Michigan and Ohio Railroad

The company incorporated on June 25, 1883, to consolidate the Toledo & Michigan, an Ohio company, and the Toledo & Milwaukee. The company filed articles on October 9, 1883 and began operations November 29.[1]^: 417 Beset by financial difficulties, the company went into receivership almost immediately; the Cincinnati, Jackson & Mackinaw (CJ&MK) bought the company on March 25, 1887.[2]^: 108

Discussing the liabilities assumed by the CJ&MK in acquiring the M&O and other companies, Michigan's railroad commissioner wrote that:

"...a sum so largely in excess of the real value of the property as to suggest unfavorable comment upon the policy of loading down a new enterprise with liabilities that cannot fail to seriously impair the financial standing of the corporation."[3]^: iv

From the Toledo & Milwaukee the M&O inherited 11.5 miles (18.5 km) of track in revenue service between Allegan and Montieth, where the tracks crossed those of the Grand Rapids & Indiana, and a completed-but-not-operational stretch 121.7 miles (195.9 km) in length east from Montieth through Battle Creek and Marshall to Dundee, in Monroe County.[4]^: 241 The M&O promptly opened this new section opened on November 29, 1883. The Toledo & Milwaukee had also leased the tracks of the Toledo, Ann Arbor & Grand Trunk, which ran south from Dundee to Toledo, Ohio, the company no longer having the funds to complete its own line.[1]^{: 422–423}[4]^: 241[5]^{: 170–171}

The M&O continued this leasing arrangement; in 1884, when the TAA&GT merged into the Toledo, Ann Arbor & North Michigan, the M&O continued to lease the Dundee–Toledo line from the new company, although the last two miles from Manhattan Junction to Toledo proper were leased from a new concern, the Wheeling and Lake Erie Railroad.[2]^{: 145–146}[6]^{: 372–373}