets of the UPRR-ED bridge at Wyandott in 1865 had given Interior Secretary Harlan the opportunity to once again invoke criticism and inspect the construction work of Perry’s crews. On November 3, 1865 three new commissioners were approved by President Andrew Johnson: Colonel James Simpson, Kansas Governor Samuel Crawford, and Henry Scott. The federal order was to make a report on the ballast, ties, rails, water stations, ditching, grades, and curves from Wyandott to Lawrence. After the examination Governor Crawford touted the Chief Engineer of Construction, Robert M. Shoemaker, as the best in the United States and that UPRR-ED President John Perry the best at getting the line completed with no wrong to railroad monies. Simpson and Scott submitted reports that were highly critical of the condition of the line saying it was nowhere near up to standard. They said the 40-mile stretch had poor excavation and embankment grading, that the low grading would not protect from flooding, and especially that the 70 small bridges over Kaw tributaries were inferior. Perry agreed to decrease the grades that were 45 feet to the mile to 30 feet between Wyandott and Lawrence by October 26, 1866 in order to receive new bonds (Petrowski, p. 131).
Durant filed protests against issuance of these new bonds because 100 miles were not completed in three years specified in the 1862 agreement. Out of necessity Congress agreed to issue the bonds in order to facilitate extension of the road to Ft. Riley. In a meeting at the Continental Hotel in Philadelphia on January 6, 1866, Scott offered holders of the old B bonds $1 million in UPRW-ED securities, and $500,00 in Series B bonds to be secured through mortgages on lands received from the government (Petrowski, 142). Durant finally settled his business with the UPRW-ED and settled for $100,000 cash and $500,000 in Land Grant bonds.
In 1866 UPRW-ED President John D Perry (Perry, Kansas and Lake Perry are named after him) defied the 1864 Pacific Railway Act by discontinuing the route from Ft. Riley to Ft. Kearney and instead constructed straight west to Denver (Petrowski, p. 144). Perry decided to put all of his resources into a competing separate transcontinental route to San Francisco. According to U.S. Attorney General, James Speed, all aid should be stopped to the UPRW-ED. However, Congress passed a joint resolution to extend aid to Perry’s railroad to Denver on June of 1866 in order to supply U.S. Army troops fighting Native Tribes in these territories. Changing the route disrupted land grants along the Republican River route to Ft. Kearney and led to 79 pre-emption filings involving 8,000 acres of land (Petrowski, p. 146). These protests were ineffective against supporters of the UPRR-ED but are a good example of how constant litigation prevailed based in part on promissory notes originating with the LP&W RW. Perry’s strong ties with Missouri led him to establish his UPRR-ED office at the corner of 6th and Broadway in Kansas City, Missouri until, ironically, the sale of the railroad “back” to the Union Pacific Railroad in 1881. Today the main offices of the Union Pacific Railroad are in Omaha and the Union Pacific Railroad Museum is in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

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