Three Southern Pacific F units lead a Los Angeles-bound piggyback train running as Extra 6368 East past Portrero Tower in San Francisco in 1956. Southern Pacific photo […]
Piggybacks at Portrero
Section: Photo of the Day
Piggyback publicity
A driver backs a brand-new 40-foot Union Pacific trailer into position on a likewise-new 85-foot flatcar in a 1959 publicity shot. The trailer was one of 10 new insulated trailers from Utility, and the flatcars were among 100 new UP cars equipped with two ACF hitches. Union Pacific photo […]
Multi-level transportation
Amtrak’s Pioneer began as an Amfleet-only train. By June 1981 it had become a hybrid of Amfleet, Superliner, and heritage equipment, as seen here in Pendleton, Ore. Bob Johnston photo […]
Joliet junket
An eastbound Rock Island freight, led by a red-and-black F unit trio — FT A-B 99/99B plus an F2 — passes the Joliet (Ill.) Union Station platform, on which several passengers wait. The Will County courthouse rises above the train and station. Wallace W. Abbey photo […]
Golden Gate
Santa Fe’s Golden Gate, a secondary Bay Area train, pulls into Merced, Calif., in May 1958 as a tour group prepares to board. Jim Neubauer photo […]
Four-coupled speedster
Canadian Pacific 4-4-4 No. 2929, last of 20 class F1a Jubilee types received from Canadian Locomotive Co. in 1937–38, sits with a short train at Montreal West station on May 11, 1957, as 4-6-2 No. 2472, last of CP’s 173 G3-class Pacifics, arrives on the next track. Bob Krone photo […]
F7, undressed
This 1949 view of the erecting floor at EMD shows a 567 diesel engine, generator (on the deck at the left of the engine), and electrical cabinet (far left) in place on an F7 frame. An FP7 is taking shape in the background. EMD photo […]
Divided, but one
At Pittsburgh in 1956, a Pennsylvania Railroad SW1 switches cars on the “Panhandle” side of the station as passenger trains pass on the “Fort Wayne” bridge over the Allegheny River in the distance. The names refer to PRR predecessors Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago & St. Louis Railway and Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railway, respectively. Philip […]
Diesel pioneers
A GP9 and RS11 work in Crookston, Minn., on Aug. 15, 1969. Northern Pacific went from hauling 35 percent of its tonnage behind diesel in 1950 to complete dieselization in January 1958. Bells retired from steam locomotives found their way onto GP9 replacements. Doug Wingfield photo […]
City of San Francisco
The joint Southern Pacific-Union Pacific-Chicago & North Western City of San Francisco crosses the Lucin Cutoff across the Great Salt Lake. Introduced in 1936, the train covered the 2,258 miles between Chicago and Oakland, Calif., in less than 40 hours. Southern Pacific photo […]
Big Sky cowl unit
Great Northern 434 was one of the road’s 14 F45 freight diesels. Built in 1969, they carried GN’s “Big Sky blue” scheme of black, white, and blue. EMD built 86 F45s, for Santa Fe, GN, and Burlington Northern, during 1968–71. EMD photo […]
Allegheny might
On June 6, 1956, one of Chesapeake & Ohio’s 60 collossal Lima 2-6-6-6 Allegheny types is westbound at Handley, W.Va., 24 miles east of Charleston. The train, framed by a signal gantry still in primer, is a mixed freight, not one of the coal trains more commonly found on this line along the Kanawha River. […]
