| History: | Moscow, Camden and San Augustine Railway Company, incorporated in 1898, belonged to W. T. Carter & Brother, which included the same set of officers for both lumber and railway companies. Carter constructed the company tramroad, the Moscow, Camden, and San Augustine Railroad, to connect his mill at Camden with the Houston East & West Texas at Moscow. This line did not originate as a logging tram, but rather as a response to the destruction of the Carter mill at Barnum in 1897. Carter needed to link his new mill at Camden with the trunk line at Moscow. The line was quickly recognized by the Railroad Commission of Texas as a common carrier, and, according to Reed, the line operated a profit almost every year. By June 30, 1918, the annual average profit had been about $3,000. The dividends paid over the years totalled more than its outstanding stock. This road never issued bonds.
By 1906, E. A. Carter was the treasurer and general manager for the railway. The rolling stock included three locomotives, four cars, and one steam loader rolling along sixteem miles of standard gauge track. In 1910, the railway owned a locomotive, a passenger car, and sixteen freight cars. An additional unincorporated logging tram from the mill into the timber covered twelve miles. The logging tram brought timber for milling at Camden, then moved it over the railway to the Houston East & West Texas. Almost 1500 people living in the area who were not company or railway employees used the railway. A daily train ran each way, which consisted of one passenger car and four or five freight cars. One shingle mill shipped about three to four carloads each year. Much of the more than 1300 tons of freight shipped on the line was for the commissary. More than ninety percent of the tonnage was for the benefit of the lumber company.
W. T. Carter died in 1921 and was succeeded by his son, A. L. Carter, as President. In 1940, R. D. Randolph operated as Vice President and General Manager, with J. J. Carroll as the Traffic Manager. The line had not been abandoned as of 1979.
The Carter logging camp at Camp Ruby, in 1937, was fourteen miles east of Livingston, in Pok County. Several log trains left daily for the mill at Camden, averaging almost 3,500 feet of lumber. Tributary camps were called “mule corrals,” because the mules were picketed there and cared by several men, while the remainder rode the train from the main camp to work and back. A Class B high school was held at Camp Ruby in 1937.
The U. S. Plywood-Champion Corporation, which had bought W. T. Carter & Bro, was updating the tracks with 75-pound rails and a modern braking system in 1969.
This tram road operated as a logging road only, bringing logs from the woods to the main facility at Camden. There lumber was manufactured, then shipped along the company shortline, theMoscow, Camden and San Augustine Railway Company to Moscow, a distance of seven miles, where connections were made with the Houston East & West Texas.
“The Panama,” a forty-two ton locomotive, nicknamed because of its use during the building of the Panama Canal in Central America, hauled cars and logs for many years before being given to the forestry center for studies at Stephen F. Austin State University in 1970. These engines, and others, hauled countless tons of short and long leaf pine.
In 1910, the MC&SA railway owned a locomotive, a passenger car, and sixteen freight cars. An additional unincorporated logging tram from the mill into the timber covered twelve miles.
Needham B. Weatherford recalled that “New Main Lines had to be built and some time it took two years to build, . . .”. The Carter logging camp at Camp Ruby, in 1937, was fourteen miles east of Livingston, in Pok County. Several log trains left daily for the mill at Camden, averaging almost 3,500 feet of lumber. Tributary camps were called “mule corrals,” because the mules were picketed there and cared by several men, while the remainder rode the train from the main camp to work and back. A Class B high school was held at Camp Ruby in 1937. Weatherford noted that by 1954 the logging operation at Camden had substituted trucking in place of railroad cars and had began phasing out mule teams for skidding. They were replaced with Ford diesel skidders.
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