Terre Haute, Indianapolis and Eastern Traction Company

The Terre Haute, Indianapolis and Eastern Traction Company, or THI&E, was the second largest interurban in the U.S. state of Indiana at the 1920s height of the "interurban era." This system included over 400 miles of track, with lines radiating from Indianapolis to the east, northwest, west and southwest as well as streetcar lines in several major cities. The THI&E was formed in 1907 by the Schoepf-McGowan Syndicate as a combination of several predecessor interurban and street car companies and was operated independently until incorporation into the Indiana Railroad in 1931. The THI&E served a wide range of territory, including farmlands in central Indiana, the mining region around Brazil, and numerous urban centers. Eventually it slowly succumbed, like all of the other central Indiana interurban lines, to competition from automobiles and trucks and improved paralleling highways.

On March 1, 1907, financiers Hugh J. McGowan, Randal Morgan and W. Kesley Schoepf formed the THI&E out of four predecessor companies: the Indianapolis and Western Railway, which operated the line from Indianapolis west to Danville; the Indianapolis and Eastern Railway, with lines from Indianapolis east to Dublin and from Dunreith to New Castle; the Richmond Street and Interurban Railway, with the line in eastern Indiana from Dublin to Richmond; and the Indianapolis Coal Traction Company. Three weeks later the THI&E acquired the Terre Haute Traction and Light Company, which operated a line from Terre Haute south to Sullivan, north to Clinton, Indiana, and west to Paris, Illinois. In April 1907 the Schoepf-McGowan Syndicate leased the Indianapolis and Northwestern Traction Company, a system of over 90 miles with lines from Indianapolis to Lafayette and from Lebanon to Crawfordsville, and purchased the Indianapolis and Martinsville Rapid Transit Company, which ran between the cities in its name. The final major piece of the THI&E was the 1912 addition of the Indianapolis Crawfordsville and Danville Electric Railway, nicknamed the "Ben Hur Route" in honor of Lew Wallace of Crawfordsville, author of the novel "Ben Hur." The THI&E system totaled over 400 miles of track at this point and was the largest Indiana interurban. It also turned out to be one of the financially weakest due to its many unproductive branch lines.

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