South Depot and Elevator: (Satellite)
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| Bill Molony posted This is a post card picture of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad station at Ottawa, Illinois. Marty Bernard Typical CB&Q look. Andy Puch Still there and now serves as Illinois Railnet/Railway offices. |
Illinois Railway has done a nice job of preserving it as an office. Unfortunately, the dumpster is stored on the track side of the parking lot.
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| 20150809 4036 |
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| Andy Zukowski posted Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, Ottawa, Illinois. 1952 Mike Landers: Was this on the south side of river Strong- Strong had a elevator there ? Think they tore it down in the early 80s. Dan Rosier: Mike, yes, just south of Rt. 71. Kevin Moe: road to the left, suicide hill to Marcy st. Thomas Whitt shared |
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| 1939 Aerial Photo via ILHAP Mike Landers: Was this on the south side of river Strong- Strong had a elevator there ? Think they tore it down in the early 80s. Dan Rosier: Mike, yes, just south of Rt. 71. |
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| William Brown posted The SD7s sport the first and last paint schemes respectively. CB&Q southbound freight hauling silica sand at the Ottawa station. Only a month to go before Burlington Northern merger. This line is still intact and extends from the mainline near Eola Ill to a connection at Streator. Unknown photographer. Ray Speerly: Worked that job when it was a night job out of Cicero with stops at Eola to pick up cars and Wendron then on to Streator and back up to Cicero. was on it the night we had someone change the switch in Oswego and we almost made it into a house along the trains. There was also a day job from Eola to Wendron to switch at the silica plant. Both are great jobs to work. William Franckey: Ray Speerly I worked that 11:40 pm job in the early 70’s for about two years. At that time our hours of service were cutdown to 14 hrs from 16 hrs. Every night our crew boarded a dinky at Aurora at 10:15 pm for dead heading to Clyde where the power sat on the pit and train waited in Cicero yard. Those days IF we made it all the way to Streator and back to Clyde, we still had to catch a dinky back to Aurora… to get rested for a repeat ride back to Clyde that same night. That job worked 365 days a year. After 50 or 60 straight nights of this, a guy would be close to befuddled. The regular engineer would welcome a slight cut in his pay because of having a fireman. That way, the job wasn’t a complete man killer. Usually I ran the first half to Streator and the engineer would run the train from Streator yard, Ottawa back towards Wedron then to Aurora and Clyde. Sometimes doubling into Serena. Every night we were assigned 5 SD-7’s and 9’s. A guy could work all night, every night with those motors as they had those six wheeled Cadillac trucks. Once in a while, we would get a GP 40 on one end of the consist and we noticed that after a few days riding a GP, our kidneys would hurt from the riding action of those locomotives. Nothing rode better than those stable platforms of SD’s at 30 mph. Every night we deadheaded with the dispatchers working 3rd shift to Clyde and the crews knew those dispatchers as they knew us. Even though slightly dysfunctional at times, the railroad felt like a family. Many many times we would drag our sand train into Cicero yard at the end of our hours of service… the entire crew would bail for Clyde depot to catch the suburban train back to Aurora. I would take the train in myself and as (we) went dead under the hours of service, I’d grab my grip and run towards Clyde depot trying NOT to miss the westbound dinky. To miss that one meant that there was a big wait for the next dinky to stop at Clyde. Mid afternoon, the dinky started to skip stop some of the lesser stations like Clyde. Sometimes I barely caught that westbound suburban back to Aurora with my crew, sometimes not. Ray Speerly: Yes that was a long day, I would catch that job off the extra list for some reason on a regular bases. I would drive to Cicero to catch it because I never wanted to worry about catching the Dinky. It was a long night, I worked that job at first when it was still 16 hours days. That job and the Rockford day switch I seems to get on a regular bases, only got the night job out of Rockford to Rochelle a couple times, Did like the day switch up there and took it when vacation time came around for the regular guys on the crew. My time was the mid 60's and 70's on that jobs. I was Brakeman, trainman in 70's Yard foreman then conductor. Remember starting when it was the Q then it became the BN then BNSF. Mike Landers: Sad Nothing goes to Streator any more one glass plant gone and owens glass took there tracks out going to the CB/Q _BN ! Thomas Whitt shared |
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