South Side Rail Road 
South Side Rail Road - Suffolk County 1867-1880  

South Side Rail Road 1872
Archive: Art Huneke

The South Side Rail Road of Long Island was incorporated March 23, 1860.   The period of time allowed for completion was extended by two years in 1864 and again in 1866.   Work began May 28, 1866 and in September 1866 the Directors voted to extend the road to Patchogue.

On October 28, 1867 regular service began between Jamaica and Babylon.  In December 1868 service began to Sayville and in April 1869 to Patchogue.

Until June 1872, the South Side RR enjoyed the advantage of a monopoly of the traffic on the south side and to Rockaway. The first serious inroad into the South Side's prosperity was the opening of the Long Island Railroad's Rockaway Branch in June 1872.

In July 1874 the South Side Rail Road was sold in foreclosure to the owners of the Flushing, North Shore & Central Railroad Company, Adolph Poppenhusen, et al. The new corporation was named: The Southern Railroad Company of Long Island.

On Wednesday evening, April 30, 1879 the last train ran from Hempstead to Valley Stream. The South Side RR's valuable main line, a big money maker because of the summer trade, continued to bear the Southern RR label only until December 1879, when the owners, Drexel, Morgan & Co., reorganized it as the "Brooklyn & Montauk RR," which was then leased to the Long Island RR.

Finally, in March 1880, the receiver issued an order erasing the road's identity completely. As of that month, the whole Southern RR was, in the future, to be referred to simply as the Montauk Division of the Long Island RR and so it remains to this day. In October 1889 the Brooklyn & Montauk RR was formally merged into the Long Island Rail Road and the subsequent history of the old road becomes the history of the Long Island Rail Road.

1873 Colton map of the S.S.R.R. approximately MP38-48

S.S.R.R. Seat Check (front) c. 1860's

First appears under its old name of Penataquit on timetable of May 20, 1868. In July 1868 the name Bayshore first appears.

Remnant of "Olympic siding" 
1/27/08 Photo: Mike McDermet

Between December 1, 1868 and June 1869, a second station was maintained west of Islip, that being Islip Centre at S.S.R.R MP 42, but on August 19, 1869 the railroad moved the 20 x 30 feet depot on a flat car drawn by the American 4-4-0 engine "Pewit" and carted it eastward, leaving Islip the sole station in the village. "South Side RR of LI"  (Vincent Seyfried / Research: Dave Keller)

There has been theorizing that it became the Islip depot because a newspaper article mentioning this depot move also mentioned a new, wider platform being added at Islip, however, the Islip depot was opened in 1868 so it could not have been the Islip Centre structure and the two events, the move and the new platform, were just two separate but railroad-related events mentioned in the same newspaper article. (Research: Dave Keller) 

Archive: Art Huneke

S.S.R.R. timetable (above/right) was printed in the "South Side Signal" newspaper and was effective 8/11/1869.  Note that as of 8/11/1869, Islip Centre was still a valid stop and Club House did not yet exist. 

If Islip Centre was moved on 8/19/1869, and Club House was opened sometime in 1869, then that "sometime" had to be between 8/12/1869 (the day after this timetable was issued) and 12/31/1869.  By the May, 1870 timetable, Club House was listed as a station stop. This timetable proves that the depot was opened AFTER the Islip Centre depot was moved east ...further evidence that these structures were very possibly one-and-the-same. It's a distinct possibility that this depot, after being moved east, became the depot at Club House.
 

Islip 1868 on timetable of May 20, 1868  view SE Photo: George Brainard Archive: Art Huneke

Depot built: 1868 2nd depot built: 1881 
Razed: 12/1963

Islip first appears on the timetable of May 20, 1868 as the terminal of the road and so remains until the  September 1, 1868 timetable. 

Club House c.1878 View E Photo: George Brainard  
Archive: East Islip Historical Society

West of Oakdale. Built: 1869 to service South Side Sportsmen’s Association across from the Connetquot Park which was the former location of the South Side Sportsmen's Club (hence "Club House" station). Located between today’s present MP45-46 at Bayard Cutting Arboretum), Closed: 7/17/1884. (Closing date per George L. Weeks, Jr. in his 1965 book: “Isle of Shells”  Research: Dave Keller

The milepost 45 in the photo was not the LIRR’s, but the SSRR’s and, as their mileage was calculated from a different starting point, was off slightly from today’s MP45.

S.S.R.R. timetable 5/30/1870 Islip Centre dropped with Clubhouse listed