HISTORICAL ENCYCLOPEDIA OF ILLINOIS.
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pany constructed a line from Montpelier, Ohio, to Clark, Ind. (149.7 miles), thence by track lease to Chicago (17.5 miles), giving an independent line between Chicago and Detroit by what is known to investors as the Detroit & Chicago Division.
The total mileage of the Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific system, in 1884, amounted to over 3,600 miles; but, in May of that year, default having been made in the payment of interest, the work of disintegration began. The main line east of the Mississippi and that on the west were separated, the latter taking the name of the "Wabash Western." The Eastern Division was placed in the hands of a receiver, so remaining until May, 1889, when the two divisions, having been bought in by a purchasing committee, were consolidated under the present name. The total earnings and income of the road in Illinois, for the fiscal year 1898, were $4,402,631, and the expenses $4,836,110. The total capital invested (1898) was $139,889,643, including capital stock of $52,000,000 and bonds to the amount of $81,534,000.
WABASH RIVER, rises in northwestern Ohio, passes into Indiana, and runs northwest to Huntington. It then flows nearly due west to Logansport, thence southwest to Covington, finally turning southward to Terre Haute, a few miles below which it strikes the western boundary of Indiana. It forms the boundary between Illinois and Indiana (taking into account its numerous windings) for some 200 miles. Below Vincennes it runs in a south-southwesterly direction, and enters the Ohio at the south-west extremity of Indiana, near latitude 37° 49' north. Its length is estimated at 557 miles.
WABASH & MISSISSIPPI RAILROAD. (See Illinois Central Railroad.)
WABASH, ST. LOUIS & PACIFIC RAIL-ROAD. (See Wabash Railroad.)
WABASH & WESTERN RAILROAD. (See Wabash Railroad.)
WAIT, William Smith, pioneer, and original suggestor of the Illinois Central Railroad, was born in Portland, Maine, March 5, 1789, and educated in the public schools of his native place. In his youth he entered a book-publishing house in which his father was a partner, and was for a time associated with the publication of a weekly paper. Later the business was conducted at Boston, and extended over the Eastern, Middle, and Southern States, the subject of this sketch making extensive tours in the interest of the firm. In 1817 he made a tour to the West,
