Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Company

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The former Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railway Station in Orange, Calif.

Robert A. Estremo

Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Company, former railway that was one of the largest in the United States. Chartered in Kansas as the Atchison and Topeka Railroad Company in 1859, it later exercised great influence on the settlement of the southwestern United States. It was renamed the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad in 1863 and acquired its modern name in 1895. Its founder was Cyrus K. Holliday, a Topeka lawyer and business promoter, who sought to build a railroad along the Santa Fe Trail, a 19th-century trading route that ran from Independence, Mo., to Santa Fe, N.M. The railroad’s main line to the Colorado state line was completed in 1872.

The railroad was further expanded in the 1880s and early 1890s to reach about 9,000 miles (14,480 km), but it lost some of this mileage in a reorganization brought on by the financial crisis of 1893; it eventually ran from Chicago to California. Under Edward Payson Ripley, its president from 1895 until 1920, the Santa Fe flourished and grew to more than 11,000 miles (17,700 km) of track. By 1941 it had more than 13,000 miles (21,000 km) of track, but it shrank gradually thereafter. It was among the earliest railways to add dining cars to its passenger train service, which also included stops at the many Harvey House restaurants along the route. The song “On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe,” written by Harry Warren with lyrics by Johnny Mercer and performed by Judy Garland in the 1946 film The Harvey Girls, won the Academy Award for Best Original Song that year and greatly popularized the railway.

In 1968 the company became a subsidiary of Santa Fe Industries, Inc., a holding company. In 1983 this company and the Southern Pacific Transportation Company agreed to merge into the Santa Fe Southern Pacific Corporation, but the merger was rejected by the ICC in 1987. The Southern Pacific rail system was sold off in 1988, and in 1989 the Santa Fe parent company became known simply as the Santa Fe Pacific Corporation. Burlington Northern, Inc., purchased the Santa Fe Pacific Corporation in 1995, and the resulting company took the name Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corporation.

Before it was acquired by the Burlington Northern railroad, the Santa Fe Railway covered 12 states, with most of its trackage in the midwestern and southwestern portions of the United States. Its freight revenues came principally from intermodal traffic, farm and food products, chemicals, motor vehicles and parts, and industrial raw materials. The days of its famed passenger trains such as the Super Chief were largely over by 1970, and it sold its passenger service to the National Railway Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) in 1971.