The Online Search for Scripophily Dealers    Having made my decisions about parameters as to languages and theme, I started searching online. I found dealers in the US and in Europe, and started reviewing online what they had for sale. Some certificates could be quite inexpensive, others could get pricey. I read about a stock certificate signed by John D. Rockefeller that sold in the thousands. I set a limit on what I'd be willing pay per certificate, which was really quite modest, and I found a good selection within my price range.

Of the dealers I found, all had good selections, but there were two dealers I reviewed that I didn't end up doing business with, simply because I found other items elsewhere that I was more interested in. As internationally inclined as I am, I still started with two dealers in the US that I found. The first one I looked at was scripophily.com, based in Chantilly, Virginia. I liked the website and his selection, but didn't find anything I wanted to buy. The George H. LaBarre Galleries (glabarre.com) are in Hollis, New Hampshire. I corresponded with George for a while and bought four pieces from him, a French rail, a French sail and my two Russian rail pieces.

I then turned to Europe, but let me jump ahead for a moment, since at the very end, after Europe, I turned to eBay (ebay.com), headquartered in California. I'd never bought anything there before, but there were two pieces available on their site that I liked and bought. From a Canadian seller in Winnipeg I got a rail piece from Spain, and from a seller in Portugal I got a sail piece from the Azores, which are an integral part of Portugal.

The first European dealer I found was a very easy-to-use site in Paris, numistoria.com, which apparently is also a numismatic source, located in central Paris at 76, rue de Richelieu. A click on their site toggled prices between euros and dollars, and another switched between French and English, which is what I used. From Paris I also bought four pieces, a Belgian rail in French, a Portuguese rail, and two Austrian rail pieces in German.

So far, every website was selling international pieces, but I needed country-specific pieces for Italy, Sweden, and the Netherlands which seemed to be harder to find. I looked for dealers in those three countries who, along with international pieces, also specialized in local items. Both websites I found in Italy were in Italian only, but that was easy to maneuver. If you think it's hard working in Italian, take a look at the two sites and you may change your mind. The first one, scripofilia.eu, was in Rome. Since you know you're dealing in Scripofilia, when the menu asks you about Azioni e Obbligazioni, having seen similar words in other languages on the previous posting, you can choose one or the other. If you want to try Internazionali, click on it and then pick a country. You'll figure them out. But as it turns out, as much as I liked the site, this is the second one where I didn't find anything I wanted to buy.

I then found scripofilia.it. (Look how close those two Italian addresses are! I wonder what confusions result.) This one is located in Arizzano, and I had no idea where in Italy that was. Since I like to know where I'm doing business, I went off to Google Maps. It's in the Lake District, a small town near the west shore of Lago Maggiore, which in turn is just west of Lugano, Switzerland. Take a look at the site. You'll figure out the difference between certificati azionari and certificati obbligazionari. I love his motto at the top, Investire nella Storia, Invest in History. I like it even though I'm not investing, just putting together a mini-collection. I did find an Italian rail piece I liked and purchased.

There was a pleasant side development here. This site sent me a full-page Certificate of Authenticity along with the piece I bought, which was so nice—almost frameable—I had to keep it in my files, even though it's really not necessary. The entire left side and bottom are filled with a huge classical-looking vignette and I'm sure you'll at least get the gist of the text on the right side: Scripofilia / Certificato di Autenticità / Si certifica che, a nostra opinione professionale, il documento XXX, che questa lettera accompagna, è autentico. It was such a nice touch.

The next stop was Sweden, where I found Strandbergs Mynthandel & Aktiesamlaren. I could tell from my Swedish and German (Münze) that a mynthandel is a coin shop, so like the Paris place, they're also into numismatics. A samlare, like German Sammler is a collector, and you can figure out the rest of that last word, which forms the name of their website, aktiesamlaren.com. Follow the instruction: Klicka vidare, which is literally "click further". Stay in Swedish for a moment—the following isn't in the English version—and click on the picture on the upper left labeled Här hittar ni oss!, which is "Here's where you'll find us!". Välkommen till butiken! is "Welcome to the boutique/shop!". In addition to seeing what framed stock certificates look like on the wall, you can see their location on Arsenalsgatan / Arsenal Street in central Stockholm, not far from the charming Gamla stan / Old Town. Below that you see the father and daughter team that runs the business. When I emailed a question in English, it was Marita who answered and who I did business with.

Go back to the main page. If you had to, you could click knowingly on Aktiebrev or Obligationer to go searching, since you recognize those same words from other languages (brev in this case means "certificates"). Now click on the flag to get English, although a lot of the items are listed just with Swedish headings. In any case, I purchased a nice Swedish rail piece.

My last virtual stop in Europe was in the Netherlands, in Haren, at the website of Hugo van der Molen, hugovandermolen.nl. Groningen is the larger city in the northern Netherlands, and Haren abuts Groningen to the south. If you take a look, you'll see that the site is both in English and in Dutch. Click on Old Stocks and Bonds; if you want Rail click on Company Activity and look for whatever you like, although the closer you go to the listings, the less English there'll be, just as on the Swedish site. The piece I found was listed as being from the Nederlandsche Spoorwegen, which already indicated it was an older piece. Do you see why?

As we saw in the previous posting about the suffix –SCH, the current spelling is Nederlandse Spoorwegen. There was more than one piece, and the heading, accompanied by a picture, said they were obligaties met Vignet van een Elok 1200 met passagierswagens. Want to try your hand at figuring out some Dutch, based on the work we've been doing recently and knowing it deals with rail?

I would say it means "bonds with (a) vignette of an e(lectric)loco(motive) with passenger cars". And that's just what the picture showed. It was one of these I purchased.

I had an extensive correspondence with Hugo, in English, which started with my needing a clarification of some of the pricing. I also explained to him what my purpose was in assembling this mini-collection, but none beyond that, and he was interested. He wrote this this past March:

I'll have to let him know.

I had chosen thirteen pieces, and only two of them were sail, one in French and one in Portuguese, since it was harder for me to find good ones of those that I liked. That leaves eleven rail pieces, with one each in Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Swedish, and Dutch, and two each in German, French, and Russian. New Hampshire, and, surprisingly, Paris, took my credit card online. All the others took PayPal, and then it was a matter of waiting for all the mail to arrive. I wanted them to be as old as possible, and as it turned out, the oldest is a Russian piece from 1869 and the newest is the Dutch piece from 1955. That means that the latter is the only one dated during my lifetime, and the sweet irony there is that that's very close to the time in the late 1950's when I put Lautrec and La Goulue up on my wall.

When they'd all arrived, I took them to the World Trade Gallery a couple of streets away near Trinity Church, and we sat down to decide on the matting and framing. We chose traditional styles, given the time period, a different gold-and-black style for each side of the half bath, bronze and black for one side of the entry hall, and gold for the two sail pictures on the other side. Online I also had small gold-on-black nameplates made and sent. They have my English translation of the company name, the year of the certificate, and if it was a bond or share of stock. I hung them myself, and managed to get everything lined up right. I've since had friends over to see them. My adventure into, and out of, scripophily ran in its entirety from December to April, and was simultaneous with many of the postings on China.

I managed to get an image of each of the thirteen pieces from the websites that were selling them, including eBay, and for the first time ever, I opened a Flickr account, which is where I'll link the illustrations to in the following discussions. Since the account is in my name, these are links that will never die, like so many do over time on older postings.

The Eight-Language Rail 'n' Sail Scripophily Mini-Collection    We'll connect these discussions to travel and language as we did with the online certificates in the last posting. The language connection will involve the company name and other pertinent text on the certificate. The travel connection will be in the form of the history and geography in the backstory of the piece. I've started with the two sail pieces, followed by the rail ones. Most backstories are rather concise; one of the French ones extended to so much pertinent material that it got rather long, but quite enjoyable. The two Russian pieces, which are my two oldest, had enough in the way of backstory that they will appear separately, on their own posting after this one.

COMPAGNIE MARITIME DE LA SEINE
Sail, in French, 1 Share, 1899

We'll start with our two sail certificates, and the French one is for the Compagnie Maritime de la Seine. In names such as this, English will put the place name first, so it would be the Seine Maritime Company. It was founded in 1899 in Paris and its purpose is explained right on the stock certificate under the name: Service Régulier pour le Transport des Marchandises sans transbordement entre Paris et Londres par la Seine et la Tamise / Regular Service for the Transport of Merchandise without transshipment between Paris and London via the Seine and the Thames. The next line says it's a Société Anonyme, or corporation, and the currency is French Francs. The vignette is outstanding, and features a view of London and the Thames in the upper left, along with the requisite anchor, and of Paris and the Seine in the upper right. This is among the first certificates distributed for this company, since it's a Part de Fondateur / Founder's Share. Online information found in both English and French states that in 1900 the company purchased five steamers named for French provinces, Anjou, Aunis, Artois, Béarn, and Maine. The company disappeared sometime in the period 1960-1970.

COMPANHIA DE NAVIGAÇÃO CARREGADORES AÇOREANOS
Sail, in Portuguese, 5 Shares, 1920

For the other sail certificate, I have to do a bit of slight-of-hand. To show the certificate I have, I have to rely on the rather lopsided, washed-out picture sent in to eBay by the seller in a rural area of Portugal. About the third of the way from the bottom, just note the large number Cinco to show it's for Five shares, also note that the vignette is not blocked by a cancellation stamp, which is further below. Then move on to this much better picture I have for the Carregadores Açoreanos that, however, is for Dez (Ten) shares, but with a cancellation stamp somewhat obscuring the vignette. Let's use this better picture to admire the rich colors and Art Deco style of the certificate. Its name, which appears on the certificate in two out-of-order parts, is the Companhia de Navigação Carregadores Açoreanos, or the Azorean Carriers Navigation Company, which you can shorten to the first two words. From online information I found mostly in Portuguese, it was founded in 1920 for maritime transport of both passengers and cargo. While these pictures are small, very careful inspection will show you, right next to the cancellation stamp, that it says Sede em Ponta Delgada / Ilha de São Miguel / Açores, or Head Office in Ponta Delgada, São Miguel (Saint Michael) Island, Azores. I just enjoyed my visit to that port and island two years ago (2012/7). Below the money figure it says the currency is Portuguese escudos.

The company played an important role between the Azores and both northern European ports and the US east coast. It was a private company until 1972, when it was absorbed into the Empresa Insulana de Navegação / Island Navigation Company. The certificate has two antique spellings. Above where it says Ponta Delgada it says Sociedade Anonyma, ("Anonymous Company", literally "Anonymous Society") similar to other European corporate designations, but today it would be Sociedade Anónima. In larger writing, it says Titulo de Dez (Cinco) Acções, or "Certificate for Ten (Five) Shares". This is the Portuguese variation of the same word we saw elsewhere for "share", and in Portuguese the C was never pronounced, and so today it's not written: ações.

COMPAÑÍA DE LOS FERROCARRILES ANDALUCES
Rail, in Spanish, 1 Share, 1924

The first rail certificate is from Spain, for the Compañía de los Ferrocarriles Andaluces, usually shortened to the last word. English usually puts the place name first, so this is the Andalusian Rail Company. Although this one-share stock certificate, denominated in pesetas, is from 1924, according to research in Spanish, the company had been founded in 1877, and grew rapidly to be the third largest rail company in Spain. It remained prominent during the second half of the 19C and first third of the 20C.

Most of its lines (in red) were, as seen in this 1935 map, in Andalucía/Andalusia (Map by Manuchansu), running across the south of Spain, although it had one isolated line you see on the right. You'll recognize a lot of famous city names, such as Cádiz, Sevilla/Seville, Córdoba, and Granada. It also served Málaga, where Beverly and I lived for two months in the summer of 1990 studying advanced Spanish. We'd studied languages for several weeks in many places, but those two months in Málaga were the second longest we ever lived in one place abroad after the academic year 1961-1962, when we lived in Mainz studying German. On the map, the black-and-white routes belonged to the Madrid-Zaragoza-Alicante Rail Company, which was the second largest in Spain and which was the one we saw in the last posting that absorbed the Catalán line.

The Andalusian Rail Company was prosperous until the economic crisis at the end of the 1920s, when it started a decline that ended with its nationalization in 1936. The certificate has a magnificent vignette along the borders, with more to it than you may realize (or be able to make out in the small picture). In the four corners are round medallions, each showing a rail line. The left side is labeled, and shows, the famous fountain in the Patio de los Leones (Photo by Jebulon), or Courtyard of the Lions, in the Alhambra in Granada. The right side is labeled, and shows, the famous Mesquita de Córdoba (Photo by Jim Gordon), or Mosque of Cordoba. The top and bottom have four city scenes, with scrolls naming the cities. Starting in the upper left and going counterclockwise, we have Granada, Cádiz, Sevilla, and (my very own) Málaga.

COMPANHIA DO CAMINHO DE FERRO DE PENAFIEL Á LIXA E A ENTRE-OS-RIOS
Rail, in Portuguese, Bond, 1915

This rail item is one of three in the mini-collection with very long names. It's the Companhia do Caminho de Ferro de Penafiel á Lixa e a Entre-os-Rios. It's long since it wanted to name all the places it went to. While it's literally the Rail Company from Penafiel to A Lixa and to Entre-os-Rios, in English we put the place names first so it's the Penafiel, A Lixa & Entre-os-Rios Rail Company. In the black boxes you can see the denomination in escudos. This company was a short, narrow-gauge railroad, just one meter wide, that proliferated early on in Portugal. In rural and mountainous areas, this was the money-saving option. Most rail in Portugal was, and is, broad gauge, like Spain, and of several hundred kilometers of narrow-gauge railways in Portugal, today only two lines survive, and they are endangered. As decorative as the proud vignette is on this 1915 bond, the company, which was started in 1912, failed in the late 1920s with the financial crisis. To get an idea of the rural area involved, copy and paste this link in another window.
http://www.eurosis.org/cms/files/location/porto/b2.jpg
Penafiel is a half-hour's drive east of Oporto. You can see that Entre-os-Rios is about 20 minutes south. A Lixa is about 20 minutes northeast, but off the map. This is really small-town Portugal, but you can also see how the railway-building fever of the late 19C ran over into the early 20C, and how intense it was, trying to reach everywhere.

SOCIETÀ PER LE FERROVIE NAPOLETANE
Rail, in Italian, 1 Share, 1926

The Italian certificate is of the Società per le Ferrovie Napoletane, or the Neapolitan Rail Company. The decorative one-share certificate, denominated in lire, dates from 1926 and also includes a rail scene. The main line was built in 1889, and was taken over by a public agency in 1938. This is the Bay of Naples (Map by Norman Einstein). The rail line runs along the north shore of the bay and west of Naples (Map by Friedrichstrasse). That first stop is Corso Vittorio Manuele (Photo by Stefano Paolini), and this is a modern train at that station. The line is now one of several suburban commuter rail lines in Naples, and, as the map shows, it extends to the seacoast at Torregaveta. That town is located near the Greek archaeological site of Cumae (Photo by AlexanderVanLoon), which was the first Greek colony on the Italian mainland and lasted from the 8C BCE to the 13C CE. The Italian version of the name is Cuma, and because of this site, the railway is now referred to as the Ferrovia Cumana (Photo by Alexdevil), or Cumana Railway.

MELLERSTA ÖSTERGÖTLANDS JERNVÄGSAKTIEBOLAG
Rail, in Swedish, 1 Share, 1913

We can shorten the name on the Swedish certificate considerably. A bolag is a company, so, adding that international word that's become familiar, an aktiebolag is a stock company, written AB, referring to a corporation. We have here one share dated 1913, of the Mellersta Östergötlands Jernvägs AB (MÖJ). If you leave out the AB, you also leave out the possessive –S on the word before it.

Let's start with this map of traditional Swedish provinces (click). You see Östergötland separated by a lake from Västergötland. You can translate the two names not at all, or partly, as East (West) Götland, or all the way, as East (West) Gothland. That makes this the Central East Gothland Rail Corporation, or more simply, the Central East Gothland Railway. Now let's look more closely at both of these provinces. Stockholm is just off the map in the upper right, beyond Södertälje. Those two cities were where I started my three-night trip on the Göta Kanal in 2006. The route goes out into the Baltic, and then into the canal proper, into Östergötland and Lake Vättern, then into Västergötland, including Lake Vänern, to Göteborg/Gothenberg (the capital of Västergötland), where Beverly and I had studied intermediate Swedish for three weeks in the summer of 1973. Given all these names obsessed with the Goths (a major Swedish island in the Baltic, just off the map, is Gotland), you can see why it's called the Göta Kanal.

On the map, Linköping is the capital of Östergótland, and both Norrköping and Motala are located there. (Jönköping is in the next province south; in a town south of it is where Beverly and I got engaged at her grandmother's house on our visit up from Mainz during Christmas, 1961.)

The MÖJ was a narrow-gauge rail line connecting two small towns on a route running roughly east-west through Linköping, up to Lake Vättern. It was one of only three narrow-gauge passenger railroads that decided to turn to electric power. Between 1908 and 1921 two of its routes were electrified, something quite unusual when other private railways were using steam and diesel power. But the MÖJ was nationalized in 1950 and became part of the national network. However, traffic has continued to decline, and only two small stretches are still in use.

The certificate stands out, not only for the steam train in black, but because of the green border filled with trains. The two trains on the sides are rather normal, but the ones at the top and bottom have a locomotive at either end, for the purposes symmetry! The denomination is in kronor / crowns. There are two outdated spellings. The word for (stock) certificate, (aktie)bref, was always pronounced with a V and is now spelled that way: (aktie)brev, which you may remember from the website. And as we saw on the earlier posting, the word for railroad is järnväg ("ironway"), so the spelling on the certificate of the company's name with jernväg is outdated.

NV NEDERLANDSCHE SPOORWEGEN
Rail, in Dutch, Bond, 1955

This is the youngest of the certificates in the collection. It's a bond, denominated in gulden / guilders, dated 1955 in Utrecht for the NV Nederlandsche Spoorwegen. We've come across several abbreviations referring to corporations. We just had AB for Swedish and also saw SA for Portuguese Sociedade Anónima / "Anonymous Company" (also Spanish Sociedad Anónima, Catalán Societat Anònima, French Société Anonyme) and now we have Dutch NV, which stands for Naamloze Vennootschap, which is literally "Nameless Partnership", but you can see how "nameless" is the same as "anonymous". (When the word appears without its adjective ending E it's spelled naamloos, which looks even closer to English "nameless". You're seeing two quirks of standard Dutch spelling here, all in one word: O versus OO for that long vowel and Z versus S, standard variations about which I won't go into any further.)

So we end up with a name that corresponds best to Netherlands Rail Corporation. We reviewed again above that the Dutch ending –SCH, which was always pronounced –S, is now written that way, to the company today is the NV Nederlandse Spoorwegen. It was and is the principal passenger railway operator in the Netherlands, and was founded in 1938 when the two largest Dutch railway companies formally merged. These are the rail lines in the Netherlands (no attribution), with the blue lines being those of Nederlandse Spoorwegen.

Above we said, and explained, that Hugo's website pointed out that this set of certificates he had for sale were obligaties met Vignet van een Elok 1200 met passagierswagens. Check above if you don't remember what that means—or just look for that item on the certificate.

MITTENWALDBAHN
Rail, in German, Bond, 1912

So far we've had rail items one to a language, but now we come to those that are two to a language. As it turns out, both that are in German are Austrian, but one rail line enters Germany, and is named after a German town, and the other goes right up to the German border, planning on crossing it. First we have a 1912 Austrian bond, denominated in Kronen / crowns and issued in Innsbruck, for the Mittenwaldbahn, named after the German town of Mittenwald, famous since the mid 17C for the manufacture of violins, violas, and cellos. Although we don't translate place names, it's helpful to understand what a name signifies. Mitten is "middle" and Wald is "forest, wood(s)", so if this were a village in an English-speaking country, it might be called Midwood. But it isn't, so either we leave the name of the railway as Mittenwaldbahn or make it Mittenwald Railway.

This map (Map by Pechristener) shows the route of the Mittenwaldbahn. The gray line divides Austrian Tirol/Tyrol, below, and German Bayern/Bavaria, above. The Mittenwaldbahn runs from Innsbruck via Seefeld and Mittenwald (on the German side) to Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The map also shows the short Zugspitzbahn, which climbs up the highest mountain in Germany, the Zugspitze. It apparently no longer goes as high up as the Schneefernerhaus at 2,656 m (8,714 ft), which used to be a hotel, and which is the second highest place I've spent the night (so far) after Lhasa (2014/8).

German Wikipedia explains that the Mittenwaldbahn crosses the border over the Karwendel mountains, which lie mostly on the Austrian side. For this reason, when building started in 1910, the Mittenwaldbahn was also called the Karwendelbahn. Do note that this bond is meant to help finance only the Austrian part of the route, most of it by the Austrian government, with a small contribution from Tyrol and a larger one from Innsbruck. In 1927, with a change in currency the shares were redenominated from Kronen/crowns to Schilling/Schillings. Today, the route is jointly operated by Austria and Germany.

Of all the certificates in this mini-collection, this is the only one that also appears online. Since that copy shows up larger and can be clicked to enlarge further, take a look at it again here (Photo by Hans Schlieper). Check out the fine engraving, particularly at the bottom, with the view of the mountain viaduct on the right, and of Innsbruck on the left. This is one of the classic views one sees in Innsbruck, north along the Maria-Theresien-Strasse (Photo by böhringer friedrich) to the mountains.

ÖSTERREICHISCHE NORDWESTBAHN und SÜD-NORDDEUTSCHE VERBINDUNGSBAHN
Rail, in German, Bond, 1909

I mentioned that the Portuguese rail piece was one of three in this mini-collection with very long names, and another is this Austrian bond in German from 1909, which for now I'll call the ÖNWB & SNDVB, denominated in Kronen/crowns. In fairness, it is a combination of two names, where no one wanted to yield when it came to the new corporate name.

This is the situation, simplified. In the early rail-building period, a major connection was to be between Vienna and Berlin, not only to connect the two cities, but also to give Vienna access to North Sea and Baltic seaports via the German railway network. We need some maps to clarify. This was Austria-Hungary in 1910 (Map by Andrein), broken down as to ethnic groups, so that we can see in red what later became modern Austria and what became the Czech Republic (Bohemia and Moravia in blue). Imagine a route from Vienna passing Prague to the east, up to the northernmost point of the border.

Now take a look (click) at Germany (Map Modifications by Wiggy) in that time period. Now trace an imaginary line from Vienna (Wien) past Prague (Prag) into Saxony (Sachsen) at Dresden and up to Berlin, and see how Vienna would have seaport access in the north with this connection.

Railroads dating from the mid-19C were fighting their way across the Bohemian (Czech) part of Austria to the border to be the ones joining up with German railroads. One was the privately owned k.k. priv. Österreichische Nordwestbahn (for the abbreviations, see the previous posting; I'll leave them out of the translation), or the Austrian Northwest Railroad. Another private railroad was the k.k. priv. Süd-Norddeutsche Verbindungsbahn, which frankly has the craziest name I've seen. It literally translates as the South-North German Connecting Railway, a name that shows its eagerness to cross the border. I translate as the Southern Rail Connection to North Germany. If I understand it correctly, they were both nationalized by Austria in 1909, which is when this bond was issued, so that the lengthy combined name on the bond translates as the Austrian Northwest Railroad & Southern Rail Connection to North Germany.

This is their combined network (Map by Extrawurst). The ÖNWB is in black and the SNDVB is in red. Vienna (Wien) is at the bottom, but we have to keep considering the changes at the time of WWI, so north of Zellerndorf is Bohemia with bilingual names of towns, and today it's the Czech Republic, with only Czech names. There is only a side connection to Prague on the left. The routes ended at the time of nationalization—using the Czech names--at Ústí, Děčín, Liberec, and Frýdlant. Use this map of the border region with Sachsen / Saxony in Germany (Map by Ulamm)—the border runs along the mountains; look to the right—to see how poised these lines were to cross over from these four towns at the time of nationalization.

Lengthy as the title of the combined company may be, look again at the certificate, because it has the most spectacular vignette in the mini-collection. Its sweeping, curvilinear design is Art Nouveau, and its 1909 date falls right in the Art Nouveau period of 1890-1910. The amazing vignette has an optical illusion. While your eye falls on the regal double-headed Austrian eagle with its spread wings, you at first fail to notice the two tall women in flowing robes standing in front of each of the wings. Try it. Fools me every time.

COMPAGNIE INTERNATIONALE DES WAGONS-LITS ET DES GRANDS EXPRESS EUROPÉENS
Rail, in French, Bond, 1919

The third of the three items with very long names in the mini-collection, after the Portuguese and Austrian pieces, and the first rail item in French, is this Belgian piece. It's a 1919 bond, denominated in Belgian Francs, for the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits et des Grands Express Européens, which is, mercifully, usually shortened to just Wagons-Lits (va.go[ng].LI). You'll see just the shortened logo, WL, on the sides of the certificate. The full name is so long that the second line of it on the certificate is written in smaller print, but there's a good reason for that. The first part is the original name, and the second part was an add-on when the company extended its business. On the certificate, note the stylish Art Nouveau border and the vignette of a train. Yet this is the only rail-related certificate that doesn't exactly deal with a railroad.

It's a little clumsy to translate, but I do it this way. The first part, which was the original name, is the International Sleeping-Car Company, but once the second part was added, it's better to phrase it as the International Company for Sleeping Cars & for Grand European Expresses. The short form, "Wagons-Lits", word-for-word "Coaches-Beds", but more accurately translated as "Bed Coaches", is the phrase that means "Sleeping Cars". It started out supplying both sleeping and dining cars to railroads, and then expanded by running specific trains (not railroads) of its own, by far most notably the Orient-Express, which was the reason for lengthening its name. This is the company logo, which shows the company's blue-and-gold livery (Photo by Tamorlan).

It was founded by the Belgian Georges Nagelmackers in 1872 as a Belgian company, but it later moved its headquarters to Paris. It quickly became the premier provider of its services for that last quarter of the 19C and well into the 20C. I find it a curious fact that this, the epitome of European train comfort, owes its origin to American train comfort. In the US, the Pullman Company, founded by George Pullman, built and operated sleeping cars on most US railroads starting in 1867 (to 1968). The 23-year-old Nagelmackers visited the US in 1867-1868, that very first year of Pullman operations, and was so impressed by the Pullman night trains that he decided to start up a similar operation to run across Europe in 1874. The second part of the name was added in 1884 to reflect additional services. WL attached its cars to trains of the state railways in various countries, or it ran its own trains, but still pulled by locomotives of the state railways, since WL had no locomotives of its own—it was NOT a railroad. WL ran some 31 luxury Grands Express Européens, including the Orient-Express, which started in 1883 out of Paris's Gare de l'Est (East Station), then called Gare de Strasbourg (see below). WL ran services on the Transsiberian Railroad--the reach of WL was from Lisbon in the west to Vladivostok in the east, from Saint Petersburg in the north, to Cairo and Luxor in the south.

WWI wreaked chaos on the company as it did on Europe, but WL reestablished itself and flourished in the period between wars, even extending itself into the Middle East. In 1931 it reached its maximum of 2,268 railroad cars, and the 1920s and 1930s became the epitome of exotic rail travel. As an indication of that which everyone will recognize, Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express appeared in 1934. And then WWII wreaked havoc on Europe and WL again, but this time WL didn't recover quite as well.

After the war, WL concentrated on the travel business instead, and eventually, sold its aging rolling stock to all and sundry. It still provides sleeping car services in a few countries, owning a few cars of its own, and provides dining car service in certain others. Still, with the expanding high-speed rail network in Europe, sleeping cars are becoming less necessary, although quite a number still exist, including the City Night Line, which I've used several times, and EuroNight.

In recent decades, a private British company called Venice-Simplon Orient Express (VSOE) rehabilitated a number of historic coaches, and, under license of the SNCF, ran trains between London/Paris and Venice, as well as elsewhere. Beverly and I took the train in 2002 (see 2002/2). When we arrived across the Channel in Calais from our British rail connection, the most impressive thing that stays in my mind happened when we saw the train waiting for us, with uniformed personnel standing along the platform. We looked up to the upper part of each coach and saw that long WL name extending from end to end. You can get the idea of what we saw from this picture of a small model of such a coach (Photo by Asp).

Last-minute information keeps showing up on my doorstep. The very day I was going to post the previous posting I found out that the Lautrec poster had just sold for a high sum. Now, as I'm writing this posting, I just learned that the reason the private company had the Orient-Express name was that the French National Rail Company, SNCF, was only licensing it out to them. I also learned that SNCF has rescinded that license, and the private company will have to use a different name (it's picked "Belmond"). In addition, in the near future, the SNCF will reinstitute rail service, once again out of the Gare de l'Est, for a new Orient-Express, all the way to Istanbul.

CHEMIN DE FER DE PARIS À ORLÉANS
Rail, in French, Bond, 1936

The second of the two French rail items is a 1936 bond, denominated in French Francs, for the (Compagnie du) Chemin de Fer de Paris à Orléans, or the Paris & Orléans Railroad, which went by the initials PO. It's an attractive certificate, particularly the vignette at the bottom with a view of Orléans. When I saw it advertised online, the writer of the listing was unsure if it might be Paris—it sure looks like it could be Notre Dame on the Seine, crossed by some attractive bridge. But it isn't, it's the other end of that original rail line, Orléans (Photo by Patrick Giraud), showing Orléans Cathedral on the Loire, crossed by Pont Georges V. It's so much fun to find a picture to match the vignette, even better than with the Innsbruck picture.

The PO was founded in 1838, and, although it grew considerably later, its first line out of Paris, almost due south to Orléans (north is on the left!!), was built between 1840 and 1843. This 1843 German map, showing the connection between the Seine and Loire as well, is from a period magazine in Leipzig. This PO line, at 114 km (71 mi), was at the time the longest railway line in France, and a newsworthy item.

The South of France can be referred to as the Midi, and in 1856-7, the (Compagnie des) Chemins de Fer du Midi, often written CF du Midi and translatable as the Southern Railway, built its line from Bordeaux on the Atlantic via Toulouse and Narbonne to Sète on the Mediterranean, and then expanded to a large part of the area in the southwest, up to the Pyrenees. In 1934, the PO, which, from 1852 until then had been the second largest railway in France, merged with the Midi to form the even larger Chemins de Fer de Paris à Orléans et du Midi, or the PO-Midi. This new vast network, from Paris to the Pyrenees, covered almost 12,000 km (7,500 mi). But then just four years later, in 1938, the new PO-Midi and five other companies were nationalized to form today's Société Nationale de Chemins de Fer Français, which we just referred to and which you could also translate as French National Railways. It's referred to commonly as the SNCF (and not the SNCfF!).

As a side benefit of researching this certificate, I learned a lot more about certain aspects of Paris. I knew there were a number of rail stations, and had used most of them at one time or another. I knew one of the stations had been made into an art museum, and I'd visited the museum. But why was it converted? Whose station had it been? Why was it built in the unusual place where it was in the first place? Why was it so architecturally gorgeous? Now that I'm familiar with the PO, I can answer all these questions, including about the art museum, so this last item in this posting will have this additional information.

First let's take a look at a Paris map. Copy and past this link in another window:

http://stage-d6.interrail.eu/files/all/maps/cities/paris_train_stations.jpg

It's very common for cities to have several stations, since each was first built by a private rail line. Paris has six main ones (actually 6 ½) It's very normal for these stations to appear in a circle around the main part of the city. Why do you suppose?

Most of the stations were built in the 19C when the city was smaller. Rather than attempting to tunnel their way into the exact center of the city, they were built at the edge of town. But the city grew around the stations, so they are now located deep into the modern city, although still not in the exact middle. The circle of stations like this is not only typical of Paris, but you find the same thing in London, Moscow, Tokyo, and others. Berlin used to have the same until many of them were destroyed in WWII, and so now, uniquely, has been able to build a Hauptbahnhof (Main Station) right in the middle of the city (2006/2).

If you don't already know, note that gare means "rail station". All the rail lines mentioned are now part of the SNCF. We'll also find that the rail stations were named after either (1) directions served, or (2) cities served, or (3) the street in front of it, and some stations had more than one name over time.

The former Chemin de Fer de l'Ouest (Western Railroad) dating from 1855, entered Paris on two sides of the Seine, which is why they built two stations. On the Right (north) Bank they built the 1837 Gare Saint-Lazare (Saint Lazarus), often painted by Monet, and named after the Rue Saint-Lazare in front of it. It was the station in Paris I arrived at as a teenager in 1957, on my very first European trip.

On the Left (south) Bank the line arrived at what was originally called directionally the (Gare de l'Ouest) (1840), but later renamed the Gare Montparnasse after the Boulevard du Montparnasse in front of it. It was completely rebuilt in modern style in 1969.

The 1845 Chemin de Fer du Nord (Northern Railroad) built the Gare du Nord (1856 & 1864). It maintains the name of the direction served. The 1845 Chemin de Fer de l'Est (Eastern Railroad) built in 1849 what it first called the (Gare de Strasbourg), after the major city served, but which was renamed the Gare de l'Est, after the direction served.

The previous three former railroads were named after three directions, West, North, East, and two stations kept those names. Since Strasbourg wasn't kept at the name of a station, we now come to the first railroad named for a city (and beyond), with a station also named for that city. It was the 1849 Chemin de Fer de Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée (Paris, Lyon, and Mediterranean Railroad), which built the Gare de Lyon (1847, 1855, 1900). But I said there are 6 ½ stations, because Lyon has a much younger baby sister, the Gare de Bercy situated behind it, almost as an annex, on the Rue de Bercy. This smaller station, built in the 1970s, has passenger service, but is also used for auto-train service out of Paris.

And we finally arrive to "our own" former PO rail line. I was confused because I saw discussions about two different stations, and I then discovered a rather unique story. But first the earlier history. The PO built in 1849 what it at first called the (Gare d'Orléans), named rather nicely after its original destination city. But the station, almost right across the Seine from the Gare de Lyon, is situated on the Quai d'Austerlitz, named after a victory battle of Napoleon, and the station was renamed the Gare d'Austerlitz.

Before we continue our unique story about the PO, look at this interesting map (click) of the regions and stations directly served out of Paris (Map jointly by Rigil, Sting, Gonioul, Sémhur). You can see in the SE that Bercy serves, besides its auto-trains, a limited area of Lyon's territory, and in the SW that nowadays, there's some overlapping of Austerlitz and Montparnasse, but otherwise, regions are clearly defined. You can see how Saint-Lazare used to have the "boat trains" serving Cherbourg and Le Havre, and how the Eurostar coming through the Chunnel goes to Nord. The Orient-Express used to leave from Est, which you can see on the schedule at the bottom of this 1888-1889 period poster. The top two lines mention the British railway that makes the connection to the two former French railways we just discussed, first the CF du Nord and then the CH de l'Est, with the latter taking pride of place as the point from which the Orient-Express actually left Paris. Even then, of course, people had to connect via that short distance between the adjoining Gare du Nord and Gare de l'Est.

Now let's get to the special move that "our" PO uniquely made in Paris in regard to the major stations. It decided that the Gare d'Austerlitz, like all the others, wasn't close enough to the center of Paris, so it wanted another major station that was. Therefore, starting at the Gare d'Austerlitz (see our map), which had been its terminus up until then, it started building a set of tracks in a cut along the south riverbank of the Seine. Some of it is an open cut, come a closed cut. (The cut is actually quite well hidden. This is a view of it today along the Quai Saint-Bernard (Photo by Akiry), the next quai up after the Quai d'Austerlitz, where it's presently being upgraded.) On the map again, the electrified route passed Notre Dame on the Île de la Cité, and the Louvre across the Seine to a point across from the Tuileries Gardens (at the word "Seine"), and built a new terminal station right there, where the blue square is.

There had been a government building there called the Palais d'Orsay (not a palace, but in the continental sense of "large government building") that had been burned down in an uprising. It was just before the 1900 Exposition Universelle / World's Fair in Paris (it was the one in 1889 that was connected with the Moulin Rouge and Eiffel Tower, see previous posting). The government wanted a spectacular new entry to Paris for visitors of the Exposition, so it sold the site of the former Palais to the PO for a new rail station to be called the Gare d'Orsay. It was a terminal station for the short Austerlitz-Orsay extension line, and was completed in 1900. Located at the end of its electrified line, it was the first electrified rail station in the world, and the building was monumental, in Beaux-Arts style, meant to blend in with its upscale neighbors such as the Louvre, across the river. It had a hotel built into its east and south sides, and the entire building was used to receive visitors to the Exposition and for upscale receptions thereafter. This is the former hotel ballroom (Photo by Emmanuel BRUNNER [Manu25]), and this is a postcard of the Gare d'Orsay in 1920, when it apparently had the alternate name Gare d'Orléans, which Austerlitz had also once had.

The building had to be electrified in any case because of its monumental, enclosed nature. There's no way a steam locomotive could have come into that structure. Therefore, long-distance trains stopped at the Gare d'Austerlitz, changed to an electric engine, and continued the short distance to the Gare d'Orsay. But with the 1938 nationalization of all the railroads into the SNCF and subsequent reorganization, it was realized that the platforms at the Gare d'Orsay were too short for the newer long-distance trains, so, starting in 1939, the station was limited to suburban traffic and the long-distance trains went back to stopping at the Gare d'Austerlitz. The station's glory days lasted just 39 years.

During WWII, the station was used in 1940 for sorting packages for soldiers at the front. In 1945, it served once again to receive people from a distance, but this time as a transit point for returning French prisoners of war. This plaque (Photo by Ttzavaras), with my translation, is on the side of the building:

ENTRE AVRIL ET AOÛT 1945, UN GRAND NOMBRE DE RESCAPÉS DES CAMPS DE PRISONNIERS, DES CAMPS DE CONCENTRATION, DES CAMPS DE TRAVAIL FORCÉ, TOUS VICTIMES DU NAZISME, FURENT À LEUR RETOUR ACCUEILLIS DANS LA GARE D'ORSAY, LE PLUS IMPORTANT CENTRE FRANÇAIS DE RAPATRIEMENT.

BETWEEN APRIL AND AUGUST 1945, A LARGE NUMBER OF THE SURVIVORS OF THE PRISON CAMPS, CONCENTRATION CAMPS, FORCED LABOR CAMPS, ALL VICTIMS OF NAZISM, WERE ON THEIR RETURN WELCOMED AT THE GARE D'ORSAY, THE MOST IMPORTANT FRENCH REPATRIATION CENTER.

In the 1950s, there was a bit of suburban traffic, but the rest of the station was closed. In 1958, all rail traffic stopped. Discussions followed about a return to train traffic, but the building was scheduled for demolition, only to be saved by being listed in 1978 as a historic monument.

And then the glory days came back as much as ever, if not more. In 1986, the former Gare d'Orsay reopened as the new Musée d'Orsay, featuring 19C art and complementing the art in the Louvre across the way. (In the last posting, not the main poster of La Goulue and Valentin, but a second one we showed, is located today in the Musée d'Orsay.) This is the gorgeous Musée d'Orsay today (Photo by dalbera), with its unbeatable collection. Looking out from the museum across the Seine, you'd see the Tuileries Gardens opposite and the Louvre to your right. Click to look at one of the clocks, then look at this detail (Photo by Jsquish) to see not only the PO insignia on the art museum but "Paris-Orléans".

Because a conversion took place, it's fun to compare the Then with the Now. This is the interior of the former Gare d'Orsay. Note the arched windows and arched ceiling. Now look at the Great Hall of the Musée d'Orsay (Photo by Benh), and compare for yourself.

But even with the museum filling the building, rail traffic came back, and in a more useful way. From the museum basement a short tunnel of a few hundred meters/yards was built to the west, which joined with the Gare des Invalides under the esplanade in front of the Invalides complex of buildings and monuments. This smaller station, also a terminus, had been the Parisian end of the Versailles-Invalides line, that had itself dated to 1840, and also electrified in 1900. By 1979, with the startup of the RER suburban commuter traffic lines, the entire route from beyond Austerlitz via Orsay and Invalides to Versailles became Line C of the RER, with an RER station under the museum. This is a map of the Paris Metro (Map by Rigil), which also shows RER lines. Click in the lower right to follow the gold RER Line C, offering suburban service, under the Gare d'Austerlitz, along the Left Bank to the stop at the Musée d'Orsay, along that short connecting stretch to the Gare des Invalides, and on to Versailles, with a number of connections to the Metro. This modern line is based on very historic routes, part of which goes back to our PO. This, under the building, is what is now called the Gare du Musée d'Orsay (Photo by Claude villetaneuse), where the Gare referred to is not the building itself, but instead the station for the RER suburban trains below.

The PO is gone, with the other rail companies, absorbed into the SNCF, but its legacy remains, not only in the Gare d'Austerlitz, but in the Musée d'Orsay and the totally electrified RER line crossing Paris on the Left Bank of the Seine, and I finally learned much of this with the impetus of the 1936 PO rail bond hanging on my wall.

As mentioned above, the two Russian pieces are the only ones that remain to be discussed, and there's enough interesting material to warrant a separate posting, not only of those two, but more.