Chicago Railroad Visionary Inducted into Hall of Fame William Butler Ogden was honored at a formal induction ceremony in Galesburg, Illinois, on Saturday, June 25th. Ogden led the Galena & Chicago Union Railroad on whose tracks the first train steamed out of Chicago in October 1848, beginning the city’s transformation into one of the world’s most important rail hubs. “Ogden was a visionary who understood that railroads would be key to realizing Chicago’s potential as the business and commercial hub of the Midwest,” said Hall of Fame Executive Director Julie King. Ogden was represented at the ceremony by his descendant and biographer Jack Harpster of Reno, Nevada. Harpster’s book, The Railroad Tycoon who built Chicago; A Biography of William B. Ogden, won the Illinois State Historical Society Award of Merit in 2009. The ceremony, which took place on the campus of Knox College, included remarks by Rodney O. Davis, Co-Director of the Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College, titled “Chicago and Its Railroads.” Hall of Fame Executive Director Julie King said, “Stories of the lives of inductees carry meaning for us all because they tell of our shared experience as Americans; how railroads transformed our nation and how they continue to touch each of our lives today.” The National Railroad Hall of Fame was established in Galesburg, Illinois, by the United States Congress to honor the men and women who built the railroads. Induction ceremonies are conducted on an annual basis and coincide with Galesburg’s Railroad Days Festival. Biographical Information William Butler Ogden was born in Walton New York in 1805. He moved to Chicago in 1835 and was elected the city’s first mayor. In 1845, he became President and chief stockholder of the Galena and Chicago Union Railroad. Three years later, the first train left Chicago on the G&CU under steam power of the locomotive Pioneer. In 1864, Ogden consolidated the G&CU with a number of smaller railroads to create the powerful Chicago and North Western Railway. |