THE RAILWAY ERA

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 62, Issue 4422, 7 May 1941, Page 4

THE RAILWAY ERA

TRAVELLING IN A HEARSE. One of the most remarkable business hustles on record was seen 95 years ago, says the Manchester Guardian. Eighteen forty-five was the year of the great railway boom, when new lines were being projected and new companies formed for their construction almost every day. All schemes for new constructions had to be deposited at the Board of Trade by November 30, which happened to fall on Sunday, and there was a mad lastminute rush to get the necessary applications in. No fewer than 28 special trains were run and coaches were at a premium. One enterprising promoter, unable to obtain any other conveyance, drove to London with his plans in a hearse. In all, more than 600 schemes, involving estimated expenditure of more than £560,000,000, together with a much larger number of proposals that had got no further than the issue of a prospectus, were lodged that day. Of these, 500 were brought before Parliament, and 272 obtained acts—with the consequent ruin of thousands who invested money in what were merely bogus or utterly impracticable proposals.