Thanks for sharing, Jonathan, great photos!
Cheers!
Jan Kohl
bigbearoak wrote:
> I just posted a few more photos in the Oregon folder in our Photos
> section. These are from the same fan trip - a way freight with 5632 on
> June 23(?), 1962. I know Tom Mack and Dave Sarther, at least, are
> modeling this area and were interested in the look of the land back
> then. I wish I had more showing the immediate vicinity of the depot,
> but apparently that crummy black & white I posted a year ago was the
> the only one. Hopefully, these will be of some small use.
>
> The first shot is taken from the same highway overpass as the b&w
> photo, but looking westbound. 5632 is on the Mt. Morris track, and you
> can see the beginning of the branch heading off to the right. Our
> engine is backing up to retrieve a BE-1 express car, which has been
> spotted at the beginning of the branch. Don't know whether it was
> empty or loaded, but in either case this was the only 'freight' we
> had on our return trip to Chicago that day (outbound we had
> considerably more).
>
> The next two shots are at the opposite (east) end of the 'yard' (yes,
> I know, technically it wasn't one), just east of the depot. You can
> see a couple of the sheds there and glimpse some of the cars and
> equipment on the tracks at that end. The first shot shows what I take
> to be the Empire Builder, led by 9947. Just behind and to the left of
> the E8 you can barely see the Mt. Morris/Oregon switcher.
>
> The last photo shows 5 greybacks, led by F7 166C coming through with a
> long freight. At the far right you can see just a tiny bit of the Rock
> River bridge. And let me tell you, that train was moving! Seven or 8
> years ago, I posted a story about it, which I'll repeat here, now that
> I've found the photo.
>
> 5632 had picked up its return load, and we were waiting to reboard our
> train, milling around, taking pictures, inspecting the engine, and
> exploring the site. As you can see in the b&w photo, the grounds and
> tracks around the depot were full of people. Suddenly I saw the
> engineer push his way through the crowd, shoving people shoving left
> and right out of his way, and dash up the ladder into the cab.
> Immediately he let out a series of short ear-splitting blasts on the
> whistle. Since I was just 14 then and a neophyte railfan, I didn't get
> it at first. But it didn't take more than a few seconds to see the
> cause of his alarm. This long manifest freight suddenly appeared out
> of the trees on the opposite side of the river (I don't think anyone
> heard or saw it coming - not sure they could have), and was already
> barreling onto the east end of the bridge. I don't know the train's
> speed, but it was closing on us REALLY FAST. Needless to say, everyone
> scattered. There was one kid who was left on the track alone, frozen
> temporarily, probably unsure about which way to run. He did get out of
> danger in time, but only by a matter of seconds.
>
> The moral here is that even though we were all supposedly
> railroad-savvy, none of us heard or saw that train coming; nor could
> the oncoming freight have seen us until it was way too late to stop or
> even slow down much. Had it not been for our engineer's urgency, we
> could easily have seen a major tragedy. More recently this incident
> also made me think about the rather arcane system of signals (i.e.,
> whistles) used on American railroads. I'm told that European railroads
> (on the Continent, at least) don't use anything so complex. I've never
> known how the American system of long and short whistles came into
> being, whether it was related to Morse Code or something else. But
> whatever their origin, the alarm signal seems to be an exception. It
> needs no interpretation, but touches on something much more basic -
> deeper even than human consciousness. It's actually the same signal my
> parrot uses when he sees a hawk or a cat out the window - a series of
> very short, very loud bursts, repeated over and over until you know
> it's heard: an instant attention grabber with no ambiguity - the most
> essential information conveyed in the least amount of time.
>
> -Jonathan
>
>
>
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