Menards Johnson’s Texaco Station is the latest structure release from the home-improvement chain. Many of its structures are made of wood and a few out of resin. This one is plastic. It isn’t the first one made of the material; previous low-relief buildings like Dave’s Garage, Ray’s Wreckers, and current-production Sinclair Garage are also plastic. […]
Era: 1946 - 1970
Lionel The Chessie Legacy Greenbrier
The Lionel The Chessie Legacy Greenbrier is big. It’s colorful. It’s a steam engine. Should steamers be colorful? Like it or not, fantasy paint schemes on them seem to be an attractive alternative to the prototypical (mostly) black models. This one was featured in 2022’s Volume 2 catalog. A look back at previous offerings indicates […]
Gleaming SD9 reminds us of Nickel Plate Road’s big switch
Just when you think recent progress in railroad preservation can’t get any better — I’m thinking here of everything from Big Boy to Reading & Northern 2102 to Silvis Shops to Michigan Central Station — along comes another milestone that, if not quite a blockbuster, is still remarkable. Especially if you’re interested in diesel […]
New York Central’s first E unit
E7 No. 4000, the first of New York Central’s eventual fleet of 112 E units (36 E7As, 14 E7Bs, and 62 E8As) stands at the road’s Englewood engine terminal in Chicago on Aug. 13, 1946. L. V. Lucy photo […]
GN’s Western Star and Empire Builder
A Great Northern public timetable for Summer 1951 showcases the road’s two Chicago–Seattle/Portland streamliners, the new Western Star and the newly re-equipped Empire Builder. Classic Trains coll. […]
Delaware & Hudson passenger trains remembered
Delaware & Hudson passenger trains All through July 2023, Classic Trains editors are celebrating the grit and grandeur of the Delaware & Hudson in its bicentennial year. Please enjoy this photo gallery of Kansas City Southern passenger trains selected from the files in Kalmbach Media‘s David P. Morgan Library. Only from Trains.com! […]
Modeling transition era railcar brakes
Q: I am researching transition era railcar brakes. Were there books written on the subject, and are they still available for purchase? – Ron Buddemeier A: The most complete and detailed reference for transition era railcar brakes is the one used by the railroads themselves – the Car Builder’s Cyclopedia of American Practice. This weighty […]
First run of the Lionel Pennsylvania RR L1 Mikado
With the release of the Lionel Pennsylvania RR L1 Mikado, it seems that we’ve returned to pre-pandemic manufacturing timelines with the manufacturer. This Legacy engine, cataloged in Lionel’s 2022 Volume II edition, has been delivered in less than a year. This is another product made with tooling acquired from MTH Trains a few years ago. […]
2-8-2T logging engine
Simpson Lumber Co. No. 12, a 2-8-2T with tender, waits at the loading spar. By this 1949 view, the Washington line was a truck-to-rail reload operation. Fred Matthews photo […]
Southern Pacific locomotive roster overview
The Southern Pacific locomotive roster was expansive. A headlight breaking the horizon in the 1960s meant one thing; you never were sure what the motive power would be. In its latter years, despite having hundreds of Electro-Motive Division Geeps and SDs and General Electric U-Boats of all models, SP would assemble whatever was available on […]
Diesel locomotives by generation
If you’ve read stories about diesel locomotives on Trains.com or in Kalmbach Media’s railroad magazines and books, you’ve most likely seen references to diesel locomotives by generation. But what does generation mean? Unlike automobiles, locomotive manufacturers don’t bring out new models each year. The same basic locomotive model can stay in production for years – […]
Checking out the 3rd Rail GP9 locomotive
The 3rd Rail GP9 locomotive models the durable first-generation diesel-electric workhorse. The follow-on to the GP7, it was perhaps the exclamation point on the phrase, “Steam is gone and it’s not coming back!” General Motors’ Electro-Motive Division produced a whopping 4,257 including 165 cabless units between 1954 and 1963. GP stands for “general purpose” and […]