As commerce expanded, accurately weighing bulk commodities became increasingly important, and the rapid growth of railroads in the middle of the 19th century intensified the need. In St. Johnsbury, Vermont, Thaddeus Fairbanks addressed this problem by developing the use of levers on a platform scale, an idea patented in 1830 that helped the E. and T. Fairbanks Company flourish. Using the same principles, the company received a patent in 1857 for its first railroad track scale. Shortly after the Civil War, Fairbanks was selling scales for many purposes both in the United States and in Europe, Asia, and South America. Though the company changed names over the years, a version of it continued as a worldwide leader in weights and measures. The Fairbanks scale used on the Virginia Blue Ridge Railway was placed in service in 1915 and remained in use until the railroad ceased operations in 1981. Trains stopped there to weigh cars before heading east to Tye River Station to transfer loads to other outbound trains, and because each car had to be uncoupled and weighed individually, the process was time-consuming. Each car was stenciled with its tare, or empty, weight so the load could be calculated quickly and the shipper billed accordingly. The scale worked through a series of levers in a pit below the tracks that transmitted the rail car's weight to a weigh beam in the scale house.