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Dude Ranches Out West in 1928

Posted on August 1, 2023 by Train LoverJune 12, 2023

This booklet lists about 45 dude ranches and 13 lodges, most of which offered guide or pack services, that were located near Union Pacific tracks. Most were in Wyoming, a few in Colorad, Idaho, and Montana, one in Oregon, and two in California. Many of the lodges still exist, but most of the dude ranches did not survive the Depression, at least as dude ranches.

Click image to download a 24.7-MB PDF of this 52-page booklet.

Two that did were the Triangle X Ranch north of Jackson and the Elkhorn Ranch north of West Yellowstone. I’ve actually been to both ranches. Dude ranching is an interesting experience: you stay in rustic cabins that may look like they are about to fall apart and eat in a rustic dining hall that is filled with antiques. The food is great, if fattening, and the recreation activities are practically unlimited, so no one complains about the facilities. Continue reading →

NdeM August 1955 Timetable

Posted on July 31, 2023 by Train LoverJune 22, 2023

This is both a timetable and a travel booklet urging U.S. residents to visit Mexico by rail. “Why visit Egypt?” the booklet asks, when “there are pyramids in Mexico.” Similarly, “why visit Rheims and Cologne” when “there are cathedrals a-plenty in Mexico.” The booklet also includes a page of Spanish phrases people can learn while assuring potential tourists that “English, of course, is spoken in almost every large town in Mexico.”

Click image to download a 7.1-MB PDF of this 16-page timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

The timetables themselves start on page 9 with a schedule for the Aztec Eagle from St. Louis to Mexico City via Missouri Pacific and Laredo. For westerners, another schedule is from Los Angeles to Mexico City via Southern Pacific and El Paso. Six more pages of schedules include trains that went all over the country.

Texas & Pacific December 1955 Timetable

Posted on July 30, 2023 by Train LoverJuly 30, 2023

Texas & Pacific was majority-owned by Missouri Pacific, but they were separately (if cooperatively) operated, so T&P’s 1955 timetable doesn’t look anything like MP’s.

Click image to download a 2.5-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

In fact, this is really just a brochure with the equivalent of four pages of a normal timetable. The timetable shows two trains a day between El Paso and Marshall, Texas. At Marshall, the trains split with part going to New Orleans and part to Texarkana, where it was taken over by Missouri Pacific to St. Louis. One of these was the Texas Eagle, while the portion going to New Orleans was called the Louisiana Eagle. The other train was called the Westerner while the New Orleans section was called the Louisiana Daylight. Continue reading →

Missouri Pacific April 1955 Timetable

Posted on July 29, 2023 by Train LoverJune 21, 2023

This timetable makes significant use of color that is absent from most railroad timetables. The four-color cover is one we have seen before and was used on MP timetables from about 1946 through 1960, which is even longer than Frisco used its colorful cover.

Click image to download a 26.8-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

The inside and outside back covers also have four-color illustrations, while the inside front cover uses red, yellow, and cyan as tints. But, unlike almost every other timetable I’ve seen, the colors don’t stop there. Continue reading →

Frisco January 1956 Timetable

Posted on July 28, 2023 by Train LoverJanuary 5, 2024

Frisco put a very pretty painting on the cover of its timetables, but they used this illustration for more than 12 years, from at least 1953 through 1965. One reason to change covers is to alert passengers that schedules have changed so they don’t miss trains or count on trains that no longer run.

Click image to download a 20.3-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

Changes were significant. This timetable is 36 pages long and describes nine named trains and several unnamed ones. The 1965 timetable is only 20 pages and has just two named trains and one mixed train. The schedules for all three trains could have fit on just one page.

The pretty cover on the 1965 timetable was deceptive as Fresco’s passenger network was only a shadow of its former self. The 1965 routes formed an X: Kansas City southeast to Birmingham and St. Louis southwest to Tulsa with the routes crossing in Springfield, Missouri. Trains from 1956 to Wichita and Dallas were gone by 1965 as were north-south routes between Kansas City and Tulsa and between St. Louis and Memphis.

In 1956, Frisco trains went south 261 miles from Kansas City to Tulsa, taking eight hours. In 1965, passengers had to change at Springfield, making the route 387 miles long and requiring 11 hours. In 1956, passengers could take trains 305 miles south from St. Louis to Memphis in eight hours. In 1965, the route via Springfield was 522 miles and took more than 21 hours. I suspect not many took that route.

Kansas City Southern July 1956 Timetable

Posted on July 27, 2023 by Train LoverJune 20, 2023

Based on this timetable, a better name for Kansas City Southern might have been Shreveport Northern. Table 1 shows three trains a day between Shreveport and Kansas City. Table 2 shows two trains a day between Shreveport and New Orleans. Table 4 shows a train, the Flying Crow, between Shreveport and Port Arthur, Texas, while table 4 shows the Shreveporter from Shreveport to Hope, Arkansas.

Click image to download a 5.2-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

As of 1938, Kansas City Southern consisted of a line from Kansas City through Shreveport to Port Arthur, Louisiana, on the Gulf Coast. In 1939, it merged with the Louisiana and Arkansas Railway, which had lines from Shreveport to New Orleans and Hope. This enabled the railroads to start a Kansas City-New Orleans passenger train called the Southern Belle. Continue reading →

Gulf, Mobile & Ohio July 1954 Timetable

Posted on July 26, 2023 by Train LoverJune 19, 2023

The Illinois Central and Mobile & Ohio railroads were both effectively created by an 1850 federal land grant law that aimed to build a rail line from Chicago to the Gulf of Mexico. In the same way that Union Pacific and Central Pacific built parts of the first transcontinental railroad that met at Promontory, the IC was supposed to build from Cairo, Illinois north while the M&O was supposed to build from Cairo south.

Click image to download a 11.4-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

The two railroads were less cooperative than the UP and CP, as Illinois Central bought a steamboat line to ship freight from Cairo to New Orleans and later bought a series of local railroads so it would have its own rail route to the gulf. The Mobile and Ohio, meanwhile, built a line to St. Louis and later bought the Chicago and Alton, giving it a line from Chicago to New Orleans. The two lines that were supposed to be cooperators ended up as competitors. Continue reading →

Illinois Central October 1955 Timetable

Posted on July 25, 2023 by Train LoverJune 19, 2023

When Eisenhower became president, his brother Milton (then president of Penn State University) sent him a 15-page memo arguing that federal policies that discriminated against the railroads — policies devised when railroads were the only effective form of transportation — should be abolished so they could compete against trucks, air, and other modern transports. The president responded by creating a cabinet committee to review all transportation policies. The committee report that was given to the president in December 1954 and released to the public in spring 1955 strongly urged significant deregulation of the railroads.

Click image to download a 19.8-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

Page 2 of this timetable is a full-page ad promoting the implementation of this report. The ad doesn’t mention that one of the report’s recommendations was to make it easier for the railroads to abandon passenger service. In fact, that would be about the only recommendation that Congress would approve during the Eisenhower administration; full deregulation would have to wait for the Staggers Act of 1980. Continue reading →

Norfolk & Western February 1954 Timetable

Posted on July 24, 2023 by Train LoverJune 19, 2023

This timetable is dated February 28, just two months after yesterdays, which was dated January 1. Most railroads issued timetables every three to six months, so this seems an unusually short period before a reissue.

Click image to download a 13.5-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

A careful comparison reveals one change. In January, the Pennsylvania Railroad’s southbound connection to the New Orleans-bound Pelican had a different schedule on Sundays from other days of the week, while the northbound connection was the same all seven days. As of today’s February 28 timetable, however, PRR had a different north- as well as southbound connection to the Pelican on Sundays. Continue reading →

Norfolk & Western January 1954 Timetable

Posted on July 23, 2023 by Train LoverJune 19, 2023

In 1950, the Norfolk & Western had a little more than 2,100 miles of track, making it slightly smaller than the Nickel Plate, Wabash, and Erie railroads. Yet it took over the first two in 1964 and eventually its successor, Norfolk Southern, got control of the Erie (and a lot more) as well.

Click image to download a 14.2-MB PDF of this timetable contributed by Ellery Goode.

Norfolk & Western’s main line essentially paralleled C&O’s between Norfolk and Cincinnati. The C&O’s signature train, the George Washington, and N&W’s signature train, the Powhatten Arrow, both connected Norfolk with Cincinnati, along with two other trains for each railroad. Continue reading →