Still Going Strong after all these Years (the railroad, not the locomotive)

The locomotive on the front of this post card is working for the Burlington Route, as you can see on the tender. It is number 3003.

The complete name of the Burlington Route is the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. The following information comes from Wikipedia: The earliest predecessor of this railroad, the Aurora Branch Railroad, was chartered by act of the Illinois General Assembly on October 2, 1848. The Illinois General Assembly chartered the Aurora Branch Railroad on February 12, 1849, to build a branch of the Galena and Chicago Union Railroad to Aurora,[1] which it opened on September 2, 1850. Another amendment, passed February 28, 1854, authorized the company to build east from Aurora to Chicago via Naperville, and changed its name to Chicago and Southwestern Railroad. The latter provision was never acted upon,[5] and was repealed by an act of February 14, 1855, which instead changed the name to Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad (CB&Q).[6] The Aurora-Chicago line was opened on May 20, 1864, by which time the CB&Q had, through acquisitions, acquired a main line from Chicago to Galesburg, where it split into branches for Burlington and Quincy. This website provides some interesting colour commentary on the Burlington Route. https://www.american-rails.com/cbq.html Some railroads were seemingly destined to become strong, profitable operations. The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy was one such example. Its history traces back to the pre-Civil War period when trains near or west of the Mississippi River remained a relative novelty. During the mid-19th century the "Q's" earliest predecessor had established through service to Chicago and then spent the next several decades rapidly expanding. Its slogan, "Everywhere West," was quite befitting for this classic Midwestern granger. While the CB&Q did operate many secondary, agricultural branches it also boasted important through corridors to the Twin Cities, Denver, Kansas City, Omaha, southern Montana, and even reached the Gulf Coast! The Burlington was also quite close with the communities it served and highly visible in the public eye. It maintained an impressive fleet of high-class trains in addition to hosting its allying roads' transcontinental services. The long sought merger with the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, and the Spokane, Portland & Seattle, finally became a reality in early 1970 forming the gigantic Burlington Northern system. Today, all of the Burlington's principal lines remain in operation under successor BNSF Railway.

CB&Q No. 3003 is a Class S-4 (4-6-4) "Hudson" type steam locomotive built in 1930 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works. If you would like to see the locomotive today, it is preserved on a plinth at a park in Burlington, Iowa. The post card was published by the Audio Visual Designs company in Earlton, New York after 1963 – there is a zip code in their address.

Pretty Enough to Make Movies

Dancing with Wolves is one of the movies that used this canyon for the scenery in it. But it was well known before the moves came by.

The train on the front of this post card is traveling through what some people (Frank Lloyd Wright, for one) consider the most beautiful canyon in the United States. It is Spearfish Canyon in the Black Hills of South Dakota. It is about 70 miles north (and a bit west) of Mount Rushmore. I found this information on the internet about Spearfish Canyon and the railroad. It comes from this website: http://www.spearfishcanyon.com/culture/agrarian.html In 1893, Spearfish Canyon was opened by the railroad. This engineering marvel consisted of three hundred and seventy five curves of sheer up and down hill climbing. In all, the thirty two mile "Spearfish Spur" left Deadwood, rose 1,886 feet in six miles to Trojan (then known as Portland), then down 2,778 in twenty-five miles spanning thirty-three bridges to Spearfish. The ties were bedded in rock the whole way and the freight cars had to be chained to the siding to keep them from rolling to the bottom at Spearfish. The Grand Island & Wyoming Line built the spur but then sold it to the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy a short time later for more than $2-million. In an early brochure citing the breathtaking engineering accomplishments, the Burlington called the Canyon trip, "for sheer artistry of description, it need bow to no other." The railroad was very accommodating in those days. The schedule was one train a day, and the crew was most happy to let the fisherman, sightseers, picnickers, berry pickers, and the like off at any place they chose and pick them up again on the return trip. One of the most scenic and thrilling spots on the Spearfish Canyon train ride was Spearfish Falls. The crew would stop the train on the vibrating trestle spanning the falls offering a thrilling sight of the waters thundering impact below. The line as abandoned in 1933 after some severe massive flooding made it too expensive to rebuild. Today, a highway follows along where the rail bed used to be in places. This website has the following to say about the car drive: https://visitspearfish.com/things-to-do/spearfish-canyon The breathtaking limestone palisades of this creek-carved gorge are more ancient than the Grand Canyon – albeit much closer together. Once accessible only by horseback, Spearfish Canyon’s narrow, 1000-foot walls are among the most spectacular scenery in the Black Hills. Passersby can see the canyon en route to other Black Hills attractions on US Highway 14A, which winds through the canyon for nearly 20 miles from the city of Spearfish to Cheyenne Crossing. Built on top of an old rail bed, the highway affords visitors views of pristine natural wonders and historical treasures.

The post card was printed by the Curt Otto Teich Company. It was printed between 1915 and 1930 - the White Border Era. Curt's white border post cards are considered some of the best quality. He printed it for L. B. Holister, an importer and jobber in the city of Lead, South Dakota. I can find nothing on Mr. Hollister. But, there are many post cards on the internet that carry his moniker. That is his logo in the bottom left-hand corner of the back of the post card.

The One that Started It All

Although I did not know it at the time, this post card was to become the first card in my Train Post Card collection. I was ordained as a Roman Catholic priest on June 5, 1982.

One of the guys in the class one year before me knew my passion for trains. He gave this to me as an "ordination card" on that occasion. It measures five and half inches tall and eight and three quarters inches wide. I kept the post card because a) I do love trains, and b) Patrick and I were good friends. I did not know at the time, that it would be the first card in my train post card collection - which today numbers 3,014 cards from around the world. I seriously committed to collecting post cards the year that England was the feature country at Klondike Days here in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It was in the 1990s. I wanted to collect something related to trains that would not take up much room. They had a huge selection of train post cards at their exhibit for sale. I committed and bought one of each!!

This post card features a partial history of the development of what is know today as the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad Company. [Of course, at this time (1982) the Santa Fe part was still its own railroad company.] the train on the far left was built in 1892; the next one is from 1923; that is followed by a 1934 model of the "Zephyr". The second from the right is a 1955 diesel engine (an E-9 unit) as is the one on the far right, which is a GP-30 from 1962.
They all got together to celebrate "A Century of Locomotives".

The picture was taken by the Burlington Northern Railroad, as the company was known back in the 1970s. The post card itself was published by Lyman E. Cox from Sacramento, California - the home of the California State Railroad Museum.

Now Where are We?

We are in Burlington, Iowa at the edge of the Mississippi River looking over toward Henderson County, Illinois. This Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad train is about to cross a bridge built in 1868 by George S. Morison of New Bedford, Massachusetts.

He was born December 19, 1842. At age 14, he entered Phillips Exeter Academy and graduated by age 16. He went on to Harvard College where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1863 at the age of 20. After a brief break he attended Harvard Law School where he would receive a Bachelor of Laws degree by 1866 and was admitted to the New York Bar. In 1867, with only general mathematics training but an aptitude for mechanics, he abandoned the practice of law and pursued a career as a civil engineer and builder of bridges. He would apprentice under the supervision of engineer Octave Chanute during the construction of the first bridge to cross the Missouri River, the swing-span Kansas City Bridge.

He is known for many steel truss bridges he designed, including several crossing the Missouri River, Ohio River and the Mississippi River. The Memphis Bridge, built in 1891, is considered to be his crowning achievement, as it was the largest bridge he would design and the first bridge to span the difficult Lower Mississippi River.

This particular bridge is known as a through truss bridge. It was built in 1868 and the superstructure was replaced and rebuilt in 1893. It did last a long time but was finally replaced by a new bridge in 2012.

The original design is a one pin-connected swing span and six pin-connected Whipple through truss spans. Swing span being replaced by through-truss lift span of 307.5 feet. In addition to the lift span, one fixed span on the east side was replaced with three smaller, temporary spans until completion of the lift span.

This is what it looked like before it was replaced:

You can drive to see the replacement bridge at the following coordinates:

+40.79854, -91.09205 (decimal degrees)
40°47'55" N, 91°05'31" W (degrees°minutes'seconds")

The post card was published by the Woolworth Company, owned by Frank Woolworth. That is what the little W in the diamond at the bottom left corner is telling us. The post card was printed by the Curt Teich Company using the patented "C. T. Photochrome" process. This means that the post card may look like a divide back era card, but it was actually printed in the 1950s.

Let's Go Back to 1933

The Chicago World's Fair of 1933 - 34 featured a Travel & Transport Building. Outside the building they placed a 600-foot length of railroad track. On this track they placed three trains. You can see them in the picture on the front of the post card. The middle one, the feature of this post card published by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, was Number 3000. It was advertised at the time as the most powerful 4-6-4 wheeled locomotive in the world. The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad purchased twelve Hudsons from the Baldwin Locomotive Works in 1930. These 4-6-4's were designated Class S-4 and assigned road numbers 3000 through 3011. The engines weighed 391,880 pounds; the engine and tender weighed 717,930 pounds. It held 15,000 gallons of water and 24 tons of fuel (either coal or oil). The drivers were 78 inches tall and the cylinders were 25 inches in diameter with a stroke of 28 inches.

To the fireman's side of the modern locomotive stood a little old "tea kettle" engine with elongated cow catcher and diamond smokestack--No. 35, the Pride of the Prairies in the early 1880's. It is a 4-4-0 Class A-2 engine. This locomotive was built by Chicago, Burlington & Quincy's Aurora Shops in 1892 as Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad 66, later renumbered for the same company as 666. It was again renumbered in 1904 as it entered service for the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy system as Number 359. It was rebuilt in Denver in June 1932 for exhibition at the Century Of Progress (held in Chicago, Illinois during 1933-34) as Burlington & Missouri River Railroad 35. This is what this post card is commemorating.

The locomotive to the far left in the post card is from England. The original 6100 was the first of its class, built in 1927 by the North British Locomotive Company in Glasgow. It was named Royal Scot after the Royal Scots. In 1933, 6152 The King's Dragoon Guardsman and 6100 swapped identities permanently. 6152 had been built at Derby Works in 1930. The new Royal Scot was sent to the Century of Progress Exposition of 1933 and toured Canada and the United States with a train of typical LMS carriages.

It was given special commemorative plates that sit below its nameplates which read:

This locomotive with the Royal Scot train was exhibited at the Century of Progress
Exposition Chicago 1933, and made a tour of the Dominion of Canada and the United
States of America. The engine and train covered 11,194 miles over the railroads
of the North American continent and was inspected by 3,021,601 people.
W. Gilbertson - Driver T. Blackett - Fireman
J. Jackson - Fireman W.C. Woods - Fitter

The post card was published by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, commonly known as the Burlington Route.