Clang, Clang, Clang, Went the Brunswick Trolley

This article originally appeared in the December 2022 issue of Discover Downtown Brunswick, published by The Brunswick News in Brunswick, Georgia. Story by Josh Dukes

This year, we volunteered our home on Wright Square for the Magnolia Garden Club’s Christmas Tour of Homes.  Between bouts of over-the-top decorating and existential dread over cracks, stains, and bruises that we hope won’t be noticed in each room, I couldn’t help but think about the Brunswick in which this house first appeared.  As far as we can tell, our home was completed in 1907 as one of a group of cottages built as rental properties.  This was a great year not only for our home, but for Brunswick as a whole.  The year 1907 is the same year that Brunswick’s streetcars were first announced to an excited city.  Though they were relatively short-lived, our streetcars still resonate as a representation of great growth and opportunity for a city on the rise.

Streetcar lines from a 1923 survey by L. T. Morgan

In October of 1907, the newly formed City and Suburban Railway Company offered $50 in gold to the Brunswick resident who could submit the best route plan for the location of its proposed electric railway lines in Brunswick.  The wheels began to turn quickly after that; in June of 1909 the Company requested that the old public drinking fountain in the middle of Newcastle Street be removed to make way for their new streetcar rails. The fountain was in front of the area where The Kress now stands. A request was also made for the city to remove any low-hanging tree limbs to make way for the new electric lines to power the cars. The following month, iron shipments arrived by schooner as street grading and electric pole assembly got underway.  The City and Suburban Railway Company officially begin their new service on September 20^th, 1909. After the grand opening, the Brunswick News noted that two streetcars could pass each other comfortably on Newcastle Street while also allowing buggies and other traffic to park successfully on both sides of the street.

Streetcar Newcastle Street at Queen Square, 1912.
Colorized by Josh Dukes

The Company completed a streetcar shed for storage and service in October 1909. Located on Grant Street by the company's office, this prevented the cars from parking overnight in front of the Grand Opera House (Ritz Theater).  March of 1910 brought the first of many additional line extensions, with tracks laid along Fourth Avenue to connect the lines on Newcastle and Albany. A later extension extended the L street line an additional 1/2 mile all the way to Glynn Avenue.  On July 4th, record crowds over 3000 used the public system. One year later, the 1911 holiday crowd shattered that record, with over 5000 patrons on a single day.

With all its successes, City and Suburban Railway had its share of controversy as well. In September of 1910, the first lawsuit was brought by J. L. O'Neal, claiming damages after his wagon was struck by a streetcar. The following January, company motorman J. G. Crowder had his arm broken when he was caught between two cars. Later that year, the Brunswick News expressed frustrations about a lack of clear schedule availability for the service. In December of 1912, one of the street cars took a corner at Newcastle too quickly and jumped the tracks, though no injuries were reported.  Despite those issues, fiscal year 1913 ended with a total of 721,570 passenger rides for the year, up from 566,229 the previous year. This seems to have been the pinnacle of success for the line as things began to decline from here. In February 1917, another car jumped the track in the middle of a pouring rainstorm after hitting a large piece of iron left on the tracks. The paper noted that the public was greatly inconvenienced.

Streetcar on Norwich Street.  Colorized by Josh Dukes

In January of 1919, the Brunswick News published an opinion piece that looks like it was pulled directly from modern complaints of subway or train travel: "The officials of the City and Suburban Railway Company are respectfully, but at the same time very earnestly reminded that the people of Brunswick are patient and long suffering; that they should have proper service and at least sanitary cars to travel in." 

Passenger numbers continued to decline.  The railway company attempted to stem the hemorrhaging funds by raising the fare to 7 cents per ride, but this too proved unsuccessful.  They were soon forced to sell all street cars and assets to the newly formed City and Interurban Railway Company, a new group formed by the Young Men's Club in Brunswick.  Even this new reorganization wasn’t enough to stave off the inevitable, as the service was quite literally to run head-on into the new fledgling automobile industry. In December of 1923, a head-on collision between a streetcar and Horace Greenfield's automobile resulted in a broken arm for Greenfield. In February of the following year, the News reported that the street cars were still "breaking even," even though this wasn't the case at the time in larger cities.

A streetcar passes the Post Office (now City Hall) on Gloucester Street.
Photo colorized by Josh Dukes

Automobile service was on the rise all over the country, and Brunswick wasn’t unique in its public transit plight.  Cars were the new thing and offered the convenience of customized routes.  The Brunswick News rather prophetically stated, "the hundreds of automobiles owned here, of course, take the place of the car line with many people but notwithstanding this fact the line is not going behind and under the direction of Manager Mitchell it has been doing an increased business for some time."  A 1925 opinion blurb further noted that while Atlanta was attempting to save their streetcar lines through council action, “Henry Ford and GMC’s $5.00 per week plan put Brunswick’s in the junk heap.”  The exact date of the last fare is unclear, but a report on September 1926 noting the removal of the rail lines along the entire system spelled the end of the streetcar here.

Many of you by now are likely lamenting the loss of what seems like such a lovely local service, and you wouldn’t be wrong by today standards.  A conversation for better and more affordable public transit is a current topic in many Brunswick circles.  Unfortunately, Brunswick’s streetcars were basically the Betamax of their time – coming along at a transitional period where a new, better technology was already taking hold.  Maybe we could eventually have a hop-on hop-off public bus system that resembles the old streetcars? Just a Christmas wish for now.

Story and photo colorizations by Josh Dukes
All streetcar events and dates compiled from The Brunswick News archives.
Map details provided by John Hunter from a 1923 survey by L. T. Morgan, former City Engineer