This Big Lug is Very Useful

The huge locomotive pictured on the front of this post card is an

ALCO Century-628 owned by the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad (CNW). The CNW acquired a fleet of these locomotives from Norfolk & Western. This locomotive was employed for lugging heavy but slow ore trains. It is seen here at Proviso, Illinois in 1977. Here is a bit of history about the ALCO C-628, part of their Century Series of locomotives. This website is the apex of railroad information, in my opinion. I use Adam Burns’ site as a reference very often. https://www.american-rails.com/628.html By: Adam Burns The C628 was Alco's first in its line of six-axle, C-C road switchers. Overall these behemoths were as powerful as they appeared. The C628 would prove to be Alco's most successful six-axle Century, selling nearly 200 units. With the C628, “C” stood for Century series, “6” was the axle number, and the last two digits were the horsepower rating (2,800 h.p.). The C628 up to that time offered the most starting (85,750 pounds) and continuous tractive effort (79,500 pounds) of any locomotive in its class, which is a significant reason why some railroads really liked them. The Alco C628 debuted in late 1963 as a replacement for the builder's RSD-15 line.

Here is the back of the post card that was published by the ever elusive RAILCARDS.COM

Arizona Apache Takes on a Different Meaning

Apache ALCO C-420 locomotives numbered 81 to 84 and an RS-36 (also from ALCO) are seen on the front of this post card near Holbrook, Arizona on August 24, 1994. The C-420s came from four different railroads and the RS-36 was delivered new to the Apache Railroad in the early 1960s.

Why ask the Wikipedia people about something when you can go straight to the source? That is what I did. The Apache Railway still has a website... and quite the varied past. This website tells it all: http://apacherailway.com/about/ The information below is from their website. The Apache Railway was incorporated in 1917, when it began construction of a rail line from Holbrook south, reaching Snowflake in 1918. It was extended south to McNary in 1920. From October 1, 1931, until 1936, amid the Great Depression, the APA was placed in receivership. A tourist railroad, the White Mountain Scenic Railroad, operated steam powered passenger excursions over the Southwest Forest Industries-owned line from McNary to the logging camp of Maverick, AZ, beginning in 1964. My dad and I rode this train in the early 1970s before I went to New Jersey to go to college. I have some post cards of this tourist train in my collection. As track conditions deteriorated, the excursions were cut back in later years to a point about half of the way to Maverick. In the final years, it operated north from Pinetop Lakes to a place called Bell Siding on U.S. Route 60. In 1976, the White Mountain Scenic Railroad ceased operations and moved its equipment to Heber City, Utah to be used on an excursion there known as the “Heber Creeper.” The line from Maverick to McNary, with some elevations exceeding 9,000 ft (2,700 m), was removed in 1982 after the McNary sawmill closed. By the 1980s, the Apache Railway was Arizona’s only remaining logging railroad. The track from Snowflake to McNary was abandoned in 1982. The Apache Railway offered passenger service until the 1950s. In July 1954, the mixed train operated on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, departing McNary at 7:15 am, arriving Holbrook at 12:15 pm, departing there at 1:30 pm and returning to McNary at 7:00 pm. The Apache Railway is now here for you!

The post card was published by Audio-Visual Designs (AVD) in Earlton, New York. It was published after October of 1983 because the 7-digit zip code has an additional 4 digits appended to it. AVD was started in 1964 by Carl Sturner for the sole purpose of providing railfans with sound recordings of locos and trains as well as with photochrome postcards of trackside photos.

Let's Go to Wisconsin to see the ALCOs!!

The picture on the front of this post card is of freshly painted C430 and C424 ALCO locomotives. They are heading out of Green Bay, Wisconsin in August of 1977. The railroad that owns these two ALCO locomotives is the Green Bay & Western Railroad (GB&W). Sadly, it is no longer operational as the GB&W.

In my mind, there is no better source for the history of a “Fallen Flag” railroad than that railroad’s historical society. The information below is taken from the Green Bay & Western Railroad Historical Society. I strongly recommend that you visit their website for their unique perspective on the history of the Green Bay & Western Railroad (GB&W). This is their address: Green Bay & Western Historical Society, Inc. P.O. Box 940 Plover, WI 54467 This is their website address: https://www.gbwhs.com/gbw.html All the information below was taken from their website. Please go in and take a look around; it is very interesting. The Green Bay & Western Railroad packed a lot of fascination into just 248 miles of mainline and precious few branch lines. The GBW was chartered in 1866 as the Green Bay & Lake Pepin Railway. At the time, many railroads tried to link major waterways, and in 1873 the railroad, then called the Green Bay & Mississippi, linked the Great Lakes with the Mississippi River. Ultimately it ran from the Lake Michigan port of Kewaunee to Green Bay and west through the paper mill town of Wisconsin Rapids to the Mississippi River at Winona, Minnesota, the only place where it left the state of Wisconsin. The GBW even had a subsidiary on its east end, the Ahnapee & Western, which was twice independent and twice a part of the GBW. But the Great Depression dealt a heavy blow to the marginal railroad. Its frugal president, Frank B. Seymour, managed to keep the railroad alive. But it took a visionary man to see a prosperous future for the GBW. Homer E. McGee, a former Katy executive, became president of the GBW in 1934 and began an upgrading program that would improve the railroad’s track, rolling stock and financial health over the coming decades. Early on, however, the railroad was a financial failure. Traffic was sparse in the Wisconsin wilderness; passenger trains never found a real home on the “Grab Baggage & Walk.” The railroad’s resources were drained by derailments, roundhouse fires and floods. The GB&M would emerge from bankruptcy in 1881 as the Green Bay, Winona & St. Paul Railroad, only to go bankrupt again and emerge in 1896 as the Green Bay & Western Railroad. On August 28, 1993, the GBW was purchased by the Wisconsin Central Limited. Its traffic and employees were absorbed by the WC, and the remaining ALCOs were dispersed to other short lines across the U.S. Today, two-thirds of the GBW’s mainline remains in service as part of the Canadian National. The GBW was famous for ALCO power, the Harley-Davidsons of diesel locomotion. They were an ALCO customer since the 19th Century, even before steam locomotive builders like Brooks, Dickson and Schenectady merged to form the American Locomotive Company (ALCO). Every diesel the GBW ever owned – from the HH660 they bought in 1938, to the FA1s and RS2s that banished steam, to their 16-unit fleet when the railroad passed into history in 1993 – was a snorting, smoking, four-stroke product of Schenectady, New York. But the GBW was much more than ALCOs. For most of their history, their eastern connection was a fascinating cross-lake car ferry operation. From 1892 to 1990, sturdy vessels of the Ann Arbor Railroad and the Pere Marquette Railway (later the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway) battled November storms and winter ice to force railroad reliability upon treacherous Lake Michigan. In the 1950s, hundreds of freight cars moved across the lake every day, and even though this market would eventually vanish, you can still ride a car ferry across Lake Michigan.

This is the back of the post card. You can see that it was published by RAILCARDS.COM , a no longer existing company about which I can find no information.

Collecting Cabooses

Thanks to Scott Woods, president of the Greenville Railroad Park: "Those cars were acquired about 40 years ago when the Park started. There's no one left from those days. When I joined 17 years ago, I went thru the records we had to come up with signs to put on our rolling stock." This is what he wrote and posted on the signs in front of the cabooses. "1 of 60 built in 1948 by Wheeling & Lake Erie at their Toledo Ironville shops Steel framed caboose is 34'- 3" long & weighs 22,700 lbs Became Nickel Plate #705 in 1949 Became Norfolk & Western #557705 in 1964 Caboose was donated in 1989 by Norfolk Southern to Richard Rowlands, Hubbard Ohio Donated to the Park by Rowlands, repainted by Trinity Industries, and placed here in 1992" AND "Built in 1959 by the Union Pacific at their Omaha shops Was used all over the UP system Special trucks make this a high speed caboose for priority freight trains Donated by the UP, repainted by Trinity Industries, and placed here in 1992"

The post card was published by Mary Jayne's Railroad Specialities in 1997.