R.I.P. on the Q

At 1:45 p.m. on a sunny spring afternoon in 1955, the pace of activity at the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy depot in Brookfield, Mo., quickened. Due at 1:57 was train 36, the Chicago-bound Kansas City Zephyr — a streamliner led by two sliver E8’s. Automobiles began arriving and discharging passengers and their baggage. Station personnel […]

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Rough Handling

My father, Richard Henderson, was employed by the Pennsylvania Railroad as a shop clerk in the motive-power department at Toledo, Ohio, from 1901 through 1955. He told me the following story, and I will never forget it. During World War II, troop trains were given rights over virtually every other train on the road. Such […]

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