What was your first byline in Trains? Mike Wilson: My first byline in Trains was “Winter in Coal Country,” published in January 2022 featuring an in-depth look at the former Norfolk & Western, now Norfolk Southern, Pocahontas Division within the backwoods of southern Virginia and West Virginia. In my humble opinion, the Pocahontas Division serves […]
The assassination of Abraham Lincoln on April 15, 1865, sent a Civil War-battered country into 20 days of national mourning. At the center of it all was a black-draped train, slowly and sadly carrying the former commander in chief’s body from Washington, D.C. to his hometown of Springfield, Ill. The U.S. rail network is no […]
ABILENE, Kan. — Kansas now has an official state heritage railroad and a state steam locomotive. House Bill 2481, which bestows the railroad honor on the Abilene & Smoky Valley Railroad and the locomotive distinction on the railroad’s Santa Fe Pacific No. 3415, was one of seven bills signed into law on Thursday, April 18, […]
ALTOONA, Pa. — Officials of the North American Railway Foundation dedicated an outdoor display and event venue — the Luther G. Smith Memorial Yard — here today (Thursday, April 18) at the Railroaders Memorial Museum. The public space is bracketed by the museum’s Master Mechanics Building and Norfolk Southern’s Pittsburgh Line. Costing $1.9 million, the […]
Railroad fusees My first memory of using railroad fusees [flares] for signaling was on an early winter morning in 1978. Coming back from lunch on the midnight shift at Auburn yard, the scenery had turned very foggy. Lanterns, while not useless, were hard to see at a distance in that kind of weather. During those […]
Lionel No. 151 Semaphore signals made their debut in the cataloged lineup for 1947 and remained popular members right through 1969, the final year of the post-World War II era of production. During that two-decade span, Lionel must have produced tens of thousands of the out-of-proportion trackside accessories. Collectors and operators of O-27 and O […]
The Train Master diesel locomotive holds a unique spot in history. At its introduction in 1953, it was simply a logical extension of Fairbanks-Morse’s locomotive line, yet the Beloit (Wis.) builder recognized that what Trains Editor David P Morgan termed the “fat, robust, gadget-packed 2,400 hp six-motor hood unit” could become something special. Which it […]
Classic Trains Film Archive | Illinois Terminal Railroad, J. David Ingles Reel 464 – Explore the Illinois Terminal system with this cab ride video! Ride a Peoria-bound freight with three new 2300-series SD39 diesel locomotives and see the IT from the railroaders’ view. The Illinois Terminal begun in 1895 as a steam-powered switching road at […]
In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the Model Railroader Hall of Fame May nominees. For those of you joining us for the first time, we’re creating a hall of fame as part of our 90th anniversary year. The rules for nomination are simple. The inductee must have made a significant contribution to […]
NASHUA, N.H. — The Flying Yankee Association preservation group has been selected by the New Hampshire Department of Transportation as the purchaser of the historic Budd articulated streamliner Flying Yankee, the virtual duplicate of Burlington’s Pioneer Zephyr that has been owned by the state since 1996. The non-profit group announced its selection at its annual […]
It’s a dangerous world out here I heard from a reader who’d recently become a railroader. A camera tot’n railfan (as I had once been) — and a very good one, at that. My first response was to congratulate him. My next impulse was to offer a heartfelt warning. “Whatever you do, be careful. It’s […]
OAKLAND, Calif. — Bay Area Rapid Transit, the 131-mile electrified rail network in the San Francisco Bay Area, is offering the public a last chance to ride the 1970s-era futuristic railcars that made up its original fleet. On Saturday, April 20, at 1 p.m. at the MacArthur station in Oakland, BART will commemorate the cars […]
