Super failure?

Caboose on one-car freight train

Super failure? Santa Fe’s famed Super C freight commanded high rates — charged to placate other Santa Fe customers. This meant it had extremely limited traffic, as illustrated by a one-car train in 1969. Photo by Wayne Bridges […]

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TrucTrain terminal

Flat cars lined up to load with semi trailers in yard

TrucTrain terminal The Pennsylvania Railroad’s Chicago TrucTrain terminal had a concrete ramp with six tracks and access platforms between pairs of tracks. Note the storage tracks for empty flatcars at left. Photo by Pennsylvania Railroad […]

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Forgotten ‘Four Aces’

Steam locomotive smoking with passenger train on curve

Forgotten ‘Four Aces’ Northern Pacific 4-8-4 No. 2626, originally the Timken “Four Aces” roller-bearing demonstrator, leads a Seattle-Cle Elum, Wash., fan trip through Kanaskat, Wash., in August 1957. Despite efforts to preserve the locomotive, it was scrapped a year later. Photo by Albert Farrow […]

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Chicago in the snow

Diesel switcher works snow-covered station tracks

Chicago in the snow Chicago & Eastern Illinois E7 1102 and two Alcos, Monon C420 502 and RS1 263 of station owner Chicago & Western Indiana, rest at Dearborn Station following a significant snowfall in February 1967. Photo by J. David Ingles […]

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Things that go bump on third trick

Passenger train at station at night

Third trick — the midnight to 8 a.m. shift — could be a long, quiet time for railroad telegraph operators. Although during the summer months it gets light long before third trick is over, in winter, most of the shift is worked in darkness. One night during World War II at the isolated station of […]

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Stainless savior

Single unit stainless passenger train

Stainless savior Northern Pacific began replacing trains on its secondary routes with RDCs in 1955, and eventually had a fleet of six of the Budd-built cars. This Fargo-Winnipeg train takes on passengers at Hawley, Minn., in 1966. The NP’s last RDCs ran in 1969. Steve Glischinski collection […]

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Super Power premier

Steam locomotive produces smoke on fast train

Super Power premier The era of modern steam power dates to Lima’s development of Super Power and the Boston & Albany Berkshire (2-8-4), which hauled freight through its namesake mountains. But the B&A locomotive’s small (63-inch-diameter) drivers failed to take advantage of its boiler to generate steam fast enough for high-speed service. Number 1421 is […]

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Pride of the fleet

Passenger trains meet on curve under signal bridge

Pride of the fleet The Super Chief, which originated the Warbonnet paint scheme, quickly became Santa Fe’s signature passenger offering after its introduction in 1936. Here, it meets the Pekin Express at Chicago’s 15th Street Tower in an undated photo. Photo by Wallace W. Abbey […]

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Lionel No. 97 Remote Control Coal Elevator

Roger Carp with Lionel No. 97 coal elevator

Professor Roger Carp discusses the origin and evolution of the vintage Lionel Trains motor-driven coal conveyor accessory. CTT Editor Hal Miller also chimes in with operating insights and helpful tips. Learn even more about this unsung classic in the May 2021 issue of Classic Toy Trains magazine. […]

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Lionel No. 97 Remote Control Coal Elevator

Roger Carp with Lionel No. 97 coal elevator

Professor Roger Carp discusses the origin and evolution of the vintage Lionel Trains motor-driven coal conveyor accessory. CTT Editor Hal Miller also chimes in with operating insights and helpful tips. Learn even more about this unsung classic in the May 2021 issue of Classic Toy Trains magazine. […]

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4-8-2 in an N&W lubritorium

Worker lubricating steam locomotive

Norfolk & Western K2 4-8-2 117, just in from Lynchburg with the Tennessean, is prepared for its next assignment in the lubritorium service building at Shaffers Crossing terminal outside Roanoke, Va., in 1954. A. Akin Jr. […]

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