The Grand Trunk Western Railroad Company was an American subsidiary of the Canadian National Railway operating in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. Since a corporate restructuring in 1971, the railroad has been under CN's subsidiary holding company, the Grand Trunk Corporation. Grand Trunk Western's routes are part of CN's Michigan Division. Its primary mainline between Chicago and Port Huron, Michigan serves as a connection between railroad interchanges in Chicago and rail lines in eastern Canada and the Northeastern United States. The railroad's extensive trackage in Detroit and across southern Michigan has made it an essential link for the automotive industry as a hauler of parts and automobiles from manufacturing plants. Early history Grand Trunk Western grew out of a collection of 19th century Michigan rail lines which included: Bay City Terminal Railway Chicago, Detroit and Canada Grand Trunk Junction Railroad Chicago and Grand Trunk Railway Chicago, Kalamazoo and Saginaw Railway Chicago and Kalamazoo Terminal Railroad Chicago and Lake Huron Chicago and Northeastern Detroit, Grand Haven and Milwaukee Railway Detroit and Huron Railway Grand Rapids Terminal Railroad Michigan Air Line Railroad Muskegon Railway and Navigation Company Peninsular Railway of Michigan and Indiana Pontiac, Oxford and Northern Railroad Toledo, Saginaw and Muskegon Railway Mainline Grand Trunk Western began as a route for the Grand Trunk Railway (GTR) to link its line to Chicago through lower Michigan. GTR's objective was to have a mainline from shipping ports in Portland, Maine, to rail connections in Chicago through the southern part of the Province of Canada that would serve Toronto and Montreal. In 1859 the Grand Trunk completed its route to Sarnia, Canada West, and began a ferry service across the St. Clair River to Port Huron. GTR would lease the Chicago, Detroit and Canada Grand Trunk Junction Railroad to reach Detroit and from there would then run over the Michigan Central Railroad's line from Detroit into Chicago. It was on the line from Port Huron to Detroit that a 12-year-old Thomas Edison held his first job as a newsboy and candy butcher onboard passenger trains. Grand Trunk established its own route to Chicago across Michigan when the New York Central Railroad's William Henry Vanderbilt took over control of the Michigan Central in 1878. GTR sought to put together a route by acquiring three railroads it had already been sending some of its Chicago bound trains on since 1877. The Chicago and Lake Huron Railroad,