Mifflin, Samuel W. (Samuel Wright), 1805-1885

Samuel Wright Mifflin was a prominent civil engineer. In 1855 he was engaged as chief engineer to lay out a railroad running from Columbia, Pa., to New Castle, Del. The project was incorporated as the Columbia & Octorara Railroad Company in Pennsylvania on April 18, 1853, and in Delaware as the New Castle & Octorara Railroad Company on February 2, 1855. The project was intended to provide an alternate outlet for the Pennsylvania Railroad east of Columbia and may have been encouraged by that company as a bargaining chip in its effort to buy the Philadelphia & Columbia Railroad from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Octorara project was abandoned in 1857 before any construction was undertaken.