It was 50 years
ago that the trolley cars came to Patchogue, and eight years later
they were abandoned. The Suffolk Traction Company was given a
franchise to construct a trolley line between Patchogue and Port
Jefferson, and in 1907 began laying tracks on North Ocean Avenue and
clearing and grading the right of way to Holtsville.
Three years later,
the company asked for more time, as they had run out of money. The
company was reorganized and $150,000 raised, with $50,000 of this by
residents of Patchogue. Barracks were built near Canan Lake to
house the laborers, and construction of the line to Holtsville was
begun in the spring of 1911.
The first car, a
second hand storage battery car, was purchased from the Federal
Storage Battery Company of New Jersey. This car could go 52 miles
before the batteries needed recharging, but sometimes it went dead
through a short circuit or other cause, and had to be towed in by a
team of horses or pushed by another car.
On July 1, 1911,
the first car ran down Main Street and everybody who could climb
aboard rode free. Regular service started the next day between the
four corners in Patchogue and the post office in Blue Point. The
line carried 1,000 people a day and was a great success.
The tracks were
completed to Holtsville and rails were laid in Port Jefferson but
the line never was completed across the Island, and Holtsville was
as far as it ever got, with a partly constructed bridge over the
Long Island Rail Road there. On May 13, 1912, the first car was run
to Holtsville and a few days later John S. Furman was employed as
motorman. One day the car was coming downhill from Holtsville when
a lady asked Mr. Furman to stop at the next corner. Just before it
stopped, the car jumped the tracks and bounced along the dirt road
until it pulled up to the curb and stopped right on the corner. The
lady passenger calmly stepped out of the car and said “thank you” to
the motorman.
Mr. Furman said
that the Blue Point hill was the biggest headache of the line and in
winter the ice froze on the rails. In the spring the buds and seeds
from the threes made the rails slippery as though they were greased,
and in the fall the wheels of the cars spun over a litter of
leaves. Often the men riders were asked to get out and give the
trolley a push up the hill. The writer remembers riding the trolley
to Holtsville one day when it stalled on a hill and everyone had to
get out and push it over the top.
One day the car
was running along near West Lake when it hit some mud, bounced off
the rails, ran across the road and plunged into the lake. Walter
Jayne, a member of the Blue Point Life Saving Station, was a
passenger on the car, and jumped out and pulled three women out of
the lake.
Trouble began when
the company decided to extend the line to Sayville, and it took most
of the money that was to be used to construct the line to Port
Jefferson. A couple of bus lines sprang up and the line started to
lose money. The company asked for another three year extension of
time to complete the line to Port Jefferson, which was granted by
the town board. An attempt was made to raise $250,000 additional
capital but the public was not so much interested in the trolley any
more as automobiles had come into general use and people didn’t have
to depend on the trolley.
Things finally got
so bad that Electric Light Company cut off the power that was used
to charge the batteries, and on October 10, 1919 the last car ran in
Patchogue. The tracks were torn up between Patchogue and Holtsville
and the $20,000 bridge over the railroad sold as scrap. The
trolleys were run over to a siding near the lace mill and
abandoned. Here is a poem by Paul Bailey published in the Patchogue
Advance in 1909.
“The tale is told
in rails of steel
That slumber in
the street
So peacefully and
sweet
and trip the
natives feet
but nary a sign of
a trolley wheel
To make the scene
complete.”
50 Years Ago- April 26,
1912
Patchogue-
Progress that is being made with the building of the cross-island
electric car line was made vividly apparent to the people of the
village Monday when the big gasoline power car that has been working
on the track construction between Holtsville and Patchogue for a
long time came running into town over the newly laid tracks, and
proceeded through the village to the yard opposite the lace mill.
This car is propelled with a high power engine similar in a general
way to that of an automobile.
50 Years Ago- May 17, 1912
Patchogue-
The electric car line to Holtsville started actual operation Monday
under auspicious circumstances without any furs or feather. It is
very evident from the manner in which the car has been immediately
put to use by the people that it will by a paying success. The car
made the run to Holtsville in 15 minutes. Several of the directors
of the trolley company besides a goodly number of passengers rode on
the car for its first trip and there were about 200 fares Monday.