The Virginia Central Railroad was chartered as the Louisa Railroad in 1836 by the Virginia Board of Public Works, and was renamed as the Virginia Central Railroad in 1850. It connected Richmond with the Orange and Alexandria Railroad at Gordonsville in 1854, and had expanded westward past the Blue Ridge Mountains into the Shenandoah Valley as the American Civil War began in 1861. Edmund Fontaine was the president of the Virginia Central Railroad for most of its history.
Heavily damaged, it was rebuilt after the War, and merged with the Covington and Ohio Railroad in 1868 to form the new Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad (C&O). Under the leadership of Collis P. Huntington, the C&O line was completed to the Ohio River in 1873, and the Peninsula Extension built east from Richmond reached the harbor of Hampton Roads at Newport News by 1882.
Read more about Virginia Central Railroad: History, Coal To Newport News, Modern Times, Other Uses of The Virginia Central Name
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