THE ORANGE BELT RAILWAY
Sanford and St. Petersburg RR # 11, a Baldwin narrow gauge
4-4-0
(ex-Denver & Rio Grande)
By Don Hensley
Copyright ©1998-1999 DONALD R. HENSLEY, JR.
This Website is used solely for my personal,
non-commercial use!
As the 1880’s unfolded, Florida’s frontier was
being penetrated by a system of three-foot gauge railroads, spurred
on by a generous state land grant. This story focuses on one
of the last common carrier narrow gauge roads to be built
in Florida, which was also one of the last to be converted to
standard gauge.
Petrovitch A. Demenscheff was born in Petrograd, Russia in 1850.
His family was of the nobility with large estates. He was the
first cousin of Prince Petroff and a captain in the Imperial
Guard. He received training as a forester managing his large
family estates, which would serve him well in the future. In
1880 he was exiled from Russia, and with his wife, children and
servant immigrated to America, Anglicizing his name to Peter
Demens. For some odd reason he headed south to Florida and obtained
a job as a laborer at a sawmill in Longwood, Florida. He worked
hard and within a year was appointed manager. Later with the
money he saved he became partners with the owners and then quickly
bought them out. Demens became one of the biggest contractors
in the state, building houses, stations, hotels and railroads
through out Florida. One railroad contract was the narrow
gauge Orange Belt Railway that he took over when they couldn’t
pay for the work.
The Orange Belt Ry at first was a real estate promotion, using
mule power (his name was Jack) and wood rails from Longwood to
Myrtle Lake. When Demens took the road over he formed an operating
company called the "Orange Belt Investment Company".
He then obtained local financing to rebuild the line using 8
miles of 25 pound rail and purchased a steam locomotive from
an Alabama road that was converting. He then pushed the line
north to Lake Monroe, where he connected with the newly built
standard gauge road, the Jacksonville, Tampa and Key West
Ry. However Longwood had a rail connection with the North from
the "South Florida R.R.", which was in the process
of converting to standard gauge. Demens then turned his
attention to pushing the road south-westerly to Oakland, a growing
town in a rich agricultural section of the state. To do this
he had to obtain financing from investors in New York. Here he
met C.H. Armour of Philadelphia, brother of the famous meat packer
of Chicago. It was announced however that Oakland would not be
the terminus, the road would be pushed on to the Gulf of Mexico,
and a new port would be built. Demens was a man of great energy
as he worked hard on building this railroad and sunk his whole
fortune in it. He worked harder than ever, supervising construction
one week and meeting with investors the next in New York. The
road came close to collapsing at times only to be shored up by
last minute financial deals. He pushed the road to Oakland and
had trains running on October 30, 1886. The road slowly inched
toward the Gulf, reaching Tarpon Springs on January 13, 1888.
By May 1, the line was completed to Saint Petersburg, named after
the famous Russian city of his youth. By this time however, the
Longwood Branch was no longer needed, so the rail and ties were
pulled up and re-laid between Monroe and Sanford. This created
a 152 mile long mainline between Sanford and St. Petersburg.
However Demens could only hold on to his railroad for one
more year. In 1889 he was forced to accept a buy out and he left
Florida for North Carolina where he bought another sawmill, which
he operated for three years. He then went west, arriving in Los
Angeles, California where he operated a steam laundry for four
years. He sold out and bought citrus groves near Alta Loma, where
he lived until his death in 1919.
Demens in my opinion, got out while he could. The railroad was
built in a rural agricultural area, that produced traffic only
in the late Winter and early Spring. The "Orange Belt Investment
Co." owned hundreds of thousand of acres, but growth was
slow in this section. Also they had to compete against Henry
B. Plant’s "South Florida RR" and his port at
Tampa. Only a third of the road was profitable and that was the
line from Lachoochee (connection with the standard gauge
"Florida Central & Peninsular RY") to St. Petersburg.
All the communities along the Gulf coast prospered. However the
other two thirds of the railroad ran in the red, which brought
the railroad into receivership in 1893 when they couldn’t
pay the interest on their bonds. The road was sold by the court,
right back to its owners, and they reorganized as the "Sanford
and St. Petersburg RR". The road limped along until March
of 1895, when Florida had the great freeze, killing all
the Citrus trees. The ownership threw up their hands and meekly
sold out to the "Plant System of Railroads". Plant
promptly standard gauged the profitable section of the
road, while leaving the narrow gauge section in place
from Trilby to Sanford. He also purchased the standard gauge
"Florida Midland" from Sanford to Kissimmee, abandoning
north of the Orange Belt and narrow gauging the line to
Kissimmee. This was run in conjunction with the "S&SP",
using equipment from the Orange Belt and the "Florida Southern
RR" which was converted in 1896. In 1902 the "Atlantic
Coast Line" purchased the "Plant System", inheriting
the narrow gauge lines. The ACL slowly converted the road
until the last portion was completed in April of 1908, ending
the long run of the last narrow gauge common carrier in
Florida.
The Orange Belt interchanged with two standard gauge lines,
the "JT&KW" at Monroe and the "FC&P"
at Lachoochee. Both junctions used the "Ramsey Transfer"
in which standard gauge cars are lifted and re-gauged
with narrow gauge trucks. They also interchanged with
the standard gauge "South Florida RR" at Sanford,
where freight was manually reloaded onto narrow gauge
cars. Narrow gauge interchange, until 1893, was handled
at Macon (later Trilby) with the "South Florida Railroad’s"
narrow gauged Pemberton’s Ferry Branch. It was here
that cars of the "South Florida RR" and the "Florida
Southern RR" were interchanged until 1892 when the branch
was converted.
A typical mixed train of the Orange Belt, this narrow gauge engine
later
served on Atlantic Coast Line’s operation of this line.
This Brooks 14x18
was their largest engine and was the favorite of the crews, and
was used
mostly as the mixed engine.
Typical outbound traffic in an 1890 report shows fruits and
vegetables leading the pack with 3,981 tons carried with lumber
close at 3,188 tons. Inbound leader was fertilizer with 1,819
tons. A grand total of 9,507 tons was originated while 6,482
tons were received. This was carried in 20-25 ton capacity cars,
quite a bit of traffic. Unfortunately they built just south of
the Dunnellon Phosphate Mining District that could have provided
traffic to the port.
Passenger operations consisted of four trains, two southbound
and two north. The northbound No. 66 left the Wharf at 5:55 am,
arriving at Sanford at 1:45 pm. The train was turned and became
southbound No. 71 leaving Sanford at 2:45 p.m. arriving at St.
Petersburg’s Wharf at 10:35 pm. The other two trains were
the railroads crack express trains. The southbound No. 3 left
Lachoochee at 6:00 am, arriving at the Wharf at 10:05 am. The
train was turned and became No. 4, leaving northbound at 6:10
pm and arriving at Lachoochee at 10:15 pm. This train had to
be on time as it met with the "Florida Central & Peninsular"
mail and express trains from Jacksonville.
Freight operations consisted of two mixed trains, southbound
No. 9 leaving Sanford at 4:30 am and arriving at the Wharf at
6:15 pm. Its counterpart, No. 10 left the Wharf at 5:15 am, and
arrived at Sanford at 8:00 pm. An 1891 report stated that they
carried an average of 7 cars per freight train, 4 loads and 3
empties, for a total of 22 tons, an average of 5-2/5 tons a car.
Excursions were popular during the tourist season, from January
to Easter. A "Tarpon Springs Special" was usually run
from St. Petersburg to Tarpons Springs and back. There was also
seasonal fruit and vegetable traffic from December to June. This
consisted of tangerines in December, oranges from January to
March and early vegetables from March to May. A watermelon rush
would occur in June. Oakland was the headquarters of the company,
and their shops, roundhouse and offices were located here. Locomotive
fuel was pine wood, and wood racks were located at every station
along the line. Turntables were located at St. Petersburg, Lachoochee,
Oakland, and Monroe. Trains were backed into Sanford, from Monroe,
2 miles away.
Locomotives consisted of second hand engines from many converted
narrow gauge lines. Eleven of the Twelve engines were
4-4-0’s, with one 2-6-0. Many different builders are represented,
"Baldwin", "National" and "Pittsburgh".
Rolling stock consisted mostly of used cars from the "South
Florida RR" that had just converted their mainline in 1886.
However the shops at Oakland built many of their own boxcars
and some of their baggage cars.
This road was built through rolling hills, around lakes and through
swamps, crossing only one river, the Withlachoochee at Lachoochee.
This railroad was almost a roller coaster, as it was built with
the lay of the ground. However the average grade did not exceed
one percent, except for a short stretch of two and a half percentage
near San Antonio, where the coastal plain meets the sand hills.
The road also had many curves, avoiding the many lakes and swamps
on the route.
St. Petersburg, Florida station.
MODELING THE ORANGE BELT
I would pick the St. Petersburg terminal as the best starting
point. I have found several maps and many photos of the town
and it’s wharf. The beautiful Victorian station would be
a challenge to any modeler while the small yard would keep one
busy switching the six trains a day (plus extras and excursions).
By just cutting the actual trackage by half we can duplicate
this yard to an eight foot shelf. This would allow enough car
space to make up and send trains out as well as receiving and
breaking trains down. The Wharf should take up an additional
four feet to get the right effect.
St. Pete Railway Station: 1892 layout.
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