Bill -
Memory check here. Somewhere, under my roof, I have slides I took of
the AFT 4449 at Meriden and Congress Park taken in the Fall
(October?) of 1975, complete with the "ding" in the left front
skirting. The AFT didn't operate out of Chicago until the Spring
(April?) of 1976. In other words, it spent the entire Winter of '75-
'76 in the "garage" (test building) at EMD. I do recall driving by
EMD to see the GS-4 after completing a C&I Pool trip. The official
Bi-Centennial trips on the BN were somewhat controversial with the
engine crews at Aurora in that the Aurora RFofE, R.H.Flaar(#2)
arranged for his son, Dave, a fireman with low seniority, to
accompany each pilot engineer (from the C&I Pool) sent with the 4449
each time it moved enroute to display (Rockford & Aurora). Two of
the engineer pilots I remember were Carl Moore and Art Krahn. I do
have a slide I took of Art in the engineer's seat of the 4449 at
Blackberry Creek west of Aurora, when the train returned from display
in Rockford.
Bob
--- In CBQ@yahoogroups.com, clipperw@... wrote:
>
> Russ,
>
> IIRC, GM was one of the sponsors and there was some sort of event
> staged at La Grange involving the locomotive. In addition, it came
in
> from the west a week or so ahead of the train's arrival from the
east
> behind the Reading T1. The 4449, of course, had just been restored
to
> service after some 20 years in the pOrtland, OR park. The 4449
group
> wanted a secure location to stored the locomotive during the short
> wait. The collision in Nebraska, obviously wasn't planned, but the
> lay over time offer a good opportunity to make repairs. When it
> originally came from the west to take over the AFT, it was running
> light with only it's support cars with it. The train and the
Reading
> locomotive were still out east. I have color slides that I took of
> 4449 with the AFT train on it's initial westbound run, taken at a
> point between West Hinsdale and Clarendon Hills.
>
> I don't recall whether the train came through Chicago more than
once,
> but it may have.
>
> Bill Barber
>
> On Sep 26, 2007, at 6:57 PM, CBQ@yahoogroups.com wrote:
>
> > Re: 1976 American Freedom Train on the CB&Q
> >
> > Posted by: "Russ Strodtz" borneo@... thevlbg
> >
> > Wed Sep 26, 2007 9:59 am (PST)
> >
> > Charlie,
> >
> > I do recall there was a great deal of to-do involved in
> > getting the 4449 to EMD and back again. I do not recall
> > where it came from but the train was not with it. For
> > that matter I have no idea why EMD wanted it.
> >
> > During the mid 50's the CB&Q timetable had specified that
> > steam locomotives could not operate around the curve on
> > the North Wye track at LaGrange/Congress Park. That may
> > have been just for spite as the IHB no longer had any
> > steam power. While the NYC,MC,or Big4 may have run some
> > trains into Blue Island with steam these would not have
> > gone to the "Q".
> >
> > Whatever the case the 4449 did use that track without
> > incident.
> >
> > Russ
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
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