Bill
June is the sixth month of the year. Just pulling your
leg a little! Nice letter. Thanks
John D. Mitchell, Jr.
--- bill_og <haywarb@b...> wrote:
> My 9-year old daughter and I travelled on the MILW
> #261 steam
> excursion to Galesburg RR Days last Saturday
> 07/22/02. We boarded at
> Naperville Rt 59 station. Our coach was the 3rd car
> back from the
> last tender; we could hear the whitsle quite nicely.
> I had never
> ridden the rails to Galesburg before so it was a
> real treat to make
> the trip.
>
> Many folks out in the country and towns to watch the
> train pass.
> Outside of Aurora, an airplane was pacing the train
> with video
> cameras. Does anyone know of any of the RR video
> companies making a
> tape of these excusions or of Chicago 2002 steam
> excursions? I
> really enjoyed seeing Princeton, Buda, Neponset, and
> Kewanee from the
> rails since I have relatives in these towns.
>
> The refreshment car on the #261 train had hot dogs,
> candy, snacks,
> and various hot & cold beverages (we had dogs on the
> train). They
> also had #261 souveneers like hat pins, videos,
> posters, hats, etc.
> The unexpected find was original CB&Q posters of the
> "Parade of
> Progress" calendar drawing that they sold for only
> $10 (the catalog
> from Historic Rails recently listed this item for
> $30).
>
> We detrained at 1:30PM. This was also my first
> attendance at
> Galesburg RR Days (GRRD). We had snacks and food
> from the vendors by
> the depot (dogs, hamburgers, pork chops, barbeque,
> pop, ice cream,
> etc were all readilly available). We toured the
> Galesburg RR
> Museum's CB&Q #3006, waycar, RPO, and main exhibits
> in the MEATH
> Pullman car which were staffed with former rail
> roaders. We picked
> up some neat T-shirts with Ron Hatch drawings of the
> Silver Charger &
> #3006, a bear in engineer bibs, and a neat
> pencil-sketch print of the
> #5632 by Ron Hatch. My daughter was fascinated by
> the sketch, so I
> introduced her to Ron Hatch who was in the tent with
> his GRRD posters
> and other art-work. She spent at least 10 minutes
> telling her mother
> about Ron & his drawings when we got home.
>
> We also saw many of the other depot area displays
> from BNSF, the
> trade unions, and Lionel's layout. Of course, we
> walked through the
> Nebraska Zephyr, which is one of our favorite
> trains.
>
> Due to delays with all the Amtrak and yard excursion
> Metra trains,
> the #261 train did not leave till after 4PM. I
> finally broke down to
> my daughter's request to buy her a pair of goggles
> on the train so
> that she could sit in the open-air car (2nd car
> after the last
> tender) without getting cinders in her eyes. For
> me, it was too hot
> to sit outside of the AC. It was also fun watching
> the manic train
> chasers in cars on US-34 trying to keep up with us
> and wildly passing
> the non-railfan cars(I think the #261 was doing 60
> mph out in the
> country). Matt Phalen of Wyanet was also on the #261
> with the NRHS
> staff; I talked with him for a bit.
>
> I had my doubts as to my daughter's interest in the
> trip over 11
> hours, but we both really liked it. I wish we would
> have had more
> time in Galesburg.
>
> Does anyone else have other reports on the #261 trip
> and/or GRRD?
>
> Does anyone have any reports on the #261 trip to
> Rochelle on Sunday
> 07/23/02 ?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Bill H.
>
>
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