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Welcome to the official web site of the Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc.!The Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc. (PMHS) was founded in 1995 as a means of collecting and disseminating information regarding the Pere Marquette Railroad. Our membership is made up of historians, former employees, modelers, and railfans. If you are interested in the PM, we encourage you to join. The Pere Marquette Railroad Company was formed in 1900 by the merger of numerous Michigan railroads, the most prominent of them being the Flint and Pere Marquette, the Detroit, Grand Rapids and Western, and the Chicago and West Michigan. During its existence, it came under the control of several other railroads at one time or another, including the Baltimore and Ohio and the Erie. In the 1920s, it came under the control of Oris and Mantis Van Sweringen, two financiers from Cleveland who also controlled the Nickel Plate, the Erie, and the Chesapeake and Ohio. Over the years, the C&O gained more and more control over the PM, until on June 6, 1947 the PM was formally merged into the Chesapeake and Ohio. The Pere Marquette operated over trackage stretching from Buffalo, New York to Chicago, and from Bay View (Petoskey) Michigan to Toledo, Ohio, with trackage in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Ontario. In addition to its strictly rail operations, the PM also operated railway car ferries on the Detroit and St. Clair rivers, and a fleet of car ferries from Ludington across Lake Michigan to Milwaukee, Kewaunee and Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Nearly all of the trackage CSX operates in Michigan today is former PM trackage. Please Note: The PMHS is unable to provide
information regarding specific PM employees,
as we do not possess any of the PM's employment records. News Proceeds from this event will be used to fund SRI's tear-down, inspection and rebuild of former Pere Marquette Berkshire #1225, scheduled to begin in 2010. Berkshire #1225, will be joined by Nickel Plate Berkshire #765 from the Fort Wayne Railroad Historical Society, and Southern Pacific GS-4 4-8-4 #4449 as the three "big steam" locomotives at the event. Tickets for #4449's ferry moves are available from the Friends of 261, another event sponsor, which is providing a Milwaukee Road Super Dome and a Milwaukee Road Skytop observation lounge car as first-class accommodations for the ferry moves and the day-long trips at Train Festival. Train Festival 2009 is shaping up to be the railroading event of the year in North America, with over 30,000 expected to attend over its three days. Full details can be found at the Train Festival 2009 web site, http://www.trainfestival2009.com .
On March 21, 2008, the Surface Transportastion Board approved the abandonment petition. As of mid-December, track removal has begun in Greenville, concentrated mostly on the ex-GTW trackage the Mid-Michigan used. The trackage in question was part of the PM's "Turkey Trail" line which connected Grand Rapids and Saginaw by way of Elmdale, Lowell, Greenville, Edmore, Alma and St. Louis. The Mid-Michigan Railroad had operated the remaining Greenville-Elmdale segment since 1987, when it served appliance and auto parts manufacturers in Greenville. Frigidaire's March, 2006 closing of its manufacturing plant in Greenville eliminated the last substantial source of traffic on the line. The filing indicates that the MMRR has executed a Memorandum of Understanding
with the West Michigan Trails and Greenways Coalition for the sale of
the right-of-way. Upon approval of the application, it intends to remove
all rails and other track materials on the line, leaving bridges in place.
Once that is completed, it will sell the right-of-way to the Trails and
Greenways Coalition for development as a recreational trail.
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Pere
Marquette Historical Society members receive six issues of PM
Tracks, the bimonthly PMHS newsletter, and two issues of Pere
Marquette Rails, the PMHS magazine, each year. Members also receive
notices of special projects, such as our
custom-run PM freight cars.
We hold an annual "get-together" for members and their immediate families each year at a town along the former-PM right-of-way. The 2008 PMHS Members' Get-Together was held on Saturday, July 26 at the Steam Railroading Institute in Owosso, Michigan and included a trip to Alma and back behind ex-PM Berkshire #1225. Plans for the 2009 Get-Together are being developed.
To join the Pere Marquette Historical Society, send a check or money order for $30.00 (Canadian residents $35.00 US) payable to the "Pere Marquette Historical Society" to:
| Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc. Membership Officer P.O. Box 422 Grand Haven, MI 49417-0422 |
A copy of our membership application form is available on this Web site.
The Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc. is a 501(c)3 non-profit educational organization incorporated in the State of Michigan and recognized by the Internal Revenue Service.
This site would not be possible without the gracious assistance of fellow PMHS members and numerous others who have contributed information and photographs for use on this site, most notably:
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And of course, no work on the PM would be complete without acknowledging the fine work of PMHS President Art Million, who is not only the pioneer PM historian, but has written most of the books and articles published about the PM over the past several decades. Art has also provided valuable background information (and error-correction!) for this site.
Use of this Web site and the materials contained within it is subject to
specific
terms and conditions.
| Do you have questions or comments
regarding this Web site? E-mail to  All original contents of this Web site are Copyright © 2009, John F. ("Fritz") Milhaupt, on behalf of the Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc., All Rights Reserved. |
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RailAmerica Abandons Lowell-Greenville Segment of former PM "Turkey
Trail" - On