Chicago & Rock Island Railroad

State: Illinois

The Chicago and Rock Island Railroad Company was created in February 1851 when the Illinois General Assembly passed an act amending the incorporation of the Rock Island and La Salle Railroad Company. The new railroad was authorized to be extended beyond the Rock Island and La Salle Railroad's terminus, by the way of Ottawa and Joliet, to Chicago. Once construction on the line was completed and it opened in July 1854, it ran from Rock Island to Chicago. The Chicago and Rock Island Railroad Company remained independent and did not merge with another railroad company until after the Civil War.

“An Act to Amend an Act to Incorporate the Rock Island and La Salle Railroad Company,” 7 February 1851, Private Laws of Illinois (1851), 47; Newton Bateman and Paul Selby, eds., Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of Carroll County, ed. by Charles L. Hostetter (Chicago: Munsell, 1913), 1:99.