It depends on what time frame . But far and away the line between Mendota and Denrock was rural in nature. Almost every town had an elevator.
Also most had a stock yard. As the commercial fertilizer industry developed there were
Distributors in some of the towns as I recall in the 1970s.
At Prophetstown there was a feed mill that was a good customer. Also the casket factory. But I cant provide dates of when they started in business . By the 1970’s I don’t recall any business at the casket factory built the feed mill was still receiving cars.
At Walnut, GBH was a prefab home company that received cars of lumber in the 70’s. Don’t know when they started in business.
La Moille had an elevator,lumber yard and fertilizer distributor.
Tampicos’ most unique “industry” was the connection to the short line that went to Hoople. You could still sort of find the ROW in the 70’s. There was a fertilizer distributor and elevator just outside of town.
Since the line between Denrock and Savanna was Galesburg crews territory Aurora Division men didn’t usually do local work on this segment but then by the 1970s there really wasn’t any to speak of. But one trip on the way freight we did stop at a station and pick up a car of peat moss that was loaded there. The car was destined all the way to West Chicago on the original Q line for George Ball industries. I just can’t remember which station we picked it up at. Im sure someone will chime in with the answer.
This Denrock-Mendota branch line has a special spot in my work history as I made my first paid trip as a Conductor across the line on the way freight. We started out of Eola and picked up 25 cars for the branch at Mendota. The entire regular crew had laid off and I wondered why until we arrived at Mendota and were told to pick up 25 cars ! For an all extra crew with two brakeman that had less than 90 days on the RR things went quite well and we managed to put the cars where we thought they belonged in each town and industry.
Nothing was derailed or sideswiped nor anyone hurt. Why that comment? The job was infamous for all the facing point switch point moves that were required. Also unlike model RRs many businesses didn’t have big colorful signs on the back side of them stating their names.
Came back the next day from Savanna to Eola via Oregon,Rochelle,etc with another 25 cars(that was the stated limit on the job with a GP7 or an SD for power).
Im planning to write this adventure up as a FOBNR article someday.
The January issue of the FOBNR Expediter will have some discussion of this line from the perspective of a pool crew operating over the line as an option to the C&I route.
Not every time but pretty regularly had to double either Ohio or Walnut hills or both.
Another interesting spot on the line was named “the pump handle” as it was shaped just like an old time outside water pump handle. If we had trains running in both directions on the branch that had meets you would hear one crew ask another “where are you” and sometimes the response was “on the pump handle”. I recall one day on the way freight running along the pump handle and when I turned in the cab toward the engineer the seat was empty but we were moving right along at 25-30MPH ! So I got up to find where the hogger had gone. He was on the walkway of the SD tossing a baseball against the side of the engine room and catching it in his baseball mitt !
The line between Mendota and Aurora had the usual agrarian industries at each town.
The one and only time I spotted a combine for delivery was at Earlville.
Sandwich at one time was an early manufacturer of the reaper. Later the implement manufacturer “New Idea” was located there. Plano had a rather substantial manufacturer whose name escapes me right now. The elevator at Bristol became Bristol Seed and they blended seeds. Still getting car loads of seeds in the 1970s but don’t know when it went into business.
But the big industry was CAT just outside Montgomery. See the Bulletin article on the Earlville turn for the details. The Montgomery sheep yards and all the big industry across route 31 were served by Eola and Aurora based switch crews. But the big,heavy industries didn’t start arriving until the very late 1950s and early 60s. All Steel was the big one. But Lyon Metal on the east side of the mains had been there for many,many decades. it was served appropriately by “The Lyon Metal job”.
Leo Phillipp
On Oct 23, 2024, at 9:44 AM, Tom Mack via groups.io <thommack=yahoo.com@groups.io> wrote:
Were there any industries served by the Q on the "Around the Horn" route from Savanna to Denrock to Mendota? In Mendota I see from a spreadsheet that there was a Del Monte Foods plant, but my spreadsheet doesn't show anything along the "Around the Horn" line itself.
Also interested in any Q served industries between Mendota and Aurora.
--
Tom Mack
Cincinnati, OH
Modeling Chicago-Mpls/StP 1965-merger