The Jersey Line: the New Jersey, Indiana & Illinois

1902–1983 · SINGER'S RAILROAD

The last steam road built into South Bend was a factory's own: The New Jersey, Indiana & Illinois was incorporated in 1902 as the Singer Manufacturing Company's railroad — the firm's full profile, its 1901 South Bend works and the road's place in them, stands in this build's Businesses section, and what belongs here is the railroad's own course. Service began in 1905 over 11.4 miles from South Bend south to Pine, Indiana, where the line met the Wabash's Chicago–Detroit route; railroad men called it the Jersey Line. It was a switching and terminal road with main-line manners: through the First World War it ran passenger trains, two round trips daily, advertised as through service to Detroit over the Wabash connection, a service not discontinued until the 1930s. The Wabash took stock control in 1926 and kept the road a separate company — through the Norfolk & Western's lease of the Wabash on 16 October 1964 and beyond — until the separate company's end in 1983, when it passed into the Norfolk & Western (some accounts give 1982; the road's detailed compiled history gives 1983, and 1983 is printed). The small roundhouse stood on Olive Street north of Calvert. After the 1999 Conrail division let Norfolk Southern reach South Bend's plants over the former New York Central, the Jersey Line's own main line to Pine was abandoned and lifted in the late 1990s, back to just past Calvert Street. Its city trackage remains in the Norfolk Southern local worked out of the Sample and Olive office, told in the freight entry below.

Sources:

1. This build's Businesses section — the New Jersey, Indiana & Illinois incorporated in 1902 and in service in 1905, eleven miles to the Wabash at Pine, as Singer's own railroad; cross-referenced, with the firm's profile there.
2. Monon.org's South Bend record — the Jersey Line's passenger trains, two round trips daily through the First World War as through Detroit service, discontinued in the 1930s; the Olive Street roundhouse.
3. The New Jersey, Indiana & Illinois's compiled history (american-rails.com, rev. 2026) — the Wabash's stock control of 1926, the road's survival as a separate company past the 1964 Norfolk & Western lease, and its corporate end in 1983; the 1982 variant in the road's shorter compiled accounts is noted in the entry.
4. The Kankakee Belt Route's compiled record — the lifting of the main line to Pine in the late 1990s back to just past Calvert Street, once Norfolk Southern could reach the South Bend plants over the former New York Central.