Submitted by Hans Raum

Earlier this month I attended the annual convention of the Rutland Railroad Historical Society, held at the Vermont Marble Museum in Proctor on May 2-3.  I accepted donations of historical material from three members and took photographs of several marble quarries and railroad bridges that I visited during one of the field trips.  The oldest item that was donated to the Rutland Railroad Archives that is part of our Vermont Collection was an 1851 annual report of the Rutland & Burlington Railroad, which was the earliest ancestor of the Rutland Railroad. 

The advent of railroads in Vermont was crucial to the economic development of the state, including the marble, granite, slate, lumber and dairy industries.