The Muskogee Lines

The Midland-Valley family of Oklahoma lines included the Muskogee Roads and the Midland Valley Railroad Co.   These were made up of several subsidiary and predecessor companies.   These companies included:

Midland Valley Railroad

The Midland Valley was one of the "Muskogee Roads" (the others were the Kansas Oklahoma & Gulf and the Oklahoma City-Ada-Atoka; they were under the same ownership and headquartered in Muskogee, Oklahoma).

Recommended Reading in the Library
 
Midland Valley Rails for Coal, Cattle and Crude, Lloyd E. Stagner, South Platte Press, 1996
A History of Texas Railroads, S. G. Reed, St. Clair Publishing, 1941

The Kansas Oklahoma & Gulf (KO&G)

The Kansas Oklahoma & Gulf was one of the "Muskogee Roads" which in turn were part of the Midland-Valley family of Oklahoma lines.   The KO&G connected and interchanged at Denison with the Denison & Pacific Suburban Railroad (a wholly owned subsidiary of the Texas & Pacific Railroad).

Originally chartered on March 28, 1910, as the Missouri, Oklahoma and Gulf Railway Company of Texas, the name was changed to the Kansas, Oklahoma and Gulf Railway Company of Texas on April 2, 1921.

The company operated nearly nine miles of line from the Red River near Carpenter's Bluff to Denison as well as terminal trackage at Denison.   At the Red River the KO&GT connected with the Kansas, Oklahoma and Gulf Railway Company, thus forming a through route from Denison to Baxter Springs, Kansas.

In 1926 the KO&GT was classified as a Class II line by the Railroad Commissionqv and owned one locomotive.   That year the line received $4,054 in passenger revenue, $192,962 in freight revenue, and $249 in other revenue.   In 1952 the KO&GT earned $259,392, almost all from freight.   In 1964 the Kansas, Oklahoma and Gulf system was merged into the Texas and Pacific Railway Company, and the Texas trackage abandoned.   (Chris Cravens-Handbook of Texas Online)

The KO&G was absorbed into MoPac shortly after the T&P's own absorbtion into the system in 1976.   Most of the KO&G on-line traffic was coal and quarry products, but they were also a major bridge-line between Kansas and the upper midwest in the MoPac scheme of things, competing with both the MK&T and the Frisco.

At the end of it's life, the KO&G was made up of a rambling, run-down line which served no substantial cities.   After takeovers, first by the T&P and then MoPac, the line had financial means to be upgraded.   After passing into UP's hands, the upgrading continue until it was almost entirely a 49 mph railroad, but because of its curves and circuitous route, it wasn't capable of becoming a first class line.