DT&I: Detroit, Toledo & Ironton
Unknown Author , Public Domain This is a map of the Detroit, Toledo and Ironton Railroad as of 1918, with trackage rights in purple and then-proposed lines dotted. The Detroit, Toledo & Ironton route started as various narrow gauge railroads. With a series of bankruptcies and corporate maneuvers, it became a contiguous standard gauge railroad between Detroit and Ironton with a branch to Toledo. When Henry Ford was building his huge River Rouge Complex, he bought the DT&I on July 9, 1920 and added the Dearborn branch shown on the map below. The DT&I route connected his plant to all of the major east/west railroads and allowed him to choose which railroads handled which shipments. But his vision was much more than a glorified industrial spur. He planed to build an extension to Deepwater, WV where it would connect with the lucrative Virginian Railway. He then planned to buy that railway to give him a connection to an Atlantic port. He also planned to electrify ...