The story in brief
To keep Acre, Brazil promises Bolivia a railway around the rapids of the Madeira. Men of some forty nationalities cut the line through the jungle, between malaria and the rains, and the rails reach the border in 1912, the year rubber collapses. A legend says every sleeper cost a life. The records tell another story, smaller and still terrible.
The chapters
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Chapter 1 · 5 min · Free
The Rapids
Legend says every sleeper of this railway cost a life. The story begins with a treaty and a river that will not let itself be sailed.
Sources: Treaty of Petrópolis (1903); Manoel Rodrigues Ferreira, A Ferrovia do Diabo
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Chapter 2 · 5 min · Free
People from All Over the World
To open the line, the company looks for people all over the world. The records add up to some forty nationalities.
Sources: Oswaldo Cruz (1910); Photographs by Dana B. Merrill (Museu Paulista)
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Chapter 3 · 5 min
Quinine at Every Meal
Almost every worker catches malaria. The company puts quinine on every table and calls in the most famous doctor in Brazil.
Sources: Oswaldo Cruz, sanitary report on the Madeira (1910); Julio Nogueira (1913)
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Chapter 4 · 5 min
The Last Rail
The company pays a photographer to show progress. In one of the photos, his own shadow appears.
Sources: Photographs by Dana B. Merrill (Museu Paulista); Julio Nogueira (1913)
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Chapter 5 · 5 min
One Dead for Every Sleeper
The railway is finished the year it loses its reason to exist. And it leaves a legend: one dead for every sleeper.
Sources: Decrees of 1931 and 1966; Francisco Foot Hardman, Trem-fantasma (1988)
Who’s who
The people you meet. Each one is a hero card you can collect.
- Percival FarquharThe owner of the works · American businessman · Madeira-Mamoré Railway Company
- The Railway WorkersBarbados, Galicia, Greece, India, the Northeast · Forty nationalities · 1907 to 1912
- Belisário PennaThe travelling companion · Sanitarian · Saneamento do Brasil
- Dana MerrillThe company’s photographer · Glass plates · 1909 to 1912
- Frank KravignyThe witness · The company’s clerk · The Jungle Route
- Oswaldo CruzThe doctor who put the disease on paper · Sanitarian · Manguinhos
What you’ll be able to tell
This story belongs to the journey “The Forgotten”. By the end of it, you can tell what really happened in each place, why it was allowed to happen, and what changed after.
Stories in this journey
- Madeira-Mamoré: The Devil’s Railway
- Fordlândia: Henry Ford’s Amazon Town
- Barbacena: The Patients of the Colônia
Sources
- Treaty of Petrópolis, 17 November 1903
- Oswaldo Cruz, General Considerations on the Sanitary Conditions of the Madeira River (1910)
- Photographs by Dana B. Merrill (Museu Paulista, University of São Paulo)
- Manoel Rodrigues Ferreira, A Ferrovia do Diabo
- Francisco Foot Hardman, Trem-fantasma (1988)
