Page:Vincent F. Seyfried - The Long Island Rail Road A Comprehensive History - Vol. 2 (1963).pdf/109

 The Central Railroad of Long Island ferent routes to Babylon and Fire Island, and not until November were surveyors set to marking out the finally determined route.

Another point of progress during the long wait was the assembling and preparation of rolling stock. Three new engines, the Farmingdale, the Babylon and the Garden City, arrived during 1872 and sixteen new and elegant passenger coaches were delivered for service. Similarly, work on the stations made progress. In June the Hinsdale and Creedmoor stations went up; in October the engine house at Hempstead was finished and work on the brick depot began.

The fall months went by with no further announcements from the Central R.R. management; presumably, every last detail including the bridges was being checked before making any further statements. Then, very quietly at 10 P.M. on the evening of Tuesday, January 7, 1873, an hour when nearly all Hempstead had retired, a locomotive startled the village with the loud and unearthly screeching of its whistle and the glare of its headlight. The engine was seen to draw a string of dark cars through the frosty night into the unlit sepulchral precincts of Hempstead depot. Then all was again silent. At 6:30 the next morning, Wednesday, January 8, 1873, while it was still dark, and without any festive ceremony whatever, the engine Farmingdale pulled out with one car and two passengers, marking the first regular passenger trip on the Central Railroad of Long Island. As it grew light and word spread through the sleeping village, more persons drifted through the snow down to the Central depot, and took their first ride on the new Stewart road. The second trip at 7:45 A.M. carried thirteen passengers, and as the day wore on, better and better patronage developed.

Nine trains a day ran a through service between Hempstead and Hunter's Point. The stations on the first timetable in January were very few: Central Junction in Flushing, Creedmoor, Hinsdale, Garden City and Hempstead. During the first month of operation the cars were very well patronized, notwithstanding disagreeable winter weather. The handsome coaches elicited universal praise in every quarter.

Efforts were now made to finish the Bethpage Branch from the main line at Farmingdale to the brick works in the Bethpage Hills. In May 1872 the Bethpage Branch was surveyed to cross the L.I.R.R. main line a mile west of Farmingdale village.