The Underdog Wins this One!!

The locomotive on the front of this post card is a Mikado. The Whyte notation of steam locomotives would make it a 2-8-2. That means two wheels out front to help it get around corners, eight driving wheels and two wheels in the back to support the cab and firebox. This website gives us a short history of the Mikado Locomotive: https://railwaywondersoftheworld.com/mikado-locomotive.html "JAPAN was responsible for fostering the creation of one distinctive member of the family of locomotives. Increasing goods traffic in the island kingdom called for more power, and the “Consolidation”, despite its perfection, could not satisfactorily meet the situation. The fuel forthcoming was a most inferior quality of coal, with the result that the effective combustion necessitated a large grate area combined with a fire-box of pronounced depth and volume. The construction of the new series of locomotives was entrusted to the Baldwin Locomotive Works, whose technicians, in the resolve to satisfy the Japanese requirements, took the established “Consolidation” and gave it a wide, deep fire-box set behind the driving wheels. To provide the necessary support for the fire-box a trailing truck was introduced, giving the wheel arrangement 2-8-2. For purposes of distinction the new type was standardized as the “Mikado”, out of compliment to the Japanese Imperial Railways upon which it made its debut." The locomotive on the front belonged to the Grand Trunk Western Railway. Its story is told below as found at this website: https://www.american-rails.com/gtw.html Grand Trunk Western's immediate heritage begins when the Chicago, Detroit & Canada Grand Trunk Junction Railroad was formed on March 16, 1858 to connect Detroit with Port Huron, a distance of 60 miles. It opened a little over a year later, on November 21, 1859. It was soon leased by Grand Trunk Railway of Canada for the purpose of forming a Detroit-Chicago corridor. Grand Trunk Railway interests quickly realized that reaching Chicago would require a monumental battle with the Vanderbilts who sought to restrict competition across Michigan. The Vanderbilts were ruthless in their aim to spread New York Central's influence throughout the Northeast and Midwest. In a surprising turn of events the Vanderbilt of the day was ultimately outfoxed in attempting to block its entry. To do this he acquired the small Chicago & North Eastern (C&NE), believing this road of just 49 miles (opened in 1877) connecting Flint and Lansing was a key asset. His intuition proved correct but the Canadians countered by slyly picking up a series of disconnected railroads surrounding the C&NE. These included the Port Huron & Lake Michigan in 1879 (running between Port Huron with Flint it first opened in 1871 and totaled 66 miles); Peninsular Railroad of Michigan (opened between 1869 and 1872, at 115 miles in length it connected Lansing with South Bend, Indiana); and the Peninsular Railroad Company of Indiana (extending west from South Bend it opened 45 miles to Valparaiso by 1873). Cut off from friendly connections and with nowhere else to turn Vanderbilt capitulated and sold out to the Canadians. Service opened to Chicago via the Chicago & State Line Extension's completion on February 8th running 47 miles from Valparaiso to Chicago. At its zenith the Grand Trunk Railway was an impressive operation, maintaining its own 800-mile corridor from Portland, Maine to Sarnia while also linking Montreal, Quebec, and Toronto. In addition, it controlled the Central Vermont Railway.

The post card was published by www.railcards.com at PO Box 3081 in Alameda, California. Unfortunately, those addresses not longer valid. I looked on line for the website and found nothing. The sad part is that I have 204 post cards from this publisher and I know nothing about them.