Pan Am Railways

Beginning

The company was founded in May 1981 as Guilford Transportation Industries by Timothy Mellon, who quickly looked to form a railroad company in the Northeast through purchasing some of the area's bankrupt railroads. The company began by purchasing the Maine Central Railroad that same year, and also announced it was interested in purchasing the bankrupt Boston and Maine, making an offer that year. The company's purchase of the B&M was approved in 1983, adding it to Guilford's network.

Even as the B&M purchase was still pending, Guilford announced it intended to purchase the Delaware and Hudson Railway from its then owner Norfolk and Western Railway on September 1, 1981, marking the company's third acquisition. The next month, Timothy Mellon made an offer of $500,000 for the entirety of the D&H's stock, which was identical to the amount the Norfolk and Western had paid to buy the D&H in 1968. Both the D&H's directors and Norfolk and Western accepted the offer, in part to remove a potential obstacle to the pending merger between the N&W and the Southern Railway.

Expansion attempt

In 1985, Guilford entered into an agreement with Norfolk Southern Railway (NS) to run trains to St. Louis. NS was attempting to win approval of a plan to purchase Conrail from the US government and proposed allowing Guilford to lease Conrail lines to St. Louis in order to restore competition that would be lost in the merger. The plan would have allowed Guilford to use the Conrail mainline from Toledo to Ridgeway, Ohio, and from Crestline, Ohio, to St. Louis. Guilford would also purchase 955 miles (1,537 km) of Conrail track and 1,300 freight cars from Norfolk Southern for $53M. NS did not prevail in its attempt to purchase Conrail in 1985, and the Guilford plan was dropped. In 1987, Guilford also placed a bid to buy the Southern Pacific Railroad (SP).

The paper industry provides the largest source of business, with chemicals, clay and pulp inbound, and finished paper outbound. But the railroad has been losing ground to other forms of transportation - particularly trucking. A 2008 report issued by the American Society of Civil Engineers rated Maine at 48th of the 50 states in volume of freight traffic that moves by rail.