In studying Mr. Gelman’s series of photos featuring the last days of steam on the Illinois Central in southern Illinois, this photograph was one of the first that caught my attention. Many would say it’s a lousy shot, it doesn’t even capture the entire locomotive. But the more I look at this image, the better I like it. Here is this massive piece of machinery traveling right through the center of a typical small city in the U.S.A., surrounded by buildings filled with shops and offices. And stopping the traffic on the main drag in doing so. The locomotive was likely backing, as the engineer is leaning out and looking toward the rear. The photograph was taken in 1952 or later (based on the ’52 Chevy and ’52 Ford). The posting below contains the original caption listed for the image.

In zooming in on the image, I notice that there is a street sign at the left, and it reads “13th Street”. So that led me to research the photograph location. Using Google Maps, I have exactly located where this image was taken. The view above is looking west while standing on Walnut Street (Hwy. 149) and the cross street is indeed 13th Street, with the track actually on (or in) the street. The alleyway referred to above is a half block further west, midway between 13th and 14th Streets. The parking lot referred to is presently a Regions Bank with parking on its right side adjacent to the alleyway. The actual location (seen at left in this photo) now has a park-like setting that also has that Regions Bank drive-thru teller machine. Whew!

And I got a surprising (and confirming) find while studying the map. There is a splendid looking depot on 13th Street just a block to the north (to the right in the photo above). Below is that depot.

Mr. Gelman took a series of photos featuring the last days of steam on the Illinois Central in southern Illinois. This image is one of many contained in the Special Collections Research Center of the Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

I came across this image recently and it was labeled as “The Green Diamond in Ponchatoula”. I have seen photographs of this Illinois Central train before, but didn’t remember it ever running through Ponchatoula (in Louisiana). Researching the train, I learned that it only ran between Chicago and St. Louis. So digging further yet, I learned that this trainset eventually ceased operation as the Green Diamond, and was renamed the Miss Lou. This new train operated between Jackson, Mississippi and New Orleans, Louisiana. Read on below for further details.

The Green Diamond was a five-unit articulated trainset (each truck supported the ends of two cars). The problem with this arrangement is that the consist was fixed . . . couldn’t be added to, thus couldn’t handle the additional traffic as the train became popular. Therefore, management decided to retire this trainset as the Green Diamond, and transferred that name to a conventional train with separate locomotives and cars.

The Green Diamond trainset was built in 1936 by Pullman-Standard and powered by Electro-Motive Corporation with a single 1200 H.P. engine. The four cars it pulled were a baggage/mail, two coaches, and a diner/lounge/observation car. The train operated between 1936–1947. After it’s discontinuance as the Green Diamond, the train set was shipped to the ICRR’s shops at Paducah, Kentucky for a complete overhaul. The train emerged still in its two-tone green, but with the Green Diamond names completely removed. It then re-entered service on April 27, 1947, as the Miss Lou.

The trainset was finally retired on August 8, 1950, and sold for scrap. Unfortunately I don’t have the name of the photographer, or date of this image. Here are a couple links with more detailed information about this trainset: Illinois Central 121 (Wikipedia) and Green Diamond Train (no longer extant) – Chicago IL (Living New Deal)

A couple weeks ago we got a glimpse of the Illinois Central Mikado #1536 as she was being watered at a penstock in her usual servicing at the end of a run. Photographer Ben Gelman stayed with the locomotive and captured another view as she was preparing to leave with another train in tow. Stopped just short of a grade crossing, I speculate that the fireman is building a good head of steam in preparation of starting their train, that based on the heavy smoke plume being belched from the beast. I’m also speculating that this view is at the edge of the yard in Carbondale, Illinois. Again, the exact date is unknown, but I believe this to be in early 1959 toward the end of steam on the I.C.

Mr. Gelman took a series of photos featuring the last days of steam on the Illinois Central in southern Illinois. This image is one of many contained in the Special Collections Research Center of the Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

Once again, for this first posting in the month of August, I’m featuring a photograph from the 1986 calendar published by the Louisiana State Railroad Museum, it being for their month of August. The caption for the image follows below.

“March 1950, and Kansas City Southern’s class E-4 Consolidation, a 1913 graduate of Richmond, awaits her next assignment at Shreveport, Louisiana, the operating headquarters of the KCS Lines. (Photo from the collection of Harold K. Vollrath)”

The “1913 graduate of Richmond” referred to above is fully Alco-Richmond. By 1901 Richmond Locomotive Works had merged with seven other manufacturing companies to form the American Locomotive Company (ALCO). Locomotive production at Richmond ceased in September 1927.

There seems to be relatively few photographs of KCS locomotives, and information about them is scant (at least in my search). I was able to unearth only a bit of information about this burly 2-8-0. Built in 1913, she had 57″ drivers, and her boiler fed 175 psi steam to a pair of 24″ x 30″ cylinders. This produced 45,095 lbs of tractive effort. She underwent a re-building at some point, with the receipt of 63″ drivers, and her boiler pressure increased to 200 psi. Cylinder diameter was increased to 26″, and the tractive effort increased to 54,725 lbs. It appears she was one of eight class E-4s to be switched from coal burning to oil firing, that observation based on the Vanderbilt tender she tows. She was scrapped in 1952.

This information was uncovered at the website https://www.steamlocomotive.com, and also from handwritten notes of an unknown author, found in the collection of Lester L. Dickson at the Youngstown State University website https://digital.maag.ysu.edu/xmlui/handle/1989/43

Railroad car ferries were fairly common in Louisiana many years ago. And one of those ferries was a part of the Southern Pacific. I came across the image below sometime back and it was a ferry that I’d never seen before. I decided to learn a bit more about it and digging around on the internet, I found pieces and parts which I’ve tried stitching together here.

The first thing I noticed when studying the photograph was the large “Southern” on its side. I didn’t recall the Southern Railway as having car ferries in the New Orleans area, so wondered if the word “Pacific” was hidden behind the curvature of the hull. The second clue were the initials “ML&TRR”. That turned out to be Morgan’s Louisiana and Texas Railroad or more fully, Morgan’s Louisiana and Texas Railroad and Steamship Company. Wow! Reading a bit more on Wikipedia, the ML&TRR had become an operating subsidiary of the SP. The SP at one time had quite the maritime empire, including both ships and ferryboat operations. In the New Orleans area they had railroad car ferries operating between Avondale and Harahan, and Algiers and New Orleans. This photograph appears to be the latter location, with the docks in New Orleans on the east bank of the Mississippi. There is much more information at these Wikipedia links if you’d care to learn more about these operations: History of the S.P. and T&NO Railroad.

The freight cars shown are interesting, the Orient car is the Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway (KCM&O). The other car appears to be the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific (CMSP&P), better known as “The Milwaukee Road”. Both appear to be all wooden cars utilizing truss rod construction, and supported on arch bar type trucks.

After doing all the research, I found this same photograph on Shorpy (which has a huge library of images dating back into the 1800s). Some of the information that I had already discovered was on their description of the photo, and in the comments therein, and they date the time as circa 1910. Unfortunately, even Shorpy doesn’t identify the photographer.