New and old on the Atlantic & East Carolina

20180404

The newness of green-and-yellow F2 No. 401 contrasts with the antiquity of the wooden cars as the Atlantic & Eastern Carolina’s daily passenger train crosses the Trent River at New Bern, N.C., in 1946. The 96-mile A&EC had two F units, both F2s. A&EC photo […]

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Mail exchange on the fly

20180427

A clerk tosses two mail delivery pouches out the door of his speeding Railway Post Office car while simultaneously keeping the catcher arm raised in preparation for snagging outbound mail. This is on the Boston & Maine in the late 1940s. Edward J. Howard Jr. photo […]

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King of the Maine two-footers

20180412

In 1934 on the Sandy River & Rangeley Lakes, largest of the Maine two-foot-gauge railroads, a gasoline railcar and baggage trailer are ready to depart the depot at Strong, while 2-6-2 No. 24 prepares to follow with a freight. Peter Cornwall coll. […]

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Railroads that live ‘forever’ … on paper

Steam locomotive with train on bridge approaching tunnel

Like trilobites and brachiopods, the paper carcasses of 19th-century railroads seem forever locked away in the sediments of corporate archives and government files. They fill the pages of old Official Guides and Poor’s Manual of the Railroads by the hundreds. Nearly all of them are dormant — but some are not.   Consider the case […]

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L&N heavy Mikado

20180424

Louisville & Nashville 1807, one of the road’s big fleet of heavy USRS 2-8-2s, moves through Strawberry Yard, south of Louisville, in the late 1940s. Charles B. Castner photo […]

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Iowa mixed train

20180423

Smack in the middle of the Hawkeye State, Minneapolis & St. Louis 2-6-0 No. 310 crosses the Skunk River with train 342, the return leg of the daily mixed from Marshalltown to Story City, Iowa, in mid-1946. The spindly bridge near Roland necessitated the use of light motive power on the Story City Branch. William F. […]

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Fine day on Helmstetter’s Curve

20180420

Western Maryland 2-10-0 1109 leads empty coal hoppers and other freight cars west at famous Helmstetter’s Curve on WM’s main line west of Cumberland, Md. Today the right of way hosts Western Maryland Scenic Railway tourist trains and a bike path. Ed Theisinger photo […]

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Icing reefers on the Erie

20180425

The Erie’s icing platform at Marion, Ohio, handled a lot of meat and other perishable traffic. Here, carts on the upper-level platform service a pair of Wilson meat reefers. The two Pacific Fruit Express reefers at right will receive chunk ice from the main platform. A large ice plant is in the background. Erie Railroad photo […]

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GM&O on the eve of merger

20180418

Gulf, Mobile & Ohio GP30 502 leads southbound freight 33 south of Pomona, Ill., in December 1971, ten months before GM&O’s merger with Illinois Central. Steven Mueller photo […]

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