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CONDITION
Antique archival condition. The collection shows age-appropriate toning, folds, creases, edge wear, chips, tears, staining, old staples/brads, handwritten filing notations and general handling wear. Some deed packets and covers have damaged or separated edges. The three stock certificates are unused/unissued examples with blank ownership, share, date and signature fields.
The 1917 lease booklet and other multi-page documents have not been professionally conserved. All items are being sold as historical collectibles, exactly as shown. Please inspect every photograph carefully for content and condition.
ITEM SPECIFICS
Type: Railroad corporate and land-acquisition archive
Railroad: Chicago Union Transfer Railway / Belt Railway of Chicago
Related Company: Chicago Transfer & Clearing Company
Location: Chicago and Cook County, Illinois
Date Range: Approximately 1889–1917, plus circa-1920s aerial photograph
Original/Reproduction: Original period documents; modern printed reference map identified separately
Material: Paper
Country/Region of Manufacture: United States
Theme: Railroadiana, Chicago history, industrial history, land development
Condition: Used
Quantity: One complete archive/grouping
DESCRIPTION
Substantial original Chicago railroad and industrial-history archive documenting the acquisition, transfer and use of land connected with the Chicago Union Transfer Railway and the development that ultimately became associated with the Belt Railway of Chicago’s Clearing Yard.
This is not a random accumulation of unrelated railroad paper. The deeds, title packets, corporate correspondence, stock certificates, photograph and 1917 Belt Railway lease were preserved together as one working historical grouping. Together, they tell the story of one of Chicago’s most ambitious railroad-development projects.
THE HISTORICAL STORY
The Chicago Union Transfer Railway was organized during the late 1880s as part of an ambitious effort to create a massive freight-transfer and clearing facility southwest of Chicago.
Railroad promoter Alpheus B. Stickney envisioned an approximately one-mile circular freight-clearing yard with tracks radiating toward the many railroads entering Chicago. Often remembered as “Stickney’s Circle” or “Stickney’s Folly,” the circular plan was intended as a freight interchange and classification system—not a passenger station.
The complete circular scheme never operated as originally envisioned. The land and railway infrastructure, however, were not abandoned. The property passed through subsequent corporate and legal arrangements and became connected with the enormous Clearing Yard operated by the Belt Railway Company of Chicago.
Clearing Yard remains an active Chicago railroad facility today.
This archive appears to preserve part of the actual documentary trail behind that transformation: the late-19th-century land purchases, later title corrections and releases, corporate financing correspondence, and a direct 1917 lease from Chicago Title & Trust Company, as trustee, to the Belt Railway Company of Chicago.
ARCHIVE CONTENTS
The collection includes dozens of period deed, title and legal-document packets dating primarily from approximately 1889 through 1908. Document types represented include:
• Warranty deeds
• Quitclaim deeds
• Special warranty deeds
• Certified recorded copies
• Releases and covenants
• Right-of-way documents
• Guardianship and court-authorized conveyance material
• Title-company documents
• Cook County Recorder filing wrappers and recording information
• Corporate and banking correspondence
• Stock-transfer correspondence
• 1917 Belt Railway lease booklet
• Three engraved stock-certificate forms
• Vintage aerial railroad-yard photograph
• Modern printed reference map
Many packets retain their original Cook County filing information, document numbers, record-book numbers, page references, attorneys’ markings and historical archive notations such as “Box 990,” “Box 143” and “Box 453.”
REPRESENTATIVE LAND DOCUMENTS
Names and transactions visible in the archive include:
• Nancy Cooper, widow, to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed November 25, 1889, Document No. 1189880
• Alexander E. Aikton/Aiken and wife to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—Keystone Addition, filed November 20, 1889, Document No. 1187559
• Sarah F. Towne et al. to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed May 14, 1890, Document No. 1268847
• Flora Rebecca Chamberlain, spinster, to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed February 21, 1890, Document No. 1225320
• Charles T. Neale, guardian of James E. Brown, to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed March 1, 1890, Document No. 1228228
• Edward S. Pickering and wife to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed August 7, 1890, Document No. 1316054
• John J. Murphy and Thomas C. Murphy and their wives to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed November 30, 1891, Document No. 1576411
• Parke E. Simmons and wife to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—filed December 11, 1889, Document No. 1196131
• Annie A. Chamberlain and husband to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—Quitclaim Deed, Document No. 3293331
• Frank H. Ray to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—Special Warranty Deed, Document No. 3278812
• Chicago Title & Trust Company to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—1908 Quitclaim Deed, Document No. 4252365
• John V. Le Moyne and wife to Chicago Union Transfer Railway Company—1908 Quitclaim Deed, Document No. 4285231
The archive also contains additional chains of title, releases, certified copies and related conveyances. Some documents are original period recorded deeds, while others are period certified copies or legal filing packets. The collection is not represented as consisting entirely of original signed deeds.
1917 BELT RAILWAY LEASE
A particularly important component is the printed lease dated July 1, 1917:
Chicago Title & Trust Co., Trustee
to
The Belt Railway Company of Chicago
The opening page identifies Chicago Title & Trust Company as trustee under Trust No. 3415, dated April 1, 1908. It describes strips of land in Sections 20 and 21, Township 38 North, Range 13 East of the Third Principal Meridian, Cook County, Illinois.
This lease provides a direct documentary connection between the earlier land-holding arrangements and the Belt Railway Company of Chicago.
THREE ENGRAVED STOCK CERTIFICATES
Included are three large green engraved Chicago Transfer & Clearing Company stock-certificate forms:
• Certificate No. 610
• Certificate No. 655
• Certificate No. 656
Each certificate has an elaborate locomotive and industrial railroad vignette and states a par value of $100 per share.
These three examples are unused/unissued forms. The ownership, number-of-shares, date and officer-signature fields remain blank. They are offered strictly as historical scripophily collectibles and do not represent current ownership or financial value.
CORPORATE AND BANKING CORRESPONDENCE
The archive includes original 1912–1914 correspondence concerning issued Chicago Transfer & Clearing Company shares and stock transfers. Letterheads and institutions represented include:
• Chicago Transfer & Clearing Company
• First Trust and Savings Bank
• The Northern Trust Company
• The New York Trust Company
• United States Trust Company of New York
• Busk & Daniels
• Estate and inheritance-tax offices
One November 26, 1912 Chicago Transfer & Clearing Company letter documents the transfer of an 84-share certificate into Certificates Nos. 534 and 535.
A Northern Trust letter and Illinois Inheritance Tax Office consent concern Certificate No. 525 for 30 shares held in connection with the estate of Dwight Lawrence.
A 1914 United States Trust Company letter references Certificate No. 598 for 50 shares registered to the trust company as trustee under a deed of trust associated with former United States Treasury Secretary Lyman J. Gage. This is a corporate reference and is not represented as an autograph of Gage.
The issued certificates referenced in these letters are not included. The only stock certificates included are the three unissued engraved examples described above.
VINTAGE AERIAL PHOTOGRAPH
Also included is a vintage aerial photograph believed to date from approximately the 1920s, showing the expansive railroad yard and surrounding Chicago industrial district. Numerous tracks, freight cars, industrial buildings and undeveloped areas are visible. The number “2422” appears in the lower-left corner of the image.
The photograph is believed to depict the Clearing Yard area, but it is being described according to the available visual and collection context rather than a separately documented photographer’s attribution.
MODERN REFERENCE MAP
A modern printer-made map showing the proposed circular Chicago Union Transfer Railway yard arrangement is included as a complimentary research aid only.
The map is not antique, is not an original railroad map or blueprint, and contributes no claimed collectible value to the archive.
COLLECTING SIGNIFICANCE
The strength of this collection is its surviving context. It combines:
• Chicago railroad history
• Original Cook County land records
• The uncompleted Stickney circular-yard concept
• Chicago Union Transfer Railway material
• Chicago Transfer & Clearing Company corporate records
• Belt Railway of Chicago documentation
• Early stock-transfer and banking correspondence
• Railroad scripophily
• A period aerial view of the yard
• More than two decades of connected legal and corporate history
Individual deeds and certificates are occasionally encountered, but a coherent archive preserving the land-acquisition, corporate and operational story together is considerably more difficult to find.
The archive should be of interest to collectors and institutions specializing in Chicago history, railroadiana, industrial archaeology, land development, corporate history, legal ephemera, scripophily or the Belt Railway of Chicago.
WHAT THE BUYER WILL RECEIVE
The buyer will receive the complete grouping shown in the listing photographs, including the deed and title packets, corporate letters, three unissued stock certificates, 1917 lease booklet, vintage aerial photograph and modern printed reference map.
No railroad property, land rights, mineral rights, stock ownership or other present legal or financial interest is conveyed. All material is sold solely as historical paper collectibles.
Please examine the photographs carefully. Additional close-up photographs of individual documents or pages are available upon request.
keywords
Chicago Union Transfer Railway, Chicago Union Transfer Ry, Belt Railway of Chicago, Clearing Yard, Stickney Circle, Stickney’s Folly, A.B. Stickney, Chicago Transfer and Clearing Company, Chicago railroad archive, antique railroad deeds, railroad land records, railroad lease, Cook County deeds, Chicago Title and Trust, railroad stock certificates, antique scripophily, railroad ephemera, railroad documents, railroadiana, industrial Chicago history, freight yard, switching yard, railway right of way, warranty deed, quitclaim deed, 1889 railroad, 1890s railroad, 1917 lease, vintage aerial photograph, Chicago history archive, Illinois railroad history
