Stickney, A. B.

Stickney, A. B. (Alpheus Beede) (1840–1916) railway builder; born in Wilton, Maine. He left a career as a lawyer in Minnesota (1862–69) to start working for the railroads. He was involved in several of the midwestern and northwestern railways until 1883, when he organized and began construction of the Minneapolis & Northwestern Railroad; he was the company's president, and when it merged with the Chicago, St. Paul & Kansas City (1887), he became president of both. In 1892, as chairman of the board, he reorganized roads as the Chicago Great Western Railroad, which he led until 1908 when the road went bankrupt and he was appointed receiver. In 1909 he retired. The financial methods with which he tried to manage the railroads were new to America, ideas he acquired in England and set forth in The Railway Problem (1891), but which could not protect the road from an insufficient earning power.