The Hudson River Railroad reached the settlement by 1849; the first passengers on a regularly scheduled run through the village paid fifty cents to travel from Peekskill to Chambers Street in Manhattan on September 29, 1849. The community was in the process of renaming itself after author Washington Irving, despite the fact that he was still alive at the time. In 1852, Irvington was also named for the first coal-fueled steam locomotive of the Hudson River Railroad. The HRR was acquired by the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad in 1869, and the New York Central Railroad in 1913.