Amtrak North Coast Hiawatha service joined the Chicago to Seattle market as an unnamed, triweekly train on June 5, 1971. It obtained the North Coast Hiawatha name, a combination of Northern Pacific’s North Coast Limited and Milwaukee Road’s Hiawatha fleet, and Nos. 9-10, with the first Amtrak timetable issued on Nov. 14, 1971.
It operated from Chicago to the Twin Cities over the Milwaukee Road and west of there on the former Northern Pacific main line to Seattle. This was a change from the original NP North Coast Limited, which followed the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy along the Mississippi River east of St. Paul. Along the western route it served Fargo and Bismarck, N.D.; Billings, Butte, and Livingston, Mont.; and Ellensburg, Wash., among other stops.
At first, the Amtrak North Coast Hiawatha service was operated jointly with the Empire Builder between Chicago and Minneapolis and Spokane and Seattle. On Nov. 14, 1971, it began operation as a separate train between Chicago and Minneapolis and on June 10, 1973, also between Spokane and Seattle. While the full route was tri-weekly, the train operated daily on the Chicago to Minneapolis segment.
When the North Coast Hiawatha was shifted to an overnight run between Chicago and Minneapolis in October 1977, Amtrak instituted a new daytime service as the Twin Cities Hiawatha. This train operated on the North Coast Hiawatha’s former daytime schedule between those points.
Equipment came from the steam-heated Heritage fleet. Early power was E units acquired at Amtrak’s startup and later transitioned to the new EMD SDP40F diesels. When the EMD F40PH locomotives were used, the train also needed a steam-generator car converted from an old Alco or EMD cabless diesel.
The North Coast Hiawatha was dropped from the Amtrak map on Oct. 6, 1979, along with several other trains in Amtrak’s first systemwide cuts. This ended intercity passenger rail service to the most populous cities in Montana and the North Dakota capital city.
