That was one of the signs that the once largest corporation in the world was in big trouble financially. The first was the closure of the oldest automobile line in America, Oldsmobile.
Rich Dean, Butler, New Jersey, USA
Member of Kinney Hose Co. 1, Butler Fire Dept. since 1973, Fire Police Officer since 2000
Dispatcher at Butler Police Communications from March 1975 to July 2009
Secretary of North Jersey Volunteer Firemen's Association since 1980
Member of Tri-Boro First Aid Squad (volunteer ems) since 2000 as a driver
Member of many Yahoogroups, owner of some such as:
[post="0"]FirematicEvents Yahoogroup[/post]the place to for listing and discussion of any event by a public safety organization.
Here are some pictures of a what I consider to be a rare find. I found the CB&Q's Mark Twain Zephyr sitting in the yard for a company that rebuilds passenger cars into private cars in Madison, IL some time ago and as it turns out the salesman I was working with last week was not only a train buff but knew the secretary for the company. So I was able to get in the yard and get some photographs of this living ghost. The entire train is stripped down to the shell but supposedly there are plans to refurbish it when the economy turns around. I converted the shots to B&W to caapture the mood. This trainset was built in 1935 by the Budd Company and was used by the CB&Q (Chicago Burlington & Quincy) for many years between St.Louis and Burlington, IA. It was amazing that after 75 years that stainless steel shell was still in fantastic condition.
Dennis Metzger
Eden Prairie, MN
Canon EOS T3i
All photos Copyright Metzger.Media 2014 unless otherwise noted
Here's a close-up of the end of the observation car where the drumhead sign would typically be. Also notice Matk Twain's signature cut into the stainless.
Dennis Metzger
Eden Prairie, MN
Canon EOS T3i
All photos Copyright Metzger.Media 2014 unless otherwise noted
Some excellent photos here lately! I was out this morning railfanning, unfortunately I didn't get very many post-worthy shots. The plan was to go up and down CSX's River Line between Haverstraw, NY and Newburgh, NY. A broken rail in Haverstraw bunched things up for us, which was good. What was bad was that most of our usual photo spots hadn't been plowed out yet, even for an all-wheel drive truck like mine.
CSX Train Q-108, a container train, had stopped on the broken rail. After the conductor's assessment they decided they'd move very slowly off the break, and if there was no problem they would continue south. I pulled into Congers, NY and waited there for the train. While waiting I got this shot of the restored Congers station.
After about 20 minutes of waiting I heard on the radio that Q-108 cleared the broken rail successfully and was now continuing southbound. A few minutes later the grade crossing signals behind me activated and Q-108 came around the bend. Q-108 is being led by CSX #556, a GE AC4400CW.
I turned around to get this shot of Q-108 crossing Lake Road in Congers. Congers, NY is a nice little town. I worked in Congers most of the 1980's and wouldn't mind living there now, especially with an active rail line like the River Line running through it.
Unfortunately this was it for post-worthy pictures. The broken rail was repaired by 11:00AM and had bunched up 3 southbounds and 1 northbound. We tried to get to better locations but we lost out and missed all 4 trains. Just goes to show I should have stayed right where I was when I shot the Q-108! Oh well....any day spent shooting trains (or fire apparatus) is still a great day <img src='http://www.firepics.net/groupboards/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/cool.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='B)' /> !