Series VIII: Carrier Mergers, 1958-1968

This series contain documentation of various mergers between carriers that occurred during the 1950s and 1960s; this period is sometimes referred to Railroad Merger Era. It began in the late 1950s with the approval of the merger between the Norfolk and Western with The Virginian Railway. The culmination of the railroad merger era was the merger of the Pennsylvania Railroad with the New York Central Railroad in 1968, forming the Penn Central Transportation Company.

This series contains some of the Agreements of the Penn Central merger, as well as copies of Agreements from other large carrier mergers. These records are present because they were used as templates for the Agreements used in CNW's merger with Chicago Great Western Railway in 1968. The various Consolidation Agreements demonstrate how complicated and unwieldy this process was, and helps demonstrate why the majority of these mergers resulted in larger carrier companies declaring bankruptcy and led to the deregulation of the industry and the creation of national corporations ConRail and Amtrak which operated on what had been the Penn Central's tracks.