Arcata & Mad River

Company History: Arcata & Mad River was formed in 1881 to take over an earlier line between Korbel and Korbelex, just northeast of Arcata, California (northeast of Eureka.) Their sole connection was with the Northwestern Pacific at Korbelex near the very end of that line. The decades of the California construction boom were good to the A&MR. They served as many as 15 shippers along their route requiring a fleet of four GE 44-tonners plus a Whitcomb switcher to keep things moving. That's impressive for a line that was less than 8 miles long. The party ended in 1983 when Southern Pacific (NWP's parent) announced they could no longer maintain NWP's washout and landslide prone route north of Willits and suspended service. Operations on A&MR ended at the same time and the line was formally abandoned 2 years later.

Brief History: The U.S. is a country of 50 states covering a vast swath of North America, with Alaska in the northwest and Hawaii extending the nation’s presence into the Pacific Ocean. Major Atlantic Coast cities are New York, a global finance and culture center, and capital Washington, DC. Midwestern metropolis Chicago is known for influential architecture and on the west coast, Los Angeles' Hollywood is famed for filmmaking.