Alcophile???

The back of this post card tells us that the ALCO C-424 locomotive on the front of this post card, while now belonging to the Green Bay & Western Railroad, is still wearing Wisconsin Rapids Railroad colours.

A couple of weeks ago I posted some information about the Green Bay & Western Railroad. Today, I will provide all the information that I could find about the Wisconsin Rapids Railroad. There is a private Facebook page that contains this information: "Wisconsin Rapids Railroad, L.L.C. ("WRR"), a non-earner, hereby files this notice of exemption under 49 C.F.R. § 1150.31, et seq. to lease and operate a rail line of Wisconsin Central Ltd. ("WCL") extending from approximately milepost 0.4 to approximately milepost 1.5 in Biron, Wisconsin, a distance of approximately 1.1 miles (the "Biron Lead"). Based on projected revenues for the Biron Lead, WRR expects to be a Class III rail carrier.” And this site https://railroadfan.com/wiki/index.php/Wisconsin_Rapids_Railroad tells us the following: “The Wisconsin Rapids Railroad is a short industrial railroad running from Wisconsin Rapids to Biron. The railroad is owned by ND Paper and operated by Watco. WRR interchanges with CN at Wisconsin Rapids.” The caption on the back of the post card reads like this: Attention Alcophiles! The green Bay & Western has long been an all-ALCO Diesel railroad, making it a must visit for die-hard ALCO fans, better known as Alcophiles. C424 #312 still displays vintage colors of Wisconsin Rapids in 1969. This post card is published by RAILCARDS.COM, that ever-elusive publisher of 204 of the railroad postcards in my collection.

Two Ten-Wheelers

Both of these locomotives are waiting for their departure times to arrive. They are at the North Freedom Depot at North Freedom, Wisconsin. Both trains will take passengers on a nine mile round-trip, through the rolling counryside of Sauk County Wisconsin. This is the first locomotive. The information about it was taken from this website: Western Coal & Coke #1 – https://www.midcontinent.org/equipment-roster/steam-locomotives/western-coal-coke-1/ WC&C #1 was built by the Montreal Locomotive Co. in Canada, in 1913, for coal hauling service at Beaver Mines, Alberta. WC&C later became Royalties Oil & Share Corp., and eventually merged with Lethbridge Collieries, Ltd., in 1935. The locomotive was last used in 1964 at Plyami, Alberta. It was purchased by a group of museum members and moved to North Freedom on two flatcars, arriving at the museum on October 30, 1965. At first glance, #1 would appear a rather simple design for a locomotive of the 1910’s. In fact, its blueprint can be traced back to a group of similar engines, albeit straight-boilered, built by the Pittsburgh Locomotive Works for various American roads as B&LE, Pittsburgh & Lake Erie, and Duluth Missabi & Northern in the late 1880’s. By the early 1900’s they became obsolete and many found their way to Canada via equipment dealers. The construction of the National Transcontinental Railway across Canada brought a need for low-speed workhorse locomotives to assist with construction. A group of about 15 engines were built by Montreal to the old Pittsburgh design. So successful they were, many copies were ordered by Canadian public and private railways, thereby saving on engineering/redesign costs. WC&C #1 is one such example. MCRM’s shop forces brought WC&C #1 back to life by 1970. She served as duty engine at the museum for many years during the 1970s and 1980s. In 1991, she received a new wooden cab. She is coal fired, weighs 55 tons in working order, and features a rare chain firedoor that challenges the scoop shovel skills of Mid-Continent firemen. WC&C #1 is presently out of service, and receiving a rebuild by the museum’s shop forces, including major repairs to the boiler shell and running gear. The information about the second locomotive was taken from this website: Warren & Ouachita Valley #1 - www.rgusrail.com The Warren & Ouachita Valley Railway Company was incorporated in 1899 and was controlled by the Arkansas Lumber Company (50%) and the Southern Lumber Company (50%). The line ran sixteen miles from a connection with the Iron Mountain in Warren to Banks, AR, where it connected with the Rock Island. It carried lumber for the parent companies from mills along the line, as well as providing passenger services. Built by Burnham, Williams & Company, an early incarnation of the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, PA, this Ten Wheeler (4-6-0) locomotive joined the roster in 1906 and was the only steam locomotive owned by the company.

The picture was taken by Jeff B. Haertlein and the post card was published by the operator of the two locomotives, Mid-Continent Railway Historical Society, Inc. in North Freedom, Wisconsin. It seems that Jeff was born in 1951 and at the writing of this post is still living in Freedom, WI.

Love Those Alcos

Thanks to the foresight of Homer McGee, the president of the railway, the Green Bay Route loaded up on Alco-built locomotives and entered into the world of railroad competition with the "big boys". The front of this post card shows one of those Alcos at work leaving Green Bay, Wisconsin. The following information was gleaned from the website: http://www.greenbayroute.com/

The Green Bay and Western Railroad was a paper carrying line and bridge route operating between the Mississippi River at Winona, Minnesota and Lake Michigan at Kewaunee, Wisconsin, via Green Bay. It was chartered in 1866 as the Green Bay and Lake Pepin to provide an outlet for the region's timber and agriculture. In 1853 a charter was granted to the Green Bay & Minnesota Railroad sufficient capital was never raised, however, and the railroad never was built. On April 12, 1866 a charter was granted to the Green Bay & Lake Pepin Railway (GB&LP) and construction of a route actually began in 1869. By January of 1872 regular service began between Green Bay and New London, a total route of forty miles. The railway finally reached the banks of the Mississippi River in East Winona, Wisconsin in December 1873. The GB&LP changed its name to the Green Bay & Minnesota Railroad (GB&M) in 1873 and fell under the control of Eastern railroad interests. The GB&M fell into receivership and was sold in foreclosure in 1881 to the Green Bay, Winona, & Saint Paul Railroad, which was created for the sole purpose of taking over the old company. Financial problems continued to plague the railroad and the line went into bankruptcy, emerging as the newly formed Green Bay & Western (GB&W) in May 1896. The Green Bay Route operated as sleepy backwoods railroad until the arrival of Homer McGee as President in 1934. His twenty-eight year tenure saw a massive program to improve the line, such as replacing all untreated softwood ties with treated hardwood, smoothing out grades to speed operations, and replacing old lightweight rail with ninety pound sections to enable the railroad to operate at speeds in excess of sixty-five miles per hour. Marginal branch lines were abandoned, the one was sold to outside interests, and another was fully merged into the GB&W. Under McGee's guidance the GB&W transformed itself into a high-speed bridge route powered by a modern fleet of Alco diesel locomotives, linking the upper Midwest with the East Coast via the Lake Michigan car ferries. By the 1960's over forty percent of all traffic on the Green Bay Route was overhead traffic, originating and terminating off line. The main commodity was forest and agricultural products shipped east and automobiles and auto parts shipped west. Increasing competition from highways and large-scale railroad mergers began to cut into the Green Bay Route's traffic and the writing was on the wall. The success of the railroad was dependent on the Kewaunee ferry which ceased operation in 1990. On August 27, 1993 the assets of the GB&W and the FRVR were merged into the Fox Valley & Western Railroad which was a subsidiary of the Wisconsin Central Transportation Corporation. Much of the rolling stock had their reporting marks painted over with WC subsidiary Sault Sainte Marie Bridge Company (SSAM). The remaining assets of the FV&W were merged into the Canadian National Railway along with parent WC on October 9, 2001. The actual Green Bay and Western Railroad Company still survives, though only as a shell.

The post card was published by RAILCARDS.COM out of Alameda, California. The webite does not exist any more, so I presume that the company went out of business. This is one of two hundred and four post cards that I have from this publisher. It is the third largest group of post cards in my collection.

Geesh!! I am Confused. So Many Questions…

The picture on the front of this post card shows a Mountain type steam locomotive at North

Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. The back of the post card says that it is resting after “making its first revenue run from Chicago on the new Wisconsin Central Railroad.” I can see that it is connected to a tank car, so I am concluding that it hauled a line of tank cars to this sight. That would be a revenue run. Here is a list of what confuses me: 1) What is the Frisco locomotive doing on a Wisconsin Central Line? 2) How is it that a steam locomotive is making revenue run in 1988? 3) After reading the story below about locomotive number 1522’s life after retirement from the Frisco Line, what is it doing pulling tank cars, not passengers? Below, there are a few stories related to the front of this post card. The first one is brought to us via this website: https://www.american-rails.com/wisconsin.html The events which led to the creation of the "new" Wisconsin Central Railway began in the 1980s. With deregulation afoot after 1980 and railroads merging, the Soo realized in 1984 that to stay competitive it needed to expand as well. In February, 1985 it bid out the Grand Trunk Western and Chicago & North Western to buy the greatly slimmed down Milwaukee Road, by then a Midwestern Class I. The Milwaukee acquisition gave the Soo new markets in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, and Illinois. However, it also gained a heavy debt load and the expected income never materialized as planned from the takeover. To streamline operations the Soo Line formed the Lake States Transportation Division (LSTD) that would cover some 2,300 miles of track, mostly in Wisconsin but also reaching into northern Illinois and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to Sault Ste. Marie. It was this network that formed the new Wisconsin Central. After a year of mediocre results with LSTD, Soo announced that it was selling the entire network to help pay off its debt from the takeover. After finding a group of buyers, the old name was brought back, including its famed shield logo; Wisconsin Central Ltd (WC). The new WC and its parent Wisconsin Corporation were both formed in April, 1987. The WC thrived, although the first few years proved very rocky as the new, upstart Class II regional found its footing. When the WC began, its 2,068-mile system was so large that it dwarfed all other Class IIs of its day. As of 1990, it was also larger than some Class Is at the time. Major connections for the railroad included Chicago, Duluth, the Twin Cities, Green Bay, and Milwaukee. During its early years it was paper that allowed the WC to prosper during the 1990s as it served 25 of Wisconsin's 52 such plants and the traffic always derived a significant amount of its earnings. However, it was also diversified in other freight such as food products, sand/aggregates, coal, chemicals, electric transformers, and other general merchandise. As profits soared the WC expanded; in 1993 it picked up the historic Green Bay & Western from the Itel Corporation. Wikipedia adds this tidbit to the history of the Wisconsin Central: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisconsin_Central_Ltd. In 2001, the Wisconsin Central was purchased by Canadian National. Along with the former Illinois Central Railroad, the former Wisconsin Central became part of Canadian National's United States holdings and its property integrated into the CN system. At the time of its sale to Canadian National, Wisconsin Central operated over 2,850 miles (4,590 km) of track in the Great Lakes region. The railroad extended from Chicago into and through Wisconsin to Minneapolis-Saint Paul and Duluth, Minnesota, to Sault Ste Marie, Michigan, and north (through the Algoma Central Railway) to Hearst, Ontario. About the locomotive pictured on the post card, we find a website that has much to offer. All of the following information is from this website: http://www.stlouisnrhs.org/Frisco-1522/Frisco-1522_index.htm Frisco 1522 is a 4-8-2 'Mountain Type' Steam Locomotive built in 1926 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works of Philadelphia for service on the St. Louis - San Francisco (FRISCO) Railway. Retired by the Frisco in the early 1950s, she was donated to the Museum of Transportation in St. Louis for display. In 1988, the all-volunteer St. Louis Steam Train Association completed a 3 year restoration of the 1522, beginning her second career as an excursion engine throughout the Midwest and South. Rising insurance costs and limited access to the mainline, coinciding with an expensive, required boiler inspection forced the 1522 out of excursion service and back into retirement as of the end of 2002. The St. Louis Steam Train Association was also dissolved at the end of 2002. A small group of former crewmen did attempt to put together a plan in the mid 2000's to get the 1522 back under steam but was unable to make much progress. With the locomotive owned by St. Louis County, the crew cars transferred to the Transportation Museum Association and our former tools and supplies locked up at the Museum, getting all the pieces back into place proved too much. Another big factor is the age of the crew - we had all aged 20 years since the original restoration was started and many of the original crew were retirees at the beginning. As expected, after leaving a 10 year waiting period for anyone to restart operations, the Transportation Museum Association sold off the Firefly, Black Gold, Bluebonnet and the 1522-A water car - a move effectively ending any chance of running 1522 again. At least we former crew have the satisfaction of knowing our hard work on those cars is now benefiting the Milwaukee Road 261 operation and the Ohio Central. The St. Louis Chapter of the NRHS has been kind enough to host a republication of the former Frisco 1522 website. As former SLSTA webmaster, I am honored to be called back to maintain it. Since there is no real news to report, this website will be more of an historical look back at the SLSTA and the operations of the 1522 and her support train. It will be a work in progress with lots of photographs, a listing of 1522's travels in her second life, and some recollections from the webmaster and hopefully other members of the crew.

The picture on the post card was taken by Thomas A. Wilson and is part of the John Bartley Collection. They gave Audio Visual Designs the rights to publish the picture on this post card. I have over 300 post cards from Audio Visual Designs in my train post card collection. I hope you enjoy this one. That is the logo of the St. Louis–San Francisco Railway (reporting mark SLSF), also known as the "Frisco".

This is too much fun to stop!!

We are posting another then and now blog this week. We have moved to the state of Wisconsin; Janesville to be exact. The picture on the front of this post card is showing a Chicago and Northwestern Railroad train as it crosses of the Rock River

near Janesville. The bridge is a good example of a Double-intersection Warren Deck Truss bridge and you can see a lot of it.

The bridge is still used today by the Union Pacific Railroad. It was built between 1907 and 1908 by the American Bridge Company of New York, who built the approach in 1908, and by the Bates and Rogers Construction Company of Chicago, Illinois, who built the main spans in 1907.

The longest span on the bridge is 125 feet, but the entire bridge is 720 feet long.






If you would like to see what it looks like today you can either take at peek at this:

Or use your GPS to get you to these latitude and longitude coordinates: +42.66932, -89.03281 (decimal degrees)
42°40'10" N, 89°01'58" W (degrees°minutes'seconds")

Unfortunately, the back of the post card has been damaged.

I would like to think that it was printed or published by the Rotograph Company, a major printer and publisher of postcards. It was founded by the Germans Ludwig Knackstedt of Knackstedt & Nather in partnership with Arthur Schwarz of Neue Photographische Gesellschaft (a major bromide photo paper manufacturer). They also took over the National Art Views Co. in 1904 to gain quick access to American views, and republished many of these images under the Rotograph name. A wide variety of card types were issued but they are best known for their view-cards in color rotogravure. Many postcards were printed in the Rotograph style without their logo on them. These early cards may have been private contracts made with the Rotograph Company or from orders placed directly with their printers in Germany. Rotograph produced about 60,000 postcards that were printed in Hamburg, Germany, by Stengel of Dresden, by Knackstedt & Nather of Nancy, France, and possibly by Reinike & Rubin of Magdeburg. While Rotograph produced large amounts cards in clearly defined lettered designated sets, they also produced unique small card sets. Rather than assign small sets a new designation, they were often given a taken letter prefix that corresponded to their subject.