Posted December 25, 200915 yr Chicago Christmas Shopping The Day after Thanksgiving, 1972 All Photos Copyright © 2009 by Robert E Pence Grainy Ektachromes, probably ISO 64 or maybe even 32. Arriving at Fort Wayne's former Pennsylvania Railroad Station on Baker Street to board Amtrak's perversion of the former great Broadway Limited. Fairly busy waiting room The train's arrival has been announced, and we head for the platform No yellow line to stand behind Here it is! Breakfast in the diner. A newspaper in the lounge - on the right, notice the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette. Finish out the ride in a coach seat. Arriving at Chicago Union Station on Amtrak. Still a few privately-owned steam locomotives sitting around. The one with the silver-painted boiler is a Heisler geared locomotive. Those typically were used where pulling power and the ability to operate effectively over rough, uneven track were valued but speed wasn't, like logging and quarrying. Union Station's Great Hall was grimy, then. The current bright and clean appearance was the product of a cleanup and restoration following a major fire in July 1980 that killed one person and injured several others. Here's what they razed in the late 1960s to create the sterile, claustrophobic space pictured above; photo taken in the 1950s by Jeraldine C. Baumgartner, M.D. The architectural travesty for which the classic passenger concourse was razed Marshall Field, traditionally decorated for the season Shoppers throng State Street Michigan Avenue Commerce on the river Back to Union Station and Amtrak to Fort Wayne This is almost ten years before the Superliners went into service. The bi-level cars are former Santa Fe.
December 25, 200915 yr Very nice. I like the steam locomotive - tender - boxcar train in photo 11. It looks like it came out of a storybook or a toy store. I guess they really did operate those at one time. :-D
December 25, 200915 yr These are great photos! I have a friend that is one of the managers at the Chicago theatre, and he LOVES old photos of the theatre...and loves Diana Ross. I am going to send him this link, and he may contact you. They have a wall of old photos that they show on tours.
December 25, 200915 yr Rob, these are absolutely awesome. Is there no longer Amtrak service to Ft. Wayne? What's the story with that? Again, beautiful photographs, this one really made me stop scrolling and have another look: http://robertpence.com/il_chicago/19721102-0033.jpg Two great cities, great film and great compositions.
December 25, 200915 yr Wow!!! Awesome thread!!! "You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers
December 25, 200915 yr Tuned up some of the dark and excessively-grainy photos at the beginning, and added four photos I found that were taken on the train that morning on the way to Chicago. Rob, these are absolutely awesome. Is there no longer Amtrak service to Ft. Wayne? What's the story with that? [ ... ] Thanks. I'm glad people enjoy my visual reminsicenses. Amtrak service to Fort Wayne ended in 1990. The mergers that created Conrail resulted in consolidation of freight between Chicago and the Northeast on the former New York Central line that runs through Cleveland, Toledo, Elkhart, South Bend, etc. Conrail determined that a nineteen-mile segment of the former Pennsylvania Railroad route in Northwest Indiana was redundant for their operations, and told Amtrak that if they wanted to continue to use it, they would have to pick up all the costs associated with it. As an alternative, they offered Amtrak a substantial cash lump-sum payment to reroute the two trains (Broadway Limited and Capitol Limited) off the former PRR track. The nineteen-mile section was essential for access to Chicago's Union Station if Amtrak wanted to continue to use the former PRR route. The Capitol was rerouted on the former NYC route, with a stop at Waterloo, about 20 miles north of Fort Wayne and readily accessible off I-69. The Broadway was rerouted over CSX former B&O line through Garrett. After a few years (1995, if I remember correctly), the Broadway was eliminated. Fort Wayne's only surface transportation to Chicago now is via motorcoach from the Greyhound station downtown. There are two buses daily, one via South Bend and the other (Get This!) via Toledo - 7 hours! They used to take just over 3 hours running right up US 30, but no more. I think there may have been as many as five daily round trips on Greyhound using the direct US 30 route not too many years ago.
December 26, 200915 yr Oh man, do I ever love stuff like this. Thanks for sharing, I think I had a smile on my face the whole way down.
December 26, 200915 yr Very nice. I like the steam locomotive - tender - boxcar train in photo 11. It looks like it came out of a storybook or a toy store. I guess they really did operate those at one time. :-D That little cabbage-stacked woodburner looks like one that operated at Whitewater Valley in the early 1980s, and there was a Heisler sitting in the weeds with a boiler painted silver around the same time. I wonder if they were the same engines.
December 27, 200915 yr The architectural travesty for which the classic passenger concourse was razed in the late 1960s Were you ever inside the concourse?
December 27, 200915 yr ^The best shot I've seen of the old concourse. I was, with Dad, but I was only six or seven years old and I don't really remember much about it. I do have a photo that my aunt took in the 1950s; I've posted it various times and places, and I've edited the thread to insert it just after the 1970s concourse for comparison.
December 27, 200915 yr I was, with Dad, but I was only six or seven years old and I don't really remember much about it. I do have a photo that my aunt took in the 1950s; I've posted it various times and places, and I've edited the thread to insert it just after the 1970s concourse for comparison. Wow. What a contrast.
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