2020 Hindsight

Two photos that illustrate my continual fascination with our hobby!

I took these photos, linked on Flickr below, 40 years ago on a road trip from Colorado to Maine. My brother and I camped in Michigan City, IN enroute since I wanted to scope out the Chicago, South Shore & South Bend RR (CSS&SB) which had recently given up electrified freight operations. In the morning we parked at the passenger depot and watched a couple of passenger MU sets go by. Then this lite power/ caboose hop goes by. At the time, "geeps" were very uninspiring, but I took the photos anyway.  Film wasn't free so I didn't shoot everything, but these weren't UP or BN.

Time, countless magazine articles and "google detective" work have proven that this set is a bit less well-matched, and therefore slightly less 'ho-hum' than it appeared at the time. My findings are in the captions on Flickr. Only a railfan can truly appreciate them. Non-fans will wonder what the big deal is.

Click here for the rest:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/133256320@N04/shares/Rp31eU

BC

Don't forget our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/hapttrain/

Social Media Presence

Some time ago we moved some operations to Facebook.  The Fiddler created a simpler site using a FB business template (it informs us like a business, which is annoying but functional).  It's also far easier to post to from a mobile device if the need arises. 
https://www.facebook.com/hapttrain/

This Blogger page will be maintained for anything larger than a simple "report" as in the last essay about a caboose in Iowa.  Who knows how long that will last.  But, until it is gone, there is archive value to this site so we'll keep an eye on it and keep it's function available.

BC

"Worlds Collide" - or at least graze each other.

Here is a simple picture of a caboose. It is a Missouri Pacific caboose similar to the many that passed through my college campus in Kansas in the early '80's. But it led me on a mission that ended up crossing my “teacher life” with my passion for railroads.

What actually got my attention the day I took the photo was the Taco John's next to the caboose. I was traveling through Missouri and Iowa at the time and it was lunchtime. Taco John's was my favorite fast food in my teen years and it was unusual to find one so far from it's home range in Wyoming. After securing lunch, I crossed the parking lot and decided to shoot a photo of this rig and other equipment sitting nearby. This turned out to be Fairfield, IA on June 28, 2007. I was traveling home after a national debate tournament in Wichita and subsequent visits with Kansas friends. I was headed for the railfan park in Rochelle, IL.

Nearly 12 years later, I had forgotten where the photo was taken. I had just edited and posted it to my Flickr account, where I normally like to put a location in the caption. In small bursts for days I perused rail maps and Google maps for locations. Nothing fit my recollections. Then one day I found a similar photo by someone else which named the town. Zooming in on Google satellite view, I found the spot and the caboose. Fairfield, IA, a city a bit outside my search but certainly along my possible route.

As I zoomed in on satellite view, something else of interest in this unlikely town popped up. Maharishi University Of Management. M.U.M. Until recently, I'd never heard of it. But, in my Debate Class a student gave a commencement speech (Oratorical Declamation) given there originally by Jim Carey in 2014. This aroused my interest since there were many Vedic references in the speech, and I used to teach some ancient history, including ancient India. I had check this place out. https://www.mum.edu/about-mum

Interesting history and certainly marketed well to modern generations. Founded by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, developer of transcendental meditation, the university incorporates “Consciousness-Based education” into their work. While it's not my kind of thing, it is certainly interesting. Something I would have missed entirely if a quest for a photo location hadn't crashed into a kid's speech. Apparently the speech given just across town from the caboose. Shoot, what were the odds I'd even heard of the place let alone taken a photo near there.

BC

Readville 2016

The usual trip to Marlborough on Dec. 3rd for the annual HUB train show naturally led to the usual trip to Readville.  And, as usual, we saw a few trains of the MBTA and Amtrak variety.  However, this time we got to see the remnants of the very recent bridge replacement over the NEC.  The old pin-truss bridge was sitting on a gravel pad over the Dedham branch and the new bridge was easily seen from the platforms.  The sun was good for this sort of recon but the cold wind soon took away our will to hang around for much longer.

Follow the link to the photos https://www.flickr.com/photos/133256320@N04/shares/J8x7f0

BC

Christmas Time in Waterville

Every Christmas Carl and I wander up to Waterville on a convenient day to see what we can find.  Some years we see a lot, others we see little.  This year we caught a bit of everything.  Click on the Flickr link below to see the photos.

We started off with the B&M heritage unit sitting over by the intermodal pad.  An Eimskip train full of Poland Spring Water was sitting there, apparently loaded and ready, or it had recently arrived and needed to be unloaded.  We took a shot then left.  Nothing else of note around.  We thought we were skunked.  Upon return after the usual loop around the area, we noted that a former Army Humvee sitting by the office was on the move headed to the intermodal pad.  When it was over by the geep it unloaded some guys in safety vests who went to the geep.  The lights came on and the geep moved in our direction.  It began some switching.

The GMTX slug set was sitting in the yard and it began to make noise on the scanner about moving out of the yard.  We took off for open ground east of the yard.  It eventually showed up behind the chinese restaurant in Fairfield.  It had pulled some cars near Hutahmaki and returned to the yard.  No signs that it was headed for SAPPI yet but it used the SAPPI 3 call sign.  We'd keep an eye on that.  We got a few close up and backlit shots by the restaurant in case we couldn't do better.

Somewhere we heard MAWA looking for papers at MP104 or so.  So we dashed off for Clinton where we saw it coming in the distance.  The sun was good for the crossing so we stayed put.  We then pursued to Bellsqueeze Rd. in Benton at CPF107.  We followed this by dumping Carl out at the Kennebec bridge so he could get some shots and by the time we gathered up and dropped by Irvings SAPPI 3 was on the move.  It beat us to the crossings and was in the void shy of Shawmut before we could shoot and darkness was approaching.  We called it a day at that point. 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/133256320@N04/shares/755f8i


BC

Mass Central Visit

Back on Friday 8/6/16 The DT&I Fan and I departed my place around 7:30am for Palmer, Mass.  The idea being that we could try to find the Mass Central RR and maybe even Leo Landry, who is an engineer there and HO modeler that Carl knows.

We started with lunch at the Steaming Tender restaurant and then drove over to the railroad office.  No one was around at first but I got out to take a photo and an employee said "Photos are ten bucks!" You could tell he was joking.  We chatted a second and then I asked him if Leo still worked there.  He said he was out on the road.  Before leaving he got on his phone and called Leo for his location, which was north of Ware.  He'd be there in 20 minutes.  Awfully helpful of the guy.  We charged off in that direction.

On the way up we noted all the crossings and such where good photos could be had and got a ways beyond Ware when we saw the headlights.  Carl turned it around and headed us to the transload facility in Ware.  It's and interesting place since the transload appears to be on a remnant of the B&M while the bulk of the MCER is former B&A (NYC/PC).  The bridges in the yard reflect that.  Plus, a GP9u and NW5 are currently sitting there.  The train came along and Leo instantly spotted Carl with a friendly wave.  We chased him back to Palmer where Leo took us into the compound for some better photos of equipment.

We ended the day with a visit with Billy Leazer at the old Amshack where we caught "Purple Trains" and the actually timely "Late For Sure Limited".  No freight through but CSX was not still as an intermodal went back and forth sorting outbound trains.  We left when the light died around 8:30pm.

The selected photos are in the Flickr album here:


BC

Maryland and Pennsylvania

PRR cabooses used by tourists now.  Northern Central RR, New Freedom, PA

The day after July 4th I was convoying south with my brother's family to their home in Maryland. The photo above sort of exemplifies the whole adventure given the Pennsy dominance and regional flavor. This family visit was followed on the 11th by a few days running up to Hamburg, NY to chase down a Pennsy I-1, stay at the Bridgeview B&B, and experience a couple of nights at the Station Inn at Cresson. This was with the usual railfan co-adventurer, Charles "The Fiddler" Kadyk. Yes we checked out the newly cleared Horseshoe Curve, but for the first time for me, we also visited the Allegheny Portage Historical Site. Cassandra overlook was included but we also got down to Holidaysburg where Curry Rail Services had some cabs out where I can see them and a sizeable group of Pan Am boxcars were going in for overhaul and new owners.  More local railfanning radiating from the Kadyk estate followed this trip.  I then concluded 17 days of wandering with a visit to Macungie, PA where I saw the re-newed Pan Am cars in GATX paint.  Finally I moved on to Steamtown, finishing the trip by staying at the Radisson Lackawanna Station Hotel in Scranton.

I could go on forever, which wouldn't help anything. Here are the photo highlights on Flickr, in order and mostly with captions, because I'm getting too old to write blog entries and insert more than a few photos at the same time:

BC

Red Barns

Normally when you hear "red barn" you think of something where cows are milked and hay is stored.  In the railfan world that would be the CP's cowled SD40-2's or SD40F's.  I had a chance encounter with one about 10 years ago near Montreal and thought that was a big deal.  Now that CMQ has acquired a few, they suddenly show up more often.  Last week at Millinocket, ME and yesterday west of Lac Meganic, QC.  I think I have another "bad penny" locomotive around.  Anyway, here is the Flickr album I created of them and I assume it will see some additions down the road...

https://flic.kr/s/aHskyYMabG




BC  6/27/16

Adventures in Central Mass.

Carl and I took a near-spontaneous trip to Mass. to see something different.  Almost all of what's left of freight in the southern half of the state is nocturnal these days unless you want to chase down branches with very sporadic operations. We were growing weary of driving all over Maine and seeing maybe one train.  Lately that one train has been a scheduled Downeaster.  Not much excitement there.  Brownville Jct. is seeing more action these days but we figured the same driving would also take us to Worcester.   As it turned out, Bill Leazer had the day off so we started by meeting him at Flynn's Truck Stop in Shrewsbury to pick him up.

After a good breakfast at the Edgemere Diner just down the street, we moved on to Worcester.  Union Station on a Saturday morning is wide open for parking, but we at least got to see an MBTA train leave for Boston and the layover yard was full.  CSX and the P&W were quiet.  The intermodal yard was quiet too.  Little radio chatter.  So, after we took a walk down the platform, where I took some photos in morning light, we moved on to Palmer, W. Springfield, E.Deerfield, then Greenfield.  The album below has the captioned photos of the tour.
The Flickr album is here:


It was a hot day.  My car thermometer got up to 94+ with a lovely humidity to accompany it.  We dropped by the Gardner T station/Chinese Restaurant where an autorack and a local were parked.  But, it wasn't to be our day for freight trains.  We moved south back to Flynn's on Rt. 140, which turned out to be a quiet and scenic route around all the urban crap.  We said our goodbye's and headed back to Maine.  It was a long day, especially when the heat took so much out of us.  But it was worth it to hang out with Billy and reconnoiter a piece of the new Conn River route.

BC

Flickr Study

CV RS11 doing some work on the Grand Trunk in South Paris, ME 1980.

Quite a while back (years) I found Flickr to be useful, but being one more "thing" to keep track of,  I did not give it the time I should have for my own photos.  This put me way behind the curve.  That changed only slightly a couple of years ago when I saw more and more rail photographers posting things from their own Flickr accounts.  I gradually noticed that Flickr opened up a vast world of personal rail photo galleries where people did their own thing without the filtering (or lack thereof) of a traditional photo gallery site.  I gave it another look and decided to play with it.  So, this post is really me talking to myself about utilizing some 'new to me' stuff.

While posting here on Blogger and Facebook was easy enough to keep track of, I had numerous on-line places to keep track of at work too.  Flickr felt like "a bridge too far".  That turned out to be untrue, at least in theory.  The latest software updates to all these on-line media sites allow you to 'drop and drag' photos very smoothly as well as post in one place and share to the other media easily.  This was superior to my previous experiences.  As these technical advancements made my tasks easier and easier, I was gradually, unknowingly doing it all backwards.  Flicker supplies links that I can post to the other places.  I can still add the lesser but story worthy stuff separately as before.  So here is a trial run.

A NB CSX autorack crosses the trestle at Catskill, NY 12/28/11

The top photo is an "embed" link provided for a single photo I recently put in my Flickr account.  I simply hit 'share', chose 'embed' and then chose a 640 x 427ish size.  Most likely I'll use a larger size in the future since Blogger will show you full sizes behind the "thumbnail" used in the Post.  I then copy and paste the link provided right into this blog where I want the photo to appear.  For me it's slightly simpler than uploading photos to 3 places on my slow DSL provider.  Even "slightly simpler" means it is now quite useful rather than an "extra" thing.  So I repeated the process for the preceding photo but this time I used Blogger's editing tools to resize and place the photo like I usually do.  It seems to work like before. 

Below, I used the similar feature to provide an album of photos.  This is my local stuff, most of which is already here on Blogger.  The photo is the first photo in the album but you should have access to the rest of the photos from this one.  All of the photos above are hyperlinked to their home on Flickr.

My "Local Maine" Album.  This shot is in Peru on the Rumford Branch.

I know there are things I can do to "pretty it up" and fine tune.  But this is the fun exploration phase rather than a finished product.   You should have access to the items I targeted.  If you have an account you may see more photos at the links.  That might need some testing with someone else's account since my devices all have Flickr access.

Anything that allows technology to make photo sharing easier is fine by me!
Don't bother telling me about better sites or ways to do this.
Patience.  I'm slow but steady.
Besides, do you really want to deal with an old fart who talks to himself.

BC

Spring 2016 Has Sprung

This particular spring brought me to Lewiston Jct. Maine a few more times than usual to play with new cameras.  This of course is directly related to the tendency of DSLR cameras to have shorter lives than the old film cameras did.  Part of that obsolescence is due to advancements in the technology.  The rest is due to the longevity of the hardware.  My Olympus DSLR camera still works but has been falling to pieces and falling behind technologically.  After 11 years I'd had enough.  I had purchased the DSLR to replace an Olympus OM-2 35mm fill camera that lasted 30+ years.  I sprung for a Nikon this time.  Regardless, I got down to "the Junctions" more than usual.

To try out the camera on rail subjects, Lewiston Jct. came to mind.  I naturally played with the settings around the house first but a nice sunny day beckoned.  The photos below do not show off any skills on my part or excellence on the part of the camera, but the bright orange of GWI is kind of "springy" and the afternoon sun on a clear day is just plain nice to absorb.  These first shots were from Saturday 4/9/16 and show some subjects that I haven't posted for a while. 

The rest of my "learning curve" photos are from earlier sessions, starting with this catch of a legitimate "heritage unit" at Waterville on 3/19/16.  You might call this a bit of spring color.

Then there are a few more "springy" (at the time very wishful thinking) items back at Lewiston Jct.  on 3/11/16.  The slugs were on display in rare fashion.  I was particularly interested in how the new rig handled shadows and light variations. 


 

Yes, I took a nearly identical shot of 3007 on this trip too, same as up top.  Couldn't help myself.



Hopefully I've at least added some seasonal color to this recently neglected blog.

BC

Scanner Albums: "This is a Test"

Here is a link to a public Facebook album of scanned slides I am building.  The link below it is a prior batch.  At the moment is is just easier to have one album and share it around with the new stuff.  I have a Flickr account too but I'm saving that for digital stuff and it is one thing too many.  You should have access to the commentary on each photo which I would include here anyway.

https://www.facebook.com/brad.conant.9/media_set?set=a.10204169032946308.1073741843.1840922595&type=3&uploaded=7

This is a prior album of scans done previously when I was less systematic. 
https://www.facebook.com/brad.conant.9/media_set?set=a.10200963772896810.1073741837.1840922595&type=3

Northern Recon Trip

Carl and I took a little jaunt up north to see what we could see.  Generally we get around to this about once a year.  Every year there is less to see and we've seen even less.  We actually caught something moving at Brownville Jct. which is the biggest find in several years.  We somehow missed a southbound out of Millinocket despite knowing about it, so that was a disappointment.

Waterville

This pair were sitting at Waterville on the way up.  I usually photograph what I find since it is never the same thing each time.  For a while long ago, it was usually a pair of first generation Geeps.  Now they are newer Geeps.  The GP15-1 really catches my eye because of the "tunnel motor" style radiator and lower horsepower.  The GP40 380 is common around these parts but still a former NS high hood.  The nose bell gives it a rugged look. 


Up the road a piece we saw only the distant lights of a Pan Am unit in NMJ.  That place is getting grim despite the new interchange with CMQ.  Derby was even grimmer.  We headed out north for Brownville Jct. where we saw little at first but soon heard switching on the scanner.  Over at the crossing on the CMQ main on the southwest corner of the yard we caught up with this GP35R and SD40-2.  A very colorful set.  At first the units and crew approached the crossing and they returned down one of the yard tracks. 

Brownville Jct.

Carl and I looked around for an few minutes.  I shot this sign at the crossing and took some detail shots of the yard tracks.   Then we began to hear the units returning with some cars. Quite a variety of tank cars trailed out of the yard and then returned down another track.  Later at home I noticed that nearly all of the GP35's have had the "Santa Fe" painted out on the long hood, unlike this one. 

  

 The units and their cars soon disappeared and we'd shot enough photos.  The scanner came alive with the dispatcher.  We heard him say a southbound was leaving Millinocket at that time (1500 hrs).  We dashed to intercept.  When we were far enough away the train we saw got orders to go south.  We got as far as Seboois and caught this empty track. 

After an hour of waiting at the crossing, we moved on, certain we'd heard a ghost.  The crossing was dirty enough that it couldn't have seen a train.  No sound or scanner activity.  We moved on at 1700hrs.  

Seboois

The yard at Millinocket was as empty as we expected.  We didn't hear a FRED or see a train in getting there.  Apparently we heard wrong or simply missed it in the trees.  I think I saw an NM train photo posted later that night that showed we might have missed it in transit. 

Millinocket

The last bits are from Mattawamkeag.  Someone had posted earlier that the yard was full of cars loaded with ties and that the ties were piling up.  That's pretty much what we found.  We weren't getting home until late so we pretty much went straight south for Auburn.  First along Rt.2 and I-95. 

Mattawamkeag

We didn't get much this year, but Brownville Jct. seems to show the only promise these days.   The units we caught made the trip worthwhile.  Scanner activity as we moved about seemed to center on the vicinity of Brownville Jct. and the various points where the MN/ME/NBSR meet the CMQ.  The newish MN to ME connector seemed prominent in one scanner conversation. 

Oh well.  Enough for this year.
 
BC  8/15/15

Ohio Hotspots Tour Pt. IV - Bellevue and Beyond

Westbound double-stack following the morning sun at Iron Triangle Park, Fostoria, OH.

Part I..............Part II.............. Part III..............Part IV
We began Thursday (7/30/15) at the Best Western in Fostoria, so it was only natural that we take another spin down by the tracks on the way out of town.  We saw some interesting sights as the diamonds cleared up in NS's favor.  We met some more interesting people too.  Among the fans was the author Paul Roth who published a series of 3 books called Railroad Vistas I-III.  He had a copy of III on hand and Charles and I marveled at some of the subjects in the photos.  As soon as I saw a P&WV lashup, I wrote down the info to order all three books, from Amazon as it happens.  He turned out to be an academic, involved with music and from PA so he and Charles continued to talk on those lines. And yes I did order the books once I found the piece of paper about 10 days later. 

It was a relatively short and uneventful drive down OH-18 to Bellevue.  Our goal was a new railfan park built by the Mad River and Nickle Plate Railroad Museum.  The new Kemper Rail Park sits right in the junction of several lines from all directions, including a W&LE line shared with NS.  Since we arrived right at lunch time, the pizza joint down the tracks looked pretty enticing.  The pizza turned out to be pretty good too.

 The park is relatively new and therefore doesn't have all of the amenities yet.  You can also see why.  The location is completely surrounded by rail so plumbing and utilities might be a problem.  However, with plenty of restrooms at the museum and plenty of local eateries, the nice pavilion and plentiful benches and tables are more than enough to enjoy the place. Just sitting in one of the major rail junctions for the NKP was enough. 


Almost the minute we got there and began to get our bearings, the W&LE showed up.  Not bad, though we could have had a cleaner shot elsewhere.  It wasn't long afterwards that the Toledo line past the museum came to life.  First an eastbound general freight then a westbound local led by an SD40-2.with an NS designed "Admiral Cab"


 I think we escaped for the pizza place at this point but returned in time for this autorack.  Not sure if it went south or headed west on the old NKP Fort Wayne line.  Another fan had dropped by at this point.  He had apparently done a volunteer stint at the museum and was doing some railfanning before heading home.  He was fairly young and had a cool rig he made with a collapsible pole for elevating his camera.  The blue tooth in his camera sent the view to his phone where he could fire off photos.  Apparently it's still in "beta testing" but a cool concept nonetheless.  As we talked we found out that he too was a book author, or at least the prime photo contributor.  His name is Brandon Townley and he has been involved with two books on Ohio railroads; Norfolk Southern in Action and CSX in Action.  They were available on Amazon but I found both at the museum so purchased them there to help out.  I got the last copy of the CSX book and Charles also bought the NS.  We do meet interesting people.



No mistaking the origin of the northbound freight though, you can see the cars snaking back around the bend toward Ft. Wayne.  The lashup was pretty wild including an SD90MAC and a Crescent Cab SD60E.





This southbound out of the yard features yet another SD90MAC.  The W&LE was doubling onto it's train in the yard here.  When he left, an NS westbound blocked our view. 







The offending southbound under the "Mini Plant" signals.

A northbound AEPX (American Electric Power Service) coal train led by an early SD70 curves off toward Toledo.  Like old PPLX coal trains but with far more oddball reporting marks mixed in.





This northbound's oddball lashup not only has a now common SD90MAC but a hard to find GP59.





The last shot of the day before breaking off was this westbound 261 RoadRailer.  This was definitely going to veer off to the west on the Fort Wayne line. Toward the end of our stay the accumulation of fans dropping by was down to just one other guy.  He turned compelling when we found out he was a steam locomotive engineer at nearby Cedar Point Amusement Park.  I didn't get his name but I think he swapped business cards with Charles.  Charles had learned how to fire steamers so the two conversed about such things.  For me they might as well have been discussing nuclear physics.  I have no idea, even elementary, about operating a steam locomotive.  But, I have ridden the very trains this guy runs around the park on the Cedar Point and Lake Erie RR.  On two occasions my debate team visited the park on the way home from nationals.  It's 3' gauge and generally a bit more prototypical than most railroads you see at zoos or parks.  All of us left when it appeared we'd hit a lull.  It was time for supper and check-in at the local motel. 

On Friday we headed for Baltimore.  Once we got to our turn on OH-18 we didn't get far before encountering the town of Monroeville.  This is an old T&OC/NYC depot on the roadbed the line that once bisected the junction at Bellevue.  Hard to tell but the building behind it may have been a substation for an interurban line.  To the left is a junction of W&LE lines.  The SPV atlas proved really handy here to attempt to sort it all out.

Down the road a few miles we went over three tracks leading into the huge Willard yard complex.  We drew blanks on Willard except that a fan we met yesterday wanted to go there.  We found this intriguing and we wanted breakfast. We did the usual "follow the tracks" through town and sighted engines, some of them, unusually, were red.  We'd found the engine facility and a string of CP GP9u's that seemed to be heading to new homes.  The roundhouse area was to the right, full of the expected CSX units. We didn't know our way around, or the extent of the yard so we kept moving east once we got our photos.  One thing we noticed was a line out of the yard that was following our route.  It is apparently the Ashland Railway now and runs south out of Willard.

This Ashland Railway took us to all manner of industrial park and former military base.  It also passed by the old Plymouth Locomotive Works, along with a W&LE line crossing at a diamond out back by the tower.  The site had many intact buildings and a few unlifted rails.  A freight house across the road seemed to be hanging on for posterity but not highly modified.  The "DT&I Fan" and I visited here in 1999 and actually saw a couple of derelict units on these tracks, and the tower still had a tank on it.  I'll have to dig those up.  We next moved on to Mansfield to complete the Meijer adventure.  Beyond that was a lot of cross country travel through the hills of eastern Ohio.  Not a bad day for it either.

We'd seen the Dennison Depot before.  It was part of our 2012 trek to North Platte.  Only that time we couldn't get inside since we missed closing time.  Here we got in and ate at Lucille's diner and bought a couple of things at the gift shop.  This is now on an Ohio Central line but it was once on the PRR Panhandle Division and as important a shop town as Altoona.  A couple of former GECX B39's passed by WB with a few freight cars while we ate.  Last time we were here we had just missed a westbound too, but we had the scanner going then.





Our day was not complete.  We continued down the OHCR to Mingo Jct.  Here we encountered a local next to the steel works.  Unfortunately we later found the mill will be dismantled despite some attempts to restart with an Electroforge upgrade.  The roundhouse, terminal and yard area has been disappearing for many years.  9 or 10 years ago when I last visited with the "Wheelman" the roundhouse was gone but the concrete pads were visible but there was still plenty of yard.  Not much to see now, though a tank with Conrail Quality on the side is still visible.  A lot of the yard is now gone.  This terminal and surrounding steel mill towns like Wierton and Steubenville were once the home to many large Alco's that hauled iron ore down from Lake Erie. This naturally made Mingo Jct. popular with Alco fans. The declining steel industry has made these places quite unneeded.  A similar scene probably plays out with the Great Lakes ports that handled the iron ore.

That was the last photography we did in Ohio on Friday.  We headed straight for my brother's place near Baltimore since the hour was getting late.  On Sunday we visited the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Museums in Baltimore and Ellicott City.  I'll severely limit myself here with a photo of one of my favorite diesels at the Baltimore museum.  BAR fans will know why this one appeals to me.  I took dozens of shots but that's not very sporting for this series of posts.  I did want to include some of the really historic stuff at Ellicott City though, since some of it is recent. 

The Ellicott City branch of the B&O Museum features the oldest purpose built railroad depot still in existence.  You'll note that from the end it doesn't look "normal".  That's because the B&O not only had no pattern to follow, but loco's and cars were so small that they were stored inside the depot.  The "Tom Thumb" and sample car in Baltimore illustrate what was stored there.  This depot once had two doors and two storage tracks inside.  Later a small 50' turntable was placed in front and the depot modified with only one door.  As loco's got bigger than the depot that end was closed off and it wasn't long before the turntable was too small and it was filled in.  In fact, it's only been a couple of years since the turntable pit was discovered and carefully excavated.  Everyone thought the pit was simply a retaining wall until someone dug around it.  Apparently other depots on the line had a similar turntable but this is the only survivor.

On Monday we headed home.  We prudently (lazily) left after the crushing morning traffic and toured the nearby National Cryptologic Museum next to the NSA campus on Fort Meade.  Don't go through any gate with a guard!  We avoided being frisked and checked out by following humorously precise directions from my brother.  I'll spare you most of the pictures but this place is free and seriously cool for history, intelligence or computer geeks.  Our main task of the day was to hang out at one of the newest rail parks - Cleversburg Junction.

We did the "follow the tracks" routine when we exited I-81N at Southampton, PA which meant we turned right (north).  After tracing tracks a couple of miles and seeing nothing we headed back zig-zagging from the other side.  Naturally we found the park back near the interstate where we started. If we'd gone left and turned at the first left, Airport Rd. we would have gone right to it.  Yes, the map clearly shows this.  Anyway, the place is very nicely appointed with ample paved parking and spacious shelter.  They have a scanner running and there's plenty of picnic tables spread around.  A town building nearby has restrooms.  This is part of the NS's former Reading Lurgan Branch that connects to the old N&W Hagerstown Branch.  It's an important and moderately busy line these days for north-south traffic.  But, we hit a mid-day lull and got skunked.  We left at 4pm after about 90 minutes. The scanner was silent.  

We headed out for the Railroad House Restaurant in Sinking Springs on the NS Reading Line to meet Charles' wife for dinner.  Just approaching the crossings in town we saw two trains.  Then, two more went by as we ate.   Finally, a train approached again as we left.  This last photo was taken as we made it about 100 feet from the restaurant (opposite side of tracks).  It was nearing dark so that was the last shot of the trip.  The train turned out to be a very late "All Day 11J" auto racks returning west to Detroit, MI from Newark, NJ.

That's all folks!  I returned to Hebron from Mohnton the next day without any diversions for rail sites.  Boring but a lot quicker.  Charles and I did have breakfast at the Exeter Diner before I left though.  They do breakfast right, and they even had a palatable version of scrapple.  We did see some old PRR and RDG ROW's on the way, but I'm not counting those.  I'm getting too old for long days, especially when they're connected. 

BC

Part I..............Part II.............. Part III..............Part IV