New York and Harlem Railroad $10,000 gold bond certificate 1940-60s (New York)

NYC streetcars! Nice vignette of the railroad baron Cornelius Vanderbilt, Horizontal format. Issued and cancelled. Dated 1940s to 1960s.  Vertical folds from storage. Measuring approximately 13 x 9 inches.  

New York and Harlem Railroad was incorporated in 1831 to link New York City with suburban Harlem. Among the company's founders was John Mason, a wealthy banker and president of Chemical Bank. The New York and Harlem Railroad was first built from the original Grand Central Terminal on 42nd Street in New York City to suburban Harlem. They decided to build their railroad on the eastern side of Manhattan Island, convinced that it would never be able to compete with steamboat traffic on the Hudson River.

As in other early railroads, the dominant propulsion in the railroad's early years was horse power. In 1837, steam engines were introduced, but their use was limited to areas outside of the heavily settled parts of the city, which was then south of 23rd Street.

In 1864, the railroad was purchased by Cornelius Vanderbilt, who consolidated it five years later with the Hudson River Railroad to form the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad: a precursor of the much larger New York Central Railroad.

The first electric streetcar open to passengers in New York City, a Julien electric traction car, was run on September 17, 1888 on the line to 86th Street. The line went back to using horses for a time, but switched to a below-grade third rail in 1897. In 1896, the Metropolitan Street Railway leased the streetcar lines.

The New York City Railway, which leased the Metropolitan, and hence also these lines, went into receivership in, 1907. The receivers returned operation of the Fourth Avenue line back to the Metropolitan Street Railway in 1908. The lease was terminated in 1920 and the operation returned to the NY&H.

in 1932, it was leased again, this time to the New York Railways Corporation, with the right to convert the line to bus operation. The stockholders voted to do this in 1934. The line eventually became part of the New York Central Railroad system with trackage rights granted to the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad into Manhattan. It is now part of the Metro-North Railroad system, and the only Manhattan trackage of that system.

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