The Little Rock Railway & Electric Co. played a key role in the electrification, modernization and continued operation of the intra-urban streetcar transportation system that served the citizens of Little Rock in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Prior to electrification, the intra-urban streetcar system in Little Rock consisted of animal-drawn conveyances along the first rail lines built in 1877 by the Citizens’ Street Railway Co. by businessmen from Little Rock and Hot Springs. Over the next decade, technological developments — including the electric lamp (streetlight), more efficient power generation/distribution, and trolley pole systems — allowed animal-drawn streetcars to be gradually replaced with electric streetcars.
Little Rock Railway & Electric Company streetcar conductors and motormen in front of Shillcutt Drugs on the corner of West Markham and Chester Streets in Little Rock; 1907 (Courtesy of the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, Central Arkansas Library System)
Early on, several streetcar companies, such as Capital City Street Railway Co., City Electric Street Railway Co. and Little Rock Street Railway, competed for the right to plan routes, run track and electrify existing routes. From the beginning, the location of streetcar lines served business ventures, influenced the development of suburbs like Pulaski Heights and connected citizens to recreation areas like West End Park (an area later subsumed by Central High School). However, the ability to manufacture and distribute electricity through transportation and its associated infrastructure was crucial in making the enterprise sustainable.
Little Rock native Horace G. Allis consolidated several competing companies (City Electric, Citizens’ Street Railway and Little Rock Street Railway) into the Capital Street Railway Co. Also serving as president of the Consumers Power and Light Co., Allis oversaw the construction of an integrated streetcar barn and power-generating station along the south bank of the Arkansas River at 1100 North St., which was an important step in the establishment of a city-wide electric streetcar system.
Despite efforts to keep control in local hands, financial mismanagement by Allis, who was also president of First National Bank of Little Rock, coupled with the effects of the Panic of 1893 and subsequent economic depression, resulted in the company’s sale. Under circumstances outlined in headlines of the Arkansas Gazette, it was not until substantial financial investment and new technological expertise came from outside Arkansas that the enterprise stabilized. In 1902, led by New York–based railway tycoon Hart D. Newman, I. Newman & Sons obtained the Little Rock Traction & Electric Co. and the Little Rock Edison Light and Power Co., forming the Little Rock Railway & Electric Co.
Little Rock Streetcar #237 and Streetcar Barn (Courtesy of UA Little Rock Center for Arkansas History and Culture, J. N. Heiskell Historical Collection)
Under the company’s new management and its utilization of services by the New York–based engineering firm Ford, Beacon, & Davis, $500,000 was committed for rail improvements, service expansions and streetcar upgrades. By February 1904, a new line to Pulaski Heights was in operation; new trolley barns and power stations were constructed at Water, Arch and Gaines streets; and the old trolley barn at North Street was decommissioned and turned into company offices. The following year, Newman & Sons began acquiring a number of other railway companies based in several southern cities such as Little Rock, Memphis, Birmingham and Nashville, under the Newman Properties Association (NPA).
Despite acquiring transportation companies/systems in other southern cities, Newman Properties, and by extension Little Rock Railway & Electric, were not singly focused on business acquisition and profits but instead were equally invested in the communities in which they operated. As noted by the Arkansas Gazette in 1908, “no plan of civic growth and greatness can be conceived without the electric railroad.” To that end, for two decades, the activities of Little Rock Railway & Electric were instrumental to the further development of the city. The company continued to operate until 1923, when it was acquired by the Arkansas Power and Light Co.
With the increased demand for personal, motorized vehicle transportation, the last electric streetcar associated with Little Rock Railway & Electric ceased running in 1947. However, the remnants of the 1891 Streetcar Barn remain visible from the Arkansas River Trail below 1100 North St. near the Baring Cross Railroad Bridge. — Timothy S. Dodson and Zuzana Chovanec
This story is adapted by Guy Lancaster from the online Encyclopedia of Arkansas, a project of the Central Arkansas Library System. Visit the site at encyclopediaofarkansas.net.
