Waterlogged and logging miles

The spring flood waters have started to subside on the Mississippi River (as evidenced by the watermarks on the trees) at Gears Ferry Landing near Galena, Ill., as an eastbound BNSF “Z” train heads east toward Chicago on a cloudy and cool April 23, 2011. Photo by Steve Bauer […]

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Rondout Memories

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Seen from the North Shore Line bridge, a Milwaukee Road F7 4-6-4 rips through Rondout, Ill., with train 15, the Olympian, in March 1941. Frank Sellers At Christmastime 1940, when I was 15 years old, my widowed mother spent $4 of her hard-earned money to buy me a Kodak Brownie Special camera. I was thrilled. […]

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A Railroader’s Work is Never Done

The conductor of train BUSW, “The Peoria Rocket,” sweeps the north switch at the Limit Yard on the edge of Peoria, Ill., as the crew, southbound on Subdivision 2 of the Iowa Interstate, prepares to interchange an empty Cedar Rapids, Iowa, coal train with the Tazewell & Peoria Railroad on Dec. 13, 2010. Steve Smedley […]

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The Indiana Hi-Rail’s best and worst of days

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Indiana Hi-Rail GP20 No. 203 leads two Alcos and an Evansville-Olney train of empty Consolidated Grain & Barge cars northwest of Griffin, Ind., on Nov. 27, 1993. Scott Muskopf Alco C420 Nos. 334 and 315 sandwich GP7u No. 2097 heading south on the IHR’s Newton line (now abandoned) south of Newton, Ill., on May 29, […]

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An Ohio crossroads

Deshler, Ohio, sits at the intersection of two CSX Transportation main lines, its New York-Chicago trunk and its Toledo-Cincinnati route. A Chicago-bound stack train rolls across the diamond on Nov. 11, 2010. Photo by John P. Locke III […]

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Second 68 and the Lafayette Helper

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With engineer Steiner at the throttle of Nickel Plate Road 893, fireman Jennings shows photographer Lewis the coal scoop, which Lewis often wielded aboard the old 2-8-0. Hal Lewis In 1949, on the Nickel Plate Road’s Peoria Division, a daily eastbound local freight, operated as Second 68, ran from Peoria to Frankfort, Ind. Its power […]

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