FL9

In the past two blog entries we have seen the view back from the locomotive and the caboose working at the other end of the train, both taken in 1990.  In today’s time capsule from July that same year we get to see both ends of a westbound intermodal train climbing the grade on the ATSF Transcon between Belva and Quinlan, Oklahoma.  SD45-2 5808 in the briefly displayed Kodachrome paint scheme along with three SD40-2’s are leading a string of trailers that stretches back out of sight.

Bringing up the rear this day instead of a disappearing caboose or a new and boring rear-end device was a welcome surprise in the form of business car “Santa Fe.”

If the conductor was indeed back there this trip he was certainly traveling in style!

Yesterday I mentioned the caboose way back on the end of a loaded Burlington Northern coal train east of Childress, and so today’s slide was a natural when I pulled it out of the box.  Here is a scene that you no longer see on the Wichita Falls Subdivision.

Back in May of 1990 between Bowie and Decatur at the old east end of the siding at Fruitland before it was lengthened, the conductor of an eastbound loaded BN coal train that has just left the siding is on the ground lining the switch back for the main after meeting a westbound train.  Lining switches here is today done with the push of a button or by block occupancy, and caboose 10411 has long since been retired in favor of soulless end-of-train devices.

Back in August of 1990 this photo finds us in the cab of Santa Fe SD40-2 5079 leading four more SD40-2’s and a loaded 120-car coal train eastbound through the hogbacks alongside Highway 287 between Childress and Kirkland, Texas.

As we round a curve where the whole train is visible, now is the time the head-end brakeman is looking back and his counterpart along with the conductor are looking forward from the caboose to see if anything is amiss with the string of cars in between.

Thanks to I35 and Crowley Road, John and Brian and I made it to Crowley about ten minutes ahead of the southbound BNSF grain train led by the KCSM 4094.  The radio alerted us to a northbound empty grain train that was waiting to take the siding once the southbound got close enough, so we caught the BNSF 7786 North at the Magnolia Street crossing near the south end of town.

(Read on …)