The Choctaw Route, or more formally the Choctaw, Oklahoma and Gulf Railroad, extended from West Memphis, Arkansas to Amarillo, Texas in 1902 when it was purchased by the Rock Island Railroad. Rock Island extended the line to Memphis, TN on … Continue reading
This booklet argues that “scenic Colorado” is the best answer to the above question (which is posed on the front cover, while the cover shown below is, like Rock Island timetables, on the back). It also notes that “The Rock … Continue reading
Although Chicago’s 1933-1934 Century of Progress fair was usually called an “International Exhibition,” this booklet repeatedly calls it the “World’s Fair.” In fact, except for a line drawing of the Travel and Transport Building on page 2, there’s nothing about … Continue reading
In 1929, Rock Island was competing with Union Pacific and Burlington in offering both escorted and independent (unescorted) tours of Colorado. The two-week, escorted tours left from Chicago, St. Louis, Memphis, the Twin Cities, or Dallas-Ft. Worth every Saturday in … Continue reading
Consisting of twelve pages that are half the size of a regular timetable, this timetable uses the same amount of space as the 1961 condensed timetable. Not surprisingly, however, several trains are missing, mostly in the form of reduced frequencies. … Continue reading
The 1961 condensed timetable is only three-fourths as large as the 1957 edition. All of Rock Island’s train schedules (except Chicago commuter trains) fit on three 4″-by-9″ panels, whereas it took seven in 1957. Click image to download a 2.1-MB … Continue reading
Rock Island’s 1957 system timetable was a respectable 20 pages long. But the condensed version fits into the equivalent of just four pages. One whole page shows Chicago-Colorado, with five trains a day to Peoria, four to Des Moines, two … Continue reading
Here’s the dinner menu Rock Island used at the 1948-1949 Chicago Rail Fair. Dinner was $3, or about $30 in today’s money. Click image to download a 1.2-MB PDF of this menu. Normally aging is believed to be a major … Continue reading
The Rock Island offered lunch and dinner at the Chicago Rail Fair in its replica 1880s diner and modern Golden State Rocket Fiesta diner. Despite the Southwest theme of Rock Island’s exhibit, this menu didn’t have a particularly Southwest flavor. … Continue reading
At first glance, this brochure appears to be a guide to Rock Island’s exhibit at the 1949 Chicago Rail Fair. But actually only one fourth of the brochure is about that exhibit; the 1949 Rail Fair program actually said more … Continue reading
