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 Replies: 7 / Views: 2,343 |
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Valued Member
United States
224 Posts |
Hi Folks,
My sister just passed away and my nephew and myself were going through the coins and currency that she had collected over the years and found a 25 Cent Stock printed on paper and issued by the State of Georgia for the Wills Valley Railroad and dated 1862. It was apparently issued as payment to workers that worked on building the Wills Valley Railroad! Has anyone ever come across one of these or know anything about them? The Stock is in pretty poor shape but would probably grade at Good with much of the printing still legible. Since the Wills Valley Railroad was taken over by another Railroad Company, then passed to several others over the years, some of which (I believe) still exist, could it be possible that the Stock is still good and payable? Probably not but does anyone know what the value might be?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks...Frank
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Rest in Peace
United States
7075 Posts |
If the Wills Valley RR was taken over, the new company would have had to purchase the majority, if not all, of the shares. If the new company went out of business, then the stock is worthless.
There was a time when new cereal companies were cropping up all over the place and they would issue millions of shares. Most went out of business and anyone who owned shares lost what they invested. The shares, which were printed on cotton rag paper, were then used to stuff mattresses and for insulation.
I don't know what the value of the stock certificate would be as a collectable but I think you might try taking it to a historical society or museum for more informaiton. You might want to consider donating to a museum...there might be a tax write-off for that.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1358 Posts |
I'm sorry about your sister..
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Valued Member
 United States
224 Posts |
coinsearcher83,
Thanks for the condolences!
Also, I wanted to say Hi to all of my friends here on Coin Community...especially those that knew me when I frequented Coin Talk!
Frank
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Valued Member
United States
224 Posts |
Buddy, I believe it is possible that the Wills Valley Railroad Stock is still payable! However, it would probably take tons of research and the 25 Cent Stock would have to be Certified as authentic. It is possible that the Stock was made non-payable and void long ago and this information is just not on the World Wide Web. However, unless I missed something, I can find no mention that any of the Railroad Companies went totally bottom-up before they were taken over or their operations were taken over by another Railroad Company. I have copied and pasted below an sizable piece about the Wills Valley Railroad and the companies that succeeded it, done by Wikipedia. Alabama Great Southern RailroadFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alabama Great Southern Railroad
Reporting mark
AGS
Locale
Chattanooga, TN-Meridian, MS (New Orleans, LA from 1969)
Dates of operation
1877--present
Track gauge
4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) (standard gauge); originally built as 5 ft (1,524 mm)
The Alabama Great Southern Railroad (reporting mark AGS) is a railroad in the U.S. states of Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. It is an operating subsidiary of the Norfolk Southern Corporation (NS),[1] running southwest from Chattanooga (where it connects with the similarly owned Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Railway) to New Orleans through Birmingham and Meridian. The AGS also owns approximately a 30% interest in the Kansas City Southern-controlled Meridian-Shreveport Meridian Speedway.[2]
[edit] History
The AGS's oldest predecessor was the Wills Valley Railroad, chartered by the Alabama Legislature in February 1852 to extend from a point on the Alabama and Tennessee River Railroad northeast to the Georgia state line. In January and February 1854, respectively, the Georgia and Tennessee legislatures authorized the company to continue its road to a point on the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad.[4][5] The North East and South West Alabama Railroad was chartered in Alabama in December 1853 and Mississippi in February 1854, to extend from Meridian through Livingston, Eutaw, Tuscaloosa, and Elyton (Birmingham) in the direction of Knoxville, Tennessee.[6][7] Both companies received land grants through a June 1856 federal law,[9] assigned by Alabama in January 1858 to the North East and South West from Mississippi to near Gadsden and to the Wills Valley from near Gadsden to Georgia.[10]
The two companies began construction from their termini lying outside Alabama. The Wills Valley opened the line from the Nashville and Chattanooga at Wauhatchie, Tennessee to Trenton, Georgia by December 1860, operating to Chattanooga via trackage rights over the Nashville and Chattanooga.[11] The North East and South West began its line at Meridian, reaching a connection with the Alabama and Mississippi Rivers Railroad (later the Selma and Meridian Railroad) at York, Alabama by 1860, and was leased to the latter company.[12] A group of Boston capitalists headed by John C. Stanton gained control of the companies after the Civil War, and the legislature passed a law in November 1868 to merge the two as the Alabama and Chattanooga Railroad. (Georgia, Tennessee, and Mississippi renamed their portions in March 1869, February 1870, and May 1871, respectively.) The entire line was completed in May 1871, creating a diagonal link across Alabama.[13] However, due to nonpayment of interest on state bonds, the state of Alabama seized the property in mid-1871, and it was operated by other parties (including the president of the connecting New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad) until November 1877, when it was reorganized as the Alabama Great Southern Railroad by Emile Erlanger and Company.[7]
Erlanger set up an English corporation, Alabama Great Southern Railway Company, Limited, to own the stock of the AGS. In 1881, this company gained control of the Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Railway, which continued north from Chattanooga to Cincinnati. A second English corporation, Alabama, New Orleans, Texas and Pacific Junction Railways Company, Limited, was created in 1881 to increase the funds available to purchase associated lines. It bought the Alabama Great Southern Railway Company, New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad, Vicksburg and Meridian Railway, and Vicksburg, Shreveport and Pacific Railroad, but in 1890 control of the AGS was sold to the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railway and Richmond and Danville Railroad, which both became part of the Southern Railway later that decade.[14] In April 1892, the AGS acquired the Gadsden and Attalla Railroad, a branch from Attalla to Gadsden, but in 1905 the AGS sold it to the Southern, retaining trackage rights. The AGS bought a half interest in the Woodstock and Blocton Railway from the Louisville and Nashville Railroad in July 1909, giving it access to West Blocton.[12]
The AGS incorporated the Wauhatchie Extension Railway in April 1914 to continue the line from Wauhatchie to a junction with the Southern subsidiary Memphis-Chattanooga Railway west of Lookout Mountain. The property became part of the AGS in February 1917 and was completed later that year, giving the AGS a new route into Chattanooga, via the extension, trackage rights over the Memphis-Chattanooga, and a lease of the Belt Railway of Chattanooga.[7]
In January 1969, at the same time as the Southern gained total control over the AGS, it merged the New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad into the AGS.[15][16][17] The AGS absorbed the Chattanooga Terminal Railway, Louisiana Southern Railway, and New Orleans Terminal Company in August 1993.Edited by huntsman53
12/08/2011 11:04 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1358 Posts |
Oh, so that's what AGS stands for! I'm kind of a railroad buff myself, and I just never knew what that reporting mark meant.
All I know is that AGS is part of Norfolk Southern. From what I read above, it seems that AGS still operates as its own business, although I'm not sure how they'd account for stocks anymore. It seems it was all combined into Norfolk Southern stock, which is about $70/share...
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Pillar of the Community
United States
507 Posts |
If it's true that the company eventually was acquired by Norfolk Southern, I'd call their shareholder information customer service line. It might be a deadend, but it might be a quick way to some solid information that the internet can't provide. Most big corporations have an 'Investors' section of their website with contact information.
Good luck, keep us posted
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1358 Posts |
Edited by coinsearcher83
12/09/2011 10:06 am
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Replies: 7 / Views: 2,343 |
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Posted 12/06/2011 12:08 am
