Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway (AT&SF)

Unlike BN, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway name remained virtually intact since 1863, with only a minor change from "railroad" to "railway" in December 1895.

The ATSF owes its beginnings to Cyrus Kurtz Holliday, a transplanted Pennsylvanian born in 1826. Quite an entrepreneur, Holliday owned or promoted a variety of business ventures in land, coal and transportation. He was the founding father and mayor of Topeka, served in the Union army during the Civil War and dabbled in many other political and social ventures in Kansas. Holliday also guided the development of the Santa Fe Railway, from the creation of its charter in 1859 through construction that began in Topeka on a cool and blustery October 30, 1868. He lived to see the railroad reach the Great Lakes, Gulf of Mexico and California's Pacific shore, his vision from the start.

Santa Fe's heritage is rich with people and milestones that would be the envy of most American corporations. It helped introduce hard red winter wheat to the Midwest, transporting the wheat itself and the eastern European immigrants who chose to settle in and farm this rich grain-producing region.

The Santa Fe played a key role in promoting the art and culture of the Southwest and Native Americans, creating a "romantic" vision of the Southwest and encouraging travel to the area. Santa Fe passenger service (which continued until 1971, when Amtrak took passenger service over from most railroads) set the standard for luxury and attention to detail, with famed trains like the California Limited, the Super Chief, the El Capitan, the Valley Flyer and the Texas Chief. In association with this legendary passenger service, Fred Harvey established a chain of restaurants, hotels, lunch counters and dining rooms to feed and accommodate millions of travelers between 1876 and the 1950s. Several of these establishments are still operating today.

In addition to its role in influencing culture, Santa Fe played a key role in moving the transportation industry forward with innovation and creativity. Santa Fe developed the first land-bridge container train, linking Asia with Europe using Santa Fe and Penn Central (Conrail) lines. In the mid-1970s, Santa Fe people developed the first articulated intermodal railcar, featuring a skeleton design for lighter weight, a lower center of gravity and reduced fuel consumption. This "Six-Pack," which later became the "Ten-Pack Fuel Foiler," was the forerunner of today's articulated intermodal cars. Santa Fe is credited with industry-wide improvements to other types of railcars as well, including the development of the Super Hopper and the articulated autoveyor.

In the late 1980s, Santa Fe developed improvements in locomotive cab design which later set the standard for the industry. About that same time, Santa Fe stunned the transportation industry with the announcement of its intermodal partnership with J.B. Hunt, the first such partnership between a railroad and a trucking firm. In 1993, a centralized Systems Operations Center in Schaumburg, Ill., became the world's largest fully distributed transportation management system