After more than two decades of making fabric in Lafayette, Robert Rodman benefited when wealthy summer residents of Newport, led by investors from families such as the Vanderbilts, Berwinds, and Astors, wanted an easier connection from the main rail line to Newport. In 1870, a group led by Cornelius Vanderbilt II established a short rail line from Wickford Junction to Poplar Point in Wickford Village, where a ferry would carry passengers to Newport. The line was built so private railcars could be shifted from the main line and taken down to Poplar Point, then left on a siding while their owners spent the summer in Newport. To ensure the Newport & Wickford Rail and Steamship Line would be financially viable, its backers secured contracts for U.S. Postal Service mail and freight to Aquidneck Island and southeastern Massachusetts and sought other business agreements. This created an opportunity for Rodman Manufacturing, which had previously relied on teamsters with horses and oxen to move coal, raw materials, and finished fabric to and from the Lafayette mill at great cost and inefficiency. After negotiations, Rodman Manufacturing gained a dedicated spur line from the Newport & Wickford tracks directly into the mill property, helping the company compete more effectively in the late nineteenth-century fabric market.