The City of Huntington, WV

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C&O Railroad Beginnings

The history of how the C&O Railroad came to Huntington, WV starts back around 1800 when the first road through the valley, the Old State Road, was built. It followed the Ohio River down from the mouth of the Kanawha River to the Big Sandy River (by the time C. P. Huntington visited the area). George Washington established the James River Co. and surveyed the area. The hope was to build a canal that would connect the James and Ohio rivers and provide a means of transportation from Chesapeake Bay (the James River) to the Ohio River. A road was constructed between the 1830s and 1850s called the James River & Kanawha Turnpike.

One of the first trains used on the Huntington Division of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad in 1873.
The James River Co. later became the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and the turnpike became the rail line of the B & O Railroad. Collis P. Huntington became involved after he was asked to take over the ailing Covington (VA) and Ohio Railroad and decided to fulfill the mandate the acts passed in 1867 by both the states of Virginia and West Virginia for the completion of a line or lines of railroad from the waters of the Chesapeake to the Ohio River. He reorganized the Covington and Ohio Railroad and reenamed it the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad.