Wood-burning Prairie

20180925

The engineer oils the valve gear of Brooks-Scanlon Corp. No. 5, a cabbage-stacked, wood-burning 2-6-2 that hauled forest products in Florida. Note the antlers and candlesticks adorning the headlight. Frank Clodfelter photo […]

Read More…

Stored Great Northern power

20180917

Five “stored serviceable” steam locomotives occupy a track outside the Great Northern roundhouse at Kelly Lake, Minn., the home terminal for GN’s Minnesota iron-ore operations, in September 1954. Philip R. Hastings photo […]

Read More…

UP 2-8-8-0 in Idaho

20180914

Union Pacific 2-8-8-0 3530 is near Pleasant Valley, Idaho, with time freight 655 in the late 1940s or early ’50s. Sixty-four cars back, another 2-8-8-0 pushes on the rear. Henry R. Griffiths Jr. photo […]

Read More…

Oil train on the Erie

20180910

A dramatic nighttime photo shows an oil train on the Erie Railroad during World War II, when German submarines menaced coastal shipping, forcing petroleum from the Gulf Coast onto the rails. Erie photo […]

Read More…

RPO on IC’s Hawkeye

20180920

A Railway Post Office clerk looks out from a doorway during a stop at Waterloo, Iowa, in April 1967. The train is Illinois Central’s Sioux City–Chicago Hawkeye. Philip R. Hastings photo […]

Read More…

Lima’s last Shay

20180911

Western Maryland three-truck Shay No. 6 works a coal plant on the Chaffee (W.Va.) Branch not long after delivery in 1945. The 324,000-pound giant was the last of nearly 2,800 Shays built by Lima Locomotive Works. Today she works on the Cass Scenic Railroad. Western Maryland photo […]

Read More…

Minneapolis, Northfield & Southern freight

20180913

Conceived in 1907 as an interurban line, Minneapolis, Northfield & Southern never did electrify. In the diesel era, MN&S favored Baldwin products like this blue-and-silver DRS-6-6-1500, shown switching the yard at Auto Club Junction south of Minneapolis in 1958. William D. Middleton photo […]

Read More…