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New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad Company, American railroad operating in southern New England and New York. It was absorbed by the Penn Central Transportation Company in 1969.
It was built up from about 125 small railroads, the earliest of which began operation in 1834 as the Hartford and New Haven Railroad. In 1872 the New York and New Haven Railroad Company joined with the Hartford and New Haven to form the New York, New Haven and Hartford. Eventually it had 1,800 miles (2,900 km) of main track.
The company electrified its track between New York and New Haven between 1907 and 1914; this was the first electrification of a main rail line in the United States. The opening of the Connecticut Turnpike in 1959 cut heavily into its revenues, and in 1961 it entered bankruptcy proceedings.
In 1969 the railroad merged with the Penn Central Transportation Company, which had been formed the previous year by the merger of the New York Central Railroad Company and the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. The Penn Central entered bankruptcy only two years later, however. Its passenger services were taken over by the federally established National Railway Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) in 1971, and its other railroad assets were merged with five other lines in the Consolidated Rail Corporation (Conrail) in 1976.
