1891 Newspaper Article About the Newly Opened Union Depot

The following article describing the opening of the Union Depot appeared in the Keokuk Weekly Constitution-Democrat for Wednesday, July 1, 1891. The article was scanned from another source, but reset to resemble its appearance in the newspaper. The engraving of the depot, showing it from the rear (street) side, is reproduced as it appeared in the source. Several spelling and typographic errors in the article have been corrected, including the name of the Depot Master, Hiram Celleyham, Jr., which was spelled three different ways in the article, all incorrect. Additionally, the article states that the sills were made from "Colorado peach blow stone," but investigation reveals that the match is much closer to "Wolf's Carbondale brownstone"; evidently a substitution of materials took place before construction.

Oddly, the list of Union Depot Company officers at the end of the article makes no mention of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, the major user of the Depot, but instead references one or more predecessors that operated through Keokuk prior to absorption into the CB&Q, known as the "K-Line." (The nickname was later applied to the Keokuk, Mount Pleasant & Northern, which became a CB&Q branch that is now mostly abandoned.) The "K. &. W." mentioned is the Keokuk & Western, also absorbed into the CB&Q in 1901.