Eastern Kentucky Railway

At Hitchins, between Grayson and Willard, the line junctioned with the Elizabethtown, Lexington and Big Sandy Railroad, an east–west branch of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway.

The Consolidated Southern Railway was a plan in the 1880s to extend the EK south as part of a through line to Hickory and Statesville, North Carolina, also using the never-built Norfolk and Cincinnati Railroad and part of the Chester and Lenoir Railroad.

The EK went bankrupt in 1919, and the part south of Grayson was reorganized in 1928 as the Eastern Kentucky Southern Railway.

[1] The EK is featured in the children's book A Ride with Huey, the Engineer (1966) by Jesse Stuart.

Finally, from Hitchins to Webbville, the railroad once again followed KY 1; an old alignment includes another remaining truss bridge, that one with no floor.

1883 map of the Consolidated Southern Railway (the red line heading north from the orange area)
One of the bridges over the Little Sandy River , now used by KY 773
South end of the Argillite Tunnel, ca. 1880s