Two Rock Island E units lead the Chicago–Los Angeles Golden State into Joliet (Ill.) Union Station in fall 1951. Wallace W. Abbey photo […]
Rocking at Joliet
Section: Photo of the Day
D&H PA on a swing bridge
A PA-powered Delaware & Hudson passenger train crosses a center-bearing plate girder swing bridge on the Canadian Pacific at Lachine, Quebec, in the late 1960s or early ’70s. Tom Nelligan photo […]
High-wheeled North Western 4-6-4
Chicago & North Western 4-6-4 No. 4004, having brought the San Francisco-bound Gold Coast in from Chicago, backs out of Omaha Union Station for servicing in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on June 6, 1953. Alco built nine of these 84-inch-drivered Hudsons for C&NW in 1938. R. R. Malinoski photo […]
Elephantine 2-10-4s
Making like two great pachyderms joined tail to nose, Pennsylvania Railroad J1 2-10-4s 6486 and 6488 doublehead a coal train out of Columbus, Ohio, with a coal train for the Lake Erie docks at Sandusky in September 1955. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
East Broad Top by night
Mikado No. 14 rides the turntable at the narrow-gauge coal hauler’s headquarters of Orbisonia, Pa., in July 1952. The road would shut down in 1956, then partially reopen for tourists in 1960. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
Tunnel under a town
A Maine Central E7 leads a northbound train out of the Boston & Maine tunnel under Bellows Falls, Vt., in the 1950s. David K. Johnson photo […]
Tweetsie Ten-Wheeler
East Tennessee & Western North Carolina 4-6-0 No. 10 heads a mixed train at Hampton, Tenn., in August 1939. The narrow-gauge “Tweetsie” quit 11 years later. L. B. Herrin photo […]
Wyoming along the Lehigh
One of the Lehigh Valley’s 37 4-8-4s — which the road called the Wyoming type — swings around Hetcheltooth Curve with a westbound freight train beside the Lehigh River at Glen Onoko, Pa., in the late 1930s or early ’40s. Wayne Brumbaugh photo […]
Thomas E. Dewey whistle stop
Republican presidential candidate Thomas E. Dewey waves to the camera during a campaign stop at Providence, R.I., in October 1948. Bob Withers collection […]
Santa Fe freight house in Atchison, Kans.
The Santa Fe’s freight depot at Atchison, Kans., is typical of those found in small cities. Inbound boxcars were unloaded along the single track at the dock, with trucks loading on the other side of the structure. Note the old-style grade crossing warning device in the foreground. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe photo […]
Robert F. Kennedy’s funeral train
On June 8, 1968, at Baltimore, Penn Central GG1s 4901 and 4903 lead a 21-car special train carrying 1,146 people and the body of New York Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, assassinated June 5 in Los Angeles while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination. Crowds thronged the right of way between New York and Washington, and […]
Pittsburg, Shawmut & Northern freight
Incorporated in 1899, when the name of western Pennsylvania’s biggest city was spelled without an “h,” the Pittsburg, Shawmut & Northern ran from Brockway, Pa., to Wayland and Hornell, N.Y. Heavy construction debt forced it into receivership in 1905, and it was abandoned in 1947. Just before the end, 2-8-0 No. 71 leads a freight south […]
