Decatur, IL: Wabash Backshop and Transfer Table

Robert McNeill >> Follow the Flag Wabash Railroad

Notes on the roundhouse & railyard and the coaling tower

Robert's comment:

Part of the WRHS activity in Decatur included a tour of former Wabash shops with a stop by the transfer table for pictures. Follow the Flag!

I tried using the Sanborn Maps to determine the location of the transfer table, but I needed Sheet 82 and this is what I found:

Sanborn Thumbnail

The white buildings in the red rectangle would be these backshops. The transfer table is between them. Note the roundhouse on the left side of the photo.

1941 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

Satellite

To my surprise, this part of the Decatur Shops still exists.

William A. Shaffer -> RAILROAD HISTORY BUFFS OF ILLINOIS
Wabash Shops - Decatur, IL (Photo by William A. Shaffer)

Update:

Herald&Review
1926: The locomotive shop at the Wabash Railroad

James Holzmeier posted

Update: James' comment:

Whiting crane inside the Wabash Shops at Decatur, Illinois. WRHS members were allowed to tour the inside of this shop building during our Annual Meeting last year in Decatur and many pictures were taken that day.
It certainly pays to be a WRHS member...please send in your dues today.

1960 photo of freight car construction.

1953 photo of locomotive shop updates with 250-ton overhead crane. Kenny Wolff Check out the engine rebuild going on at the bottom of the photo!

Norfolk Southern Corp posted
A Norfolk & Western staff photographer snapped this view of the Wabash car shop in Decatur, Illinois, in the fall of 1964. Soon afterwards, the local newspaper, the Herald and Review, announced “N&W, Wabash, and Nickel Plate to Merge at Midnight Thursday—October 15.”
Three other railroads were part of the merger: the 110-mile Sandusky, Ohio, line of the Pennsylvania Railroad; the 171-mile Akron, Canton, & Youngstown Railroad; and the 132-mile Pittsburgh & West Virginia. All six railroads combined to form a 7,800-mile N&W system through 14 states, crossing into Canada near Buffalo, New York.
Decatur’s rail history dates back to 1834 when Governor Joseph Duncan proposed a transportation network that included a rail line. Today, Decatur is home to a Norfolk Southern intermodal terminal, rail yard, and car shop. Then and now, railroads and railroaders deliver the goods and work hard every day to keep the steel wheels rolling.
Tim Stuy: Interesting that the boxcar in the photo still has a walkway on top. Any idea what year those walkways were removed?
Allan Johnson: Tim Stuy 1965 AAR rules changed on roof walks.

The Nickel Plate Road Historical & Technical Society, Inc.

Happy Merger Day! https://www.nkphts.org/merger

Tim Starr posted
John Barriger III was president of the Monon, Boston & Maine, Pittsburgh & Lake Erie, and the Missouri-Kansas-Texas (Katy). He had a giant photograph collection, one of the largest. This one is of Wabash shop managers and other officials in East Decatur.

 

Mid-Century Decatur posted
Workers are preparing a diesel service pit just south of the Wabash locomotive shops on March 17, 1961, exactly 63 years ago today.
 Photo: Decatur Public Library
Richard Fiedler shared
Dennis DeBruler shared

History of the Hartland posted
Leonard Perlmutter shared
Cool pic of the car shops in Decatur.