A constant chore on railroads is the ongoing inspection of the rolling stock. It’s a chilly December day in 1942, and Jack Delano has captured this view of several workers doing just that. The men are inspecting the journal boxes and brakes on a cut of cars here in the Proviso yard near Chicago.

Seen center and right are two older cars, an outside braced wooden boxcar and similar gondola. Gondolas tend to lead a rough life and that Burlington gon is no exception, with several of it’s wood planks damaged. But it can still serve for loads other than granular commodities.