The last main line railroad built in Vermont was the Rutland and Canadian, stretching from Burlington forty seven miles north through the Champlain Islands to Rouses Point, NY. It was the only way the struggling Rutland could secure a northern connection. The route swung westward in Alburgh ,VT to effect a connection with the O&LC and continued due north into Canada, via the Rutland and Noyan Railroad.  Built in only one year, the Rutland and Canadian was a spectacularly scenic railroad. Constructed mostly in 1899, it officially became part of the Rutland in the following year. It was a very expensive stretch of track to build. The three and a quarter mile marble-block causeway from Colchester Point to Allen's Point at South Hero alone cost the Rutland in the vicinity of $1 million. Sitting as one of the directors, however, was Dr. William Seward Webb, and some New York Central (Vanderbilt) money was also involved.
 During World War I, both the Rutland and Central Vermont were taken over by the federal government. In 1919, broken-down boxcars and locomotive equipment that had seen better days were returned to  the railroads. The Rutland, having to rely primarily on milk and stone from on-line shippers, continued to falter after the war. Trucks began to carry fluid milk. The end came in 1950 when the road became bankrupt for the last time. It was then organized into the Rutland Railway and struggled along for a few more years. Death finally came in 1961 when the strikebound Rutland, its passenger and milk traffic a fading memory, called it quits. On December 4, 1961, President William Ginsberg filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission for permission to abandon the entire 331 miles of line from Ogdensburg to Bennington and to Bellows Falls. In 1963 the State appropriated $2.7 million to acquire the Rutland tracks within Vermont. The former Rutland and Canadian trackage through Grand Isle County was torn up.

 In 1899 the construction work for the railroad brought a boom to the Islands, upwards of 500
men, mostly Italians, being brought in as laborers. Many of the local people found employment  also,  together with  the  huge demands of boarding the workers.
     Coleman Cota: My father as a boy worked as a waterboy when they were building the railroad. He 'd carry water to the working crews. He had a couple pails of water that he'd carry and a dipper and they would take what they wanted to drink with the dipper. A lot of the people building the railroad were Italian and mostly from Barre.

 Also much local manpower and teams hired to transport the tons of steel rails, plates and ties across the ice from Plattsburgh. Steam drills, hoisting machines, boilers dump cars were also drawn over in this way.


Leland Martin: When they were building the railroad down here, my uncle Hyde helped on one of the teams drawing stones for cribbing on the side. Sometimes if it was a big, big stone, they drove one stone from South Hero. If the stones were smaller they drove two stones for that cribbing on the
side. In the quarry near where Wilders live now is where they were getting the stone. They'd make two trips a day. I guess they hired all the teams they could to get stone there. My brothers worked on the railroad working "section." Boyden went on in 1925 Rodney went on in 1926. I was five years
old. Hayden went on in 1931. Hayden was on for thirty years, until the railroad running. Boyden was on thirty-eight years. Each branch of the railroad had a section. Grand Isle, that used to be five miles, was the Grand Isle section. Then North Hero, that section was five and a half miles. South Alburg was five and a half miles. Then Alburg section. Then you go south, there was South Hero, Colchester, Long Trail and Burlington section. In 1938 1 cut every other section off and made them
eleven miles. They had one at Burlington Colchester, Grand Isle, North Hero and Alburg. I went on the railroad September 1st, 1938. I was eighteen years old. They were short of a man in North Hero and my brother, Rodney, told the boss that I would go to work. In the summer each section had
six men and a boss. In the fall, about November when the ground froze, they generally laid off two men and kept four winter men. The oldest man got priority. When I went on in 1938 I'd get laid off every fall. April or May I'd go back when they'd take on extra help. When you got laid off you reserved your rights, they had to take you back on in the spring.

We had to cut one swath of grass along the side. When they had five miles, they used to cut the whole section from railroad  fence to railroad fence with the scythes.  They got the grass all cut. Then when they  made the section eleven miles long you only   took one swath down in the ditch. In the  summer you'd have to weed between all the  ties to keep the track clean. In the mid  fifties they started spraying some, then you  didn't weed anymore. We did tamping. You  dug a hole under the track and the section  boss would raise up the rails and that would  lift the tie and you'd tamp the ground  under the tie and make it level and hard so when everything was put back the track would be level. Sometimes we'd unload work trains, gravel, cinders, marble. We put  new rails in. We started in 1941 up here in  Grand Isle. We got it ready one year, all  new ties and then in 1942 they started laying new rail from Grand Isle and they  laid it two and a half miles. Then in 1943  they went way up to Abnaki. In 1945, after I came out of the Army,  Boyden was boss in Grand Isle. I started  working in Grand Isle then. In 1957 they  cut the North Hero section and Sid Cootware came to Grand Isle to work as   boss. My brother went to Alburgh. I stayed in  Grand Isle. In 1957 they lengthened the  section again. Now it was about eighteen  miles, from South hero to South Alburg.  They had four men working it, eight hours   a day, five days a week. Our headquarters was a "car house"  halfWay  between  the station  and  the  Creamery. We kept our tools in there.  The trains took the milk out every day. There'd be a lot of coal cars come by. People  would get coal, were were a couple of coal  dealers in town. They'd get a boxcar full of   coal. In the 40's machinery used to come on  the trains, John Deere machinery. Bullis  had the dealership. Rousseau Brothers' cars  always came in on the trains. Ed Bullis was  running a grain store and that grain as well  as the grain for the Corners Store came in  on a railroad car. Anything that was  delivered most generally came in on the  train.
           When the railroad came that was about  the  time  that  many  camps,  cottages,  different things sprung up, though some  had been here before when the boats  brought summer people in, There was  Island Villa, they had at least forty,  rooms. They'd have at least a hundred  guests. Barney's used to have twelve, fifteen  guests. Sylvesters had guests. Blackwoods  down to Adams Landing, Vantines, Camp Vermont, Day's Camp, Hurlburts, Corbins Lodge all used to keep summer guest's.  That's it in Grand Isle that I can remember.  The last ten or twelve years that Vantines  was in business all their people came by  cars. Camp Vermont was out of it by that  time, The Day's owned and ran Birchcliffe. There were two sisters. That camp was over where the State Park is now, the State  bought them out.
           In the early fifties the trains went  diesel and that was a change from coal. The biggest change in the railroad, though, was when they took off the passenger trains and  mail around 1953. There were six passenger  trains, Nos. 43' 46, 51, 52, 64 and 65. Then  there was Nos. 87 and 88 milk trains and in  the summer there would be an extra 87 and  88. When they took those all off, that just  left the freight. It cut about eight trains off   a day.  They  weren't  getting enough passengers. They ran into Montreal, night passenger coaches. When my brothers  were first running the railroad in the  thirties there'd be eight, ten people in the station waiting to get on the train, go to Burlington, then come back at night. The last day we came in from working in North Hero and there were the orders. No More Trains. The next day everybody was  laid off, except the men in Grand Isle had to first go to Alburg and help them put a crossing in. So I drove my car to Alburgh   and carried the men. We couldn't use the section car, we had to go by automobile. I  worked up there three days getting the  crossing in at Rouses' Point. The last day I  worked was September 28, 1961. The train  stopped running September 25, 1961. It went so slow you didn't see it, The cars at
 trucks came in so quick. It just kept dying dying, dying.....................(Excerpted from A History of the Town of Grand Isle as told by the People of the Town, Edited by Jan Bender. Copyright 1991 Landside Press. Used by permission.)


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