There were several of these in Southern Illinois in the early part of the century. I have been gathering information about one in particular – the Coal Belt Electric Railway – that illustrates what happened to them all The Coal Belt Electric Railway was called “ the street car line”, “the trolley line” and “the interurban” among other things. But by whatever name, for nearly a quarter of a century, it served Marion, Carterville. Herrin and points between, carrying coal miners to and from work, shoppers, visitors, sports fans and any- one who needed a cheap, reliable ride.
The Coal Belt Electric Railway was incorporated on May 28. 1901 by F.S. Peabody of the Peabody Coal Co. It started operating in 1902 running passengers and their hand baggage from Spillertown through Marion to Carterville and Herrin. There was a “wye” where the Carterville and Herrin lines branched off. It was here that the power plant for the lines was built in 1903 and a village, with a post office, was established in 1905. It became known as Fordville after real estate operator Wiley N. Ford and his son Dr. William H. Ford, who owned land there. In 1909 Herbert B. Taylor took over operation of two nearby mines, Taylor 1 and 2, and began to market a brand of coal he called “Energy”. On April 2, 1913 the town’s name was changed to Energy.
The Iron Mountain Co. acquired the Coal Belt stock in 1904 and added a few miles of track that year serving a steam engine. Eventually, the Missouri Pacific Company bought the stock and ran the Coal Belt Line. The line originally had tracks down North Market, West Main Street and through the square but was relocated from the square after a few years.
There were stops at Peabody Coal Company, Electric Park, Crenshaw Crossing, Energy, Carterville, Taylor Crossing, Hafer Crossing, Herrin and wherever else passengers could talk the motorman into picking them up and letting them off. Things ran swimmingly up until World War I. By 1917 there were so many passengers that many had to ride the cars standing up even though there was service every hour on the hour from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. The last run was called the “Owl Run.” More cars had to be added and the Coal Belt system had to buy electricity from Central Illinois Public Service Co. because the Energy power plant couldn’t supply enough. But after the war the road building program started and people began to buy cars and form car pools lo get to work and back.
By 1924 the Missouri-Pacific got permission to reduce hourly service to once every two hours. By early 1926 Mo-Pac petitioned the Illinois Commerce Commission lo discontinue operation on the 13.4 miles of main line and 9.1 miles of side track of the Coal Belt Electric Railway. It was pointed out that passenger revenue had dropped from $138,858 in 1921 to $32,363 in 1925.
Permission to discontinue operations was granted in October and on midnight Monday Nov. 15, 1926 the Coal Belt line went out of existence.
In Carterville where the street car line came into town on lllinois Avenue and stopped at the Division Street depot, it was years after the tracks were taken up before Illinois Avenue could be paved, because the railway company refilled the deep cracks where the tracks had run and the ground was too soft to hold the paving. In Herrin, city fathers reluctantly bowed to the inevitable and negotiated an agreement to have the railway take up its tracks down the middle of Park Avenue and repave the street.”
See also, Coal Belt Electric Line Disposal in 1927
(This article in its entirety was written in 1979 by Ben Gelmen, former Sunday news editor for the Southern Illinoisan, it was reprinted in the 1989 Sesquicentennial Souvenir book; photos taken from 1905 Souvenir book)