Minneapolis & St. Louis 2-6-0 330 is at Story City, Iowa, on March 9, 1944, with the triweekly mixed train from Marshalltown. Story City was at the end of a 38-mile branch line. Photo by William F. Armstrong […]
Mogul in the snow
Section: Photo of the Day
Motorcoach surprise
Even relatively pro-passenger roads like the Burlington could get ugly about train-offs. Immediately upon receiving permission to drop Omaha–Billings train 41 (pictured near Osage, Wyo., on May 28, 1969), the road halted it mid-run and bused its riders onward. Photo by Bob Johnston […]
Erie open house
Erie R-3 2-10-2 4207 stands at Avoca, Pa., on June 22, 1941, during what appears to be a railfan event (people are boarding coaches in the background). Note the push pole on the tender. Photo by Robert F. Collins photo, John Locke collection […]
Delicacy delayed
A stalled train ahead has halted the GP7s and reefers of Illinois Central hotshot CC-6 in western Illinois, enabling the photographer to get this picture. He was riding the Council Bluffs–Chicago train on the road’s Iowa Division for a story in Trains magazine. Photo by William D. Middleton […]
Dominguez Junction
In 1960, a Pacific Electric car approaches Dominguez Junction where the Southern California interurban’s Long Beach line crossed parent Southern Pacific’s Harbor Branch. Today, Blue Line light rail crosses SP successor Union Pacific overhead. Photo by Richard Francaviglia […]
Erie doodlebug
Erie doodlebug 5014, an Electro-Motive product of 1931, and a Stillwell coach are about 5 minutes into their Midvale–Jersey City run as train 530 as they pass Pompton Junction, N.J., on August 11, 1946. The Stillwell coaches were a trademark of the railroad. Photo by D. R. Connor […]
Smoke show
Union Pacific train 339, the mixed from Twin Falls, Idaho, nears its destination of Wells, Nev., in fall 1943. Locomotive 2127, a 2-8-2 of subsidiary Oregon-Washington Railroad & Navigation Co., is a class MK-1 one of 41 such engines built by Baldwin. Photo by W. B. Wolverton photo, W. H. Wolverton collection […]
Ghost train
New York Central train 315 stands at Bellefontaine, Ohio, on July 16, 1960. The E7s still wear lightning stripes, but the train is already all mail and express cars with a single coach. On the eve of Amtrak in 1971, potentials passengers petitioned Penn Central to carry privately owned passenger cars on this run, which […]
California Interurban
Passengers bound for points in Northern California’s Marin County board their train at the Northwestern Pacific rail-ferry terminal in Sausalito in the late 1930s. Service began here in 1875 under the auspices of the narrow-gauge North Pacific Coast Railroad. Opening of the Golden Gate Bridge in 1937 was the beginning of the end, and the […]
Black (smoke) Friday
The engineer of Canadian National 2-8-2 3503 enjoys the breeze as he hurries a freight eastward at Lorne Park, Ont., in August 1955. […]
Diesel diaspora
The first two ex-Reading Alco Century-series diesels to appear in Cleveland following the creation of Conrail do so here in April 1976. C424 5204 and C630 5307, not yet renumbered, are arriving with a train of empty cars at the C&P ore dock on Whiskey Island on the lakefront. The Alcos are ducking under the […]
Rebuilt for grain
Union Pacific had the largest fleet of rebuilt boxcars with built-in grain doors, visible in the upper part of the right plug door. No. 520003 was rebuilt from an older 40-foot car in 1967. Photo by Union Pacific […]
