In July 1904, Asa Bushnell, former Governor of Ohio, encouraged by the light grade of the land, established the Springfield, Troy, and Piqua Railway (ST&P), an interurban traction line that used sixty-pound rail, crossed only one bridge, and ran on direct current electricity generated in Springfield. The ST&P operated four double-ended fifty-foot cars with railroad roofs, arch windows, GE-57 engines, and fifty-horsepower motors. Its route ran from Springfield's Fountain Square through Maitland, Hill Top, Lawrenceville, Bushnell, North Hampton, Dialton, Thackery, Proctors, Christiansburg, Brights, and Casstown to Troy's North Market Street Bridge, and later received rights to travel over the Great Miami River into Troy in conjunction with the Cincinnati, Hamilton, and Dayton Railway. The northwest right-of-way from Casstown to Piqua was secured but never built. Many people preferred interurban traction lines to steam engines because they were quieter and smokeless, did not produce harmful sparks, and could exceed sixty miles per hour. In central North Hampton, passengers could flag down the train and board at Detrick's Hardware Store, where the route came from Lawrenceville to Bushnell before turning northwest and crossing Donnel's Creek at 11:58 AM on its way to Dialton and Christiansburg, then returned eastward and left North Hampton at 6:51 PM. Because of the ST&P, many villages along the route built grain elevators and warehouses and transported coal, lime, lumber, and beer, and northwest of the covered bridge on Dialton Road there was a siding for loading grain at the North Hampton Elevator. In 1917, the ST&P was reorganized as the Springfield Terminal Railway and Power Company, but by 1920 the company had filed for receivership and service was suspended.