Railroad has its roots in Aurora

The Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad has a deep connection to Aurora. In fact, one of its main predecessors, the Burlington Railroad, can trace its roots to Aurora in the 1850s.

It began as an outgrowth of the Aurora Branch Railroad, a 12-mile track built to connect Aurora with the Galena Railroad.

By October of 1850, the Aurora Branch was in full swing, offering regular service to Chicago. But when the state government started granting more and more rail charters to competitors in 1851, the Aurora Branch company decided to consolidate with three other new lines.

These were the Central Military Tract Railroad, the Peoria and Oquawka Railroad, and the Northern Cross Railroad. Before long, this company grew into the Chicago and Aurora Railroad Company and extended from Chicago to Burlington, Iowa, and Quincy, Ill., two small towns on the Mississippi River.

In 1855, the company changed its name to one most people in the Fox Valley will recognize: the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad Company. And in 1970, that company joined with three others to form the Burlington Northern Railroad.

In 1996, the Burlington Northern merged with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to form today's Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad.