After seeing Troy and Judy off on their return to Fort Worth shepherding the U-Haul truck, I parked by the foundation of the old T&P depot next to the Baird Sub east of the depot around 11:00am and relaxed while I read a book and waited for my phone to ring with a time for the closing. Nearly an hour passed with no UP trains, but then I heard an eastbound BNSF train talking to their depot, telling the outbound crew what supplies they would need. I used the advance warning to liesurely drive to the crossing at the west end of BNSF’s Tecific siding. The curve here was well lit, and just before noon I was rewarded with this shot of the BNSF 7318 East leading a stack train from the west coast to Houston. The UP Baird Sub is only about 100 feet to the right behind the trees at this location.
Clouds were beginning to roll in, driven by storms up around Lubbock to the northwest. I drove back into town and parked at the crossing where Troy and I had shot the UP sign earlier. At 1:55pm my phone rang that I could come on down to the title company where they were now ready for the closing. Two minutes later before I drove away I got this eastbound merchandise train with the sign in the photo.
With the UP train blocking the crossing, my only route to the title company took me over the BNSF / T&O tracks going to Maryneal. From an earlier phone conversation with my friends the T&O crew I knew they would be leaving town right about now, and sure enough three minutes after photographing the UP train I skidded to a stop and got SD9’s 6183 and 1733 heading south at milepost three.
A quick highball to them on the radio and I was at the tile office by 2:10pm. After all the official business was done I caught one more train in Sweetwater as I once again used the T&P historical marker as a prop with the UP 7778 West at 3:19pm.
No other trains were easy catches on the Baird Sub that afternoon, so the rest of my drive home was uneventful as closure on the past week of ending an era of the Fitzgerald’s owning land around Sweetwater.
