Marietta, Part II

Let's continue our tour of Marietta.
Here is a photo I took of where the PRR once crossed to go to Marietta College. This is where ST. RT 26, 7th St and Green St all meet. It is very much different today.





Here is the B and O bridge from East to West (Marietta to Harmar). Once upon a time, Harmar was separate from Marietta!
To the right of the bridge on the far bank, is the house I lived in before we "moved up on the hill" (green house, third one from bridge).





Here we are looking back towards the bridge on the Harmar side.
Behind me, and to the left is the CSX office. The former B & O tracks run north to a power plant, about half way to Zanesville. The line used to run all the way to Zanesville. I've been told that a RDC used to run up that way between the towns. You can't get to Zanesville anymore from Marietta this way!




Here is a view towards Belpre, which would be south. The track curving towards the right is the active track north. I am standing on the line towards Marietta. I suppose that CSX could still use this part of the track-for what I dunno.




This photo shows the beginning of the CSX tracks running up Harmar Street! Oh, to live on such a street!









Finally, here is my closing shot of the Harmar bridge. The reason I stopped and visited Marietta is that I had heard that the bridge may not survive for long. It is closed to walkers and it does look rather, well, old. Here is hoping the community comes to its rescue. I cannot wonder, but what would have happen to the PRR line, if it had somehow survived the Conrail era, and made it to the NS (?) era. If, B&O had keep the bridge intact for traffic, if, if,if. Isn't that just like life? A lot of ifs?
The lesson here is that, if I had the time, money, and ability to travel as I can today, I would very much like to have taken photos of all that was. Do the same where you live. It is gone so easily.


For best results, right click and open this image in another window. Feel free to place on your desktop if you want Just give credit where credit is due. Talk about a moment! The right light, shadow and reflections!

A Visit To Marietta

Take a little trip with me, to Marietta, and remember railroads of the past. With a few photographs, along with distant memories, we will travel back over thirty years.
The first photograph (on the left) is where the Pennsylvania Railroad crossed State Route 26, as it entered Marietta.

Our next stop on the tour, is along RT 26 looking back towards
what were once destinations for the PRR, but today are other types of businesses, ones that do not need a railroad.











Our next two shots (below) show the road bed as it goes under I-77 and behind Phillips Elementary School. You can still see the ROW in several places, but you have to look!










This photo is of the old Pennington Bread Factory, where the PRR would deliver flour for making bread. When I worked there, one summer back in the late 70's, a Conrail crew showed up to collect the car on the siding. They were recovering cars in preparation of closing the line and removing the rail. Today, even Pennington Bread is gone!











Our next shot is of the old B & O (Baltimore and Ohio) RR's yard along side second street. If you cllick on the photo, to enlarge it, and look at the building in the back with the painted railcar on it, you will be looking at a store that once received boxcars inside it! I always thought that was so cool when I saw that boxcar inside the "garage". But, by the time I came along, the yard was just about gone.









Can you say, railroad tracks? Look at the shape of this building! The Marietta Times newspaper used to have a column titled Down Around the Railroad Tracks. Obvioulsy not today.











Finally here is the B & O bridge across the Muskingum River to the Harmar side of town.
Today the bridge is closed, waiting to be made save for pedestrains once more. No trains will have to worry about the bridge anymore. Hopefully, the bridge will be opened once more.


And here is the approach to the bridge. Seems kinda steep for the engine as it starts up to the bridge. Must have been a sight to see and hear!





I hope you enjoyed our little trek through Marietta. I will post more photos of the bridge, and other locations in Marietta!

The B & O Comes To Town
My dad took this film (not video!) way back when, possibly in the 1940's. His mother lived in Clarksburg, and he took her to Parkersburg to take the train back to her home. The train has just come over the Ohio River from Belpre.

This film shows a B & O train crossing the Muskingum River from Marietta to Harmar heading, most likely, back to Parkersburg. This was probably taken around 1938-1940, since on this reel of film are scenes of the a flood on the Muskingum, and I think the last large flood there was 1939.
Today, many years later, the scene has changed. In Parkersburg, no passenger trains come to town, the B & O is gone, and the rails to Clarksburg are gone. In Marietta, CSX still comes to Harmar, but no one crosses the bridge anymore. Especially trains. Times have change, but thanks to my dad, we can watch a little bit of what was, once more!
These films were video taped off the movie screen while we watched the films. This is one reason for the quality, the other is the age of the movies.

On my model railroad, to get to my coal mine, the train has to pull into the yard, then back up onto one track, pull forward, and then back up to the mine. I have thought that this isn't quite right, until the day I drove through Zanesville, and there I watched the same scene unfold before my eyes!
The Ohio Central was moving a coal drag up from southern Ohio to a power plant up north of the town. With engines on both end, the train came into town, backed up, crossed a bridge, and then pulled forward to leave town. Here are some photos of the train as it moved through Zanesville.

Back to Russell, Kentucky

Last summer, I took a return trip to watch the trains in the Russell area.
Enjoy!
Russell slide show

It is October and I am in Byesville, Ohio with my parents waiting for the Byesville Scenic's steam excursion to come around the bend. It is a nice, warm afternoon and with the evening shadows approaching, here it comes, just down the track.

Here is Ohio Central Railroad's Pacific #1293, a 4-6-2, quietly approaching the street crossing. Everyone stops to watch the sight.

Here is the Pacific, stopped at the "end of the line" while the passenger's unload.

A close up of the front of the engine. The data plate on the side there will tell you that this engine was built in 1948. My dad was 31 years old then and I was six years into the future.

The tracks number 1293 stands on were once part of the PRR's line from Cleveland to Marietta. I don't know how much is left north of where I stood, but all that remains here is this short section from Cambridge, through Byesville and just a few miles south. There are no tracks to Marietta at all today, just CSX into the Harmar side of the town (west of the Muskingum River). According to the Byesville Scenic's web page (http://www.bsrw.org/)
most of the traffic on the "Marietta Branch" was coal, in the Byesville area. Once the coal was consumed, the railroad had no more interest in the area and so the slow decline began.
But today, it was unique to see this engine run again. Get out to see these old behemoths. As they get older and older, there will be a day when they cannot run again. Watch while you can!
To stand beside the engine and here the noises, its sounds like it is panting, wheezing and gurgling. Like it is alive. Quite different from the quiet running a/c engines of today!
Good job Byesville Scenic! Quite a show!

My nephew came up to visit, so I took him on a day trip to Russell Kentucky. Having been there just this past April, I'd thought he like to see the action. Before we got there, we saw a freight heading into Portsmouth (OH), so we stopped and took a photo of it heading into town.
Behind us and to the right is where the NW station used to be. It is now a county jail/sheriff office.


The car hadn't had time to cool off after we parked at Russell, when here comes the first freight we saw of the day. In the background is coal train just heading out of the yard. It was really roaring as it strained to get going!

Then we watched a yard engine working the yard. As you can see from these two photos, these engines need a little paint job! After awhile, we decided to head on over to Kenova and try to catch a NS and CSX crossover here. While we weren't successful with that idea, we did see a freight roar over the bridge to Ohio. It came up so fast and quiet I didn't have time to set up my photo or hardly get my camera going! And here I thought trains slowed down when they cross over bridges. Not this one! Whosh!

We waited for some more action, but hunger drove us on. After lunch we were heading back to Russell when we pulled over to visit this station/museum. Unfortunately, it was not open, but I did get the obligatory photographs of the station at Catlettsburg.


Here is the sign for the trains. I don't think any are coming. . .numbers 36 and 39 are long gone.

So ends another day of train chasing. More on the next post.

Out in the country in Eastern Ohio, in the hills and there it is, the coal mine I have been looking for.
Norfolk Southern Railroad has a rail head out here in country of Ohio. It comes from the Ohio River and ends here to pick up the coal from two coal mines (one clings to the hill side on right).




Ex-Conrail SD-40-2, NS#3331 waits for the hoppers to fill up. This is the front end of the long line of cars. I got there in time to see the last two cars filled.








NS #3377, still in its Conrail paint is attached to the end of the long train. As I stood to take its photo, I heard it rev up and slowly push cars "forward" under the loader.










Then the operator in the cab (look to the right of the sign) loads the coal into the car. There is a chute that fits right down over the car.










The last photo shows the mine sitting on that steep Ohio hillside.

Barnesville, a small town in the hills of eastern Ohio.
On my way to visit my parents, I stopped a took some photos of the old B&O station. Once upon a time this line came from Wheeling and went on to Cambridge, Zanesville, Newark and Columbus.
When I was in high school, the band came to play in the pumpkin festival and I remember walking up the street to look at the station. At that time, the tracks were still there, there was a siding and I suppose a train came through once in a while. Sometime between then and the 1990's the tracks came up. The station is a registered National Historic Structure (1985).
What is ironic is that just a few short miles away NS has a spur to two mines that are active.

Here is another view of the station. In the background you can see the tunnel used to pass the trains under downtown Barnesville. Today it is a nice graveled walkway.
Someday I'd like to return and walk the path for awhile. But not today, it is too cold!





Here is a closeup of the tunnel and the warning device just before it. If you are riding on top of a car, it warned you that you'd better duck! Quick get down!
I wonder if that also let the engineer know if a car was too tall for the tunnel? I don't know how he would know. Was there some kind of signal?
Well, I was out of time so it was time to leave. I is good to know that this part of Ohio's past has been preserved.

The sign tells all. An afternoon photo trip to Parkersburg to visit what is left of the B&O.
The day before the temperature was 80 and the skies clear, today it is 40 and cloudy! What a change!
This photograph was taken from Belpre, Ohio as I waited to cross the RT. 50 bridge to Parkersburg. (Click on the photos for larger views.)


These two views are taken where the station once stood. When I was just a little boy, I stood here with my parents waiting for the B&O to come from Clarksburg bringing my grandmother for a visit. I was so excited to see the huge train come. I guess that is where I became enthralled with railroads.
The first shot looks back towards the Ohio River and the second toward Clarksburg. My oh my, how time has changed things.


I remember the engine rolling in, the steam swirling around me, the bell ringing, the baggage cart rolling up. Of course, when you can go anywhere, anytime by car, why take a train? Even with the cost of gasoline, I could drive for less to Texas, than take Amtrak-and get there sooner. It isn't hard to figure out why passenger trains no longer come to Parkersburg. Economics.




Here is a view of the high yard. Many industrial sidings were along where. In another post I will illustrate some of these sidings.
Today, the line is severed just a short distance east and trains no longer come from Clarksburg; well they do, but by a round-about-way. There still are several cars sitting in the yard as illustrated by the next photograph.



Here is another view of the high yard. The track in the foreground is the connection between the low yard down by the river, and the high yard.







Here is the yard engine coming from the low yard, I guess it is the end of the day for this crew (it was around 5pm). In fact they did drive up to the high yard and dismount their engine just a few minutes later.






Here are some views of the massive bridge across the Ohio River. This bridge was finished in 1871 and was for a time the world's longest bridge. Railroads obviously built things to last, but did they know it would last for 126 years?



















Here is a mixed freight rolling into the low yard in the late afternoon. It stopped and with the help of some ground crew, began switching moves. I was running out of time and couldn't get a good angle for anymore photographs of the moves. Video would have been better anyway.


Some comments about the photographs. I took a lot of photos this week. One day the sun was too bright and today there wasn't enough. Cloudy days a best for outdoor shots, but not a heavy overcast-the day is just too grey!

Russell, Kentucky!







It's spring break and so off to Russell to take in the sights, railroad sights of course.
Photo #1 is at the station at Russell. The display of the C&O caboose is very nice. Be sure to take the time to look at the bricks in the sidewalk.




Photos #2 shows Russell Tower. The tower is now owned by the city and a sign announces that it being converted to a museum.
Behind me is the former station.







Photo #3 shows the remote control unit switching a freight in the yard. Engine number 1021 is an ex-B&O SWMT slug and is followed by GP39, number 4283. At first I didn't notice the box in the operator's hand (standing on the front of the slug). After waving to him, I started to wave to the "operator" in the cab and noticed that there wasn't anyone there! That's when I figured it out. This is the first remote controlled unit I have seen. I have read of them and also the controversy about their use. Now, it seems they are used (I saw another one later in the day).

Photos #4 show the next entry on the hit parade. A unit train hauling LPG tank cars. Not a job I would want to do, but this guy is hauling them! Hauling the cars are numbers 6488, a GP 40-2, followed by RDMT, number 2254.





Here they go, slowly into the yard.







The last photos from Russell is of GP 38-2, 2507 and SWMT 1040 passing by and finally a shot of Russell Tower.
My day in Russell went well. Met a couple of track workers. One had started on the C&O in 1969! Wow! Almost forty years! I find that common in reading and talking with workers on the railroad. Many work 40-50 years on the railroad. Again, check out those bricks by the caboose.