Jerry,
First, thanks for the info on Mt. Morris. It was great! I model Oregon in
1967-69 with a long spur that serves as the Mt. Morris branch, so this is
helpful.
A few of points of clarification would be appreciated:
1. In regard to Buser lumber, did they receive lumber, etc. in anything other
than boxcars? Did they ever get flat or bulkhead flat cars of lumber?
2. Would coal still have been coming in occasionally to Buser in the late 60's?
If so, was this usually smaller two-bay ton hoppers?
3. Did Farmers Elevator ever get covered hoppers in the late 60's, or was
everything still pretty much shipped out in boxcars? Good to know you were
loading cars in 1969 as this gives me another industry for the Mt. Morris
"spur".
4. Piggyback operation at Kable is what probably interests me most. Could you
explain more about the piggyback loading at Kable? Am I to understand that
empty 86' piggyback cars came into Kable and were loaded with trailers? Or did
they come in with empty trailers already on the piggyback cars and the trailers
were then loaded at Kable? This is very interesting operation since I did not
know private industries loaded piggyback cars.
Tom Mack
Cincinnati, OH
--- In CBQ@yahoogroups.com, Jerry Stauffer <milw265@...> wrote:
>
> OK..getting back on track here..sorry...during the 50's period you were
> asking about Roger, the following businesses and industry were serviced here
> in Mt. Morris.
>
> We had 2 lumber yards, Buser Lumber and McGee Lumber. Both yards received
> boxcar loads of lumber and may have shared load space on a car at times. Both
> firms also had construction divisions of their lumber yards so they probably
> received a lot by rail. Both had docks to receive from. Both are gone today,
> most of the buildings at McGee's are still there and you can see where they
> were serviced but the siding and switch have been removed years ago. Buser
> Lumber closed in about 68 or 69, the buildings remained until just a month or
> so ago. The siding that served Buser also serviced the Farmers Elevator just
> to the SE of the lumber yard where they mostly sent grain from outbound.
> Mostly in box cars. I worked for the elevator in 69 as a teenager and boarded
> up and loaded cars with corn to be shipped. If we were lucky we had the
> cardboard with steel banding to use to board them up but if not we had to use
> lumber that the RR may have supplied.
> Really a dirty job but it was kinda fun doing as a teen. That track was also
> removed I believe in the late 70's or early 80's as the lumber yard had
> closed and the elevator stopped shipping by rail. We would respot cars for
> the elevator with the endloader and sometimes had to use the loader to open
> or close a bad door on the car.
>
> Buser Lumber also further to the NW had some coal bins that were still in use
> as well and I remember coal being delivered to the house just across the
> street from us in the winter. There was also the Kaufman Elevator standing on
> another siding but I believe it was out of business by the early 50's. A
> local farmer did use it in the late 60's for his own grain but it was all by
> truck. I helped him dig the grain leg out so he could use it after a long
> silent spell from its commercial days. A little further on the same spur was
> a small Standard Oil bulk plant but by the mid 50's it stopped receiving
> loads from the RR as well. The bulk of the traffic was the Kable Printing
> Plant at the NW end of the line. There was and still is a small yard before
> the plant to sort cars in and be able to run around the train for the return
> trip to Oregon. In the early years of the Printing Plant which I will refer
> to as just the ' plant' they received fuel oil to operate the boilers in the
> plant. That came to an end when natural gas was installed years prior to the
> 50's. The plant had four other sidings, track one was inbound paper for the
> flatbed presses and also shipped waist paper from also. This track went
> inside and there was room for perhaps 3 or 4 cars. The track one trainshed is
> still there, tracks are still in the building, not outside, and is used by
> the Rochelle disposal for their compactor today. Track two received paper
> rolls by boxcar for The Roto printing dept. and also still serves as the
> loading track for outbound waist paper from the bailer room. Most of the time
> they would bring in empty cars for the waste paper as some RR's would not let
> you ship anything else in a car that carried newsprint rolls of paper. Rolls
> are shipped sitting on end and anything on the floor could damage the rolls
> and that is a big NO NO! Tracks 3 and 4 were also inside tracks with a wide
> inside dock between them and were shared between receiving paper rolls for
> both Roto and the Offset pressrooms. These tracks were not there in 1950,
> probably were added during expansion of the plant in the early 60's. Both
> tracks were also used to load mail from the bindery directly into boxcars
> being supplied directly by conveyors from the bindery production lines.
> Several people would load from the conveyor into the cars. In it's day it was
> a very modern operation. Track 3 has been filled in to dock level but track
> four is still in operation receiving inbound paper for the Roto print room
> with offset paper using track 2. No finished product has been shipped by rail
> since the 60's by boxcar when trucks took over this job. Track 3 and 4 shared
> piggy back loading of trailers which contained mail sacks so yes..product was
> shipped out on piggys. That lasted into the mid to lat 70's but was gone when
> I went to work at the plant in 1979. All ink used for printing was hauled by
> truck and still is today. The future of the plant not good at all...after
> this coming March the only thing to stay in operation in the entire plant
> will be 3 Roto presses. Every other department will be closing and I
> understand that all the presses and binders will be torched for scrap. Quad
> Graphics from Wisconsin bought the plant about a year ago and it looks like
> their plan is to close this plant and move the little bit of work we still
> do, to some of their other newer plants.. They are still running the job to
> town Monday thru Friday with from just a few cars to a max of 11 cars. So
> their is still some good shots to be taken yet of Mt. Morris railroading.
> Maybe not much longer..anyone's guess at this time.
>
> Jerry Stauffer
> Milw261 Crewmember
> Mt. Morris, IL
------------------------------------
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CBQ/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CBQ/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
CBQ-digest@yahoogroups.com
CBQ-fullfeatured@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
CBQ-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
|