Try contacting the National Sporting Library and Museum of Middleburg,
Virginia. They have the largest collection of primary related to
everything-horse in the country.  The librarians might know of some things
that could be of use to you.

On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 8:00 AM, Miles Shugar <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> Greetings all,
>
> I am a MA candidate at UMass Boston interested in urban transportation,
> growth, and labor.  After scouring multiple online journal databases and
> article collections, albeit in a limited capacity due to the constraints of
> any library, I haven't been able to find any archaeology of 19th century
> horse railroads, save the project that I'm studying for my in progress
> thesis.  My collection comes from a support complex of the Metropolitan
> Railroad Company of Boston, Massachusetts, which operated from the 1850s
> until the 1880s, when it was swallowed up by a conglomerate of street
> railway companies that would become the later electrified lines.  The
> complex, which consisted of stables, carhouses, various workshops, and a
> blacksmith, was dug in the late 1970s by the archaeology staff of what was
> then called the Museum of Afro American History, and the report was
> completed in 1986 by Beth Anne Bowers.   The artifacts are largely
> architectural and industrial, that is, relating to the ha
>  rnessing of the Company's many horses, the maintenance and construction
> of its streetcars, and various materials coming from the 20th century
> demolitions and construction onsite.
>
> I am particularly interested in the leather harness collection that was
> recovered during Phase II and III, of which there are portions
> representative of every piece of 19th century industrial draught horse
> power.  Unfortunately, as mentioned above, I can't seem to find any
> analogous reports or literature against which I might compare my
> collection.  This seems odd considering that in the latter half of the 19th
> century, most metropolitan areas of the US from Los Angeles to Philadelphia
> had adopted horse rails for commuter transportation, and further, that some
> urban archaeological excavations probably have encountered the vestiges of
> these systems.
>
> So I'm turning to you to see if any of your collective experience
> remembers anything of the sort.   Thanks so much in advance for any
> information you might be able to supply as I seek to learn more about these
> interesting urban contexts.
>