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| Roger Holmes posted I love shooting photos with a late afternoon sun. It casts a golden glow on subjects such as this BNSF eastbound going past the old pumping station for the Standard Oil pipeline at Wilburn (or is it Wilbern? I've seen it spelled both ways) Illinois on November 27, 2009. © Roger A. Holmes. |
Note that for some of these towns, these pumping stations were the only industry. You can tell they were a source of pride because they have not removed the tall smokestacks.
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| 1907 Post Card of Wilburn Illinois from GenealogyTrails Donated by Sharon Kopina This is a view looking down into the village of Wilburn. Behind the photographer are hills and cliffs with the creek running in front of the hills. You can see the oil pumping station in the distance. Beyond the station is the creek and the Santa Fe Railroad. -- Nancy Piper |
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| Roger Holmes posted An eastbound BNSF freight with the old Standard Oil Pipeline pumping station at Wilburn, IL on February 22, 2008. © Roger A. Holmes. |
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| Howard Keil posted Wilburn IL Abandoned Pipeline Pumping Statioin |
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| Postcard from GenealogyTrails Standard Oil Pumping Station
During the early 1900's an oil pumping station was built in Wilburn which was used until at least until the 1930's.
"Not far from the track of the railroad the Standard Oil Company has laid a pipe line the past year, to carry oil from the Kansas oil fields to their refineries in Whiting, Indiana. They have also established a pumping station in the township and are erecting buildings and installing machinery to the amount of forty or fifty thousand dollars so that the taxes assessed against it will materially lesson the taxation of the farmers". --Past and Present of Marshall and Putnam County, Illinois, 1907, Page 51-52
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| Josh Clark posted A nice pair of Santa Fe lineage units are seen pulling the delayed yesterday's Streator Flip job past the old Santa Fe pump station in Wilbern this morning. John Carson: Josh, This was a Standard Oil Pipeline pumping station at Wilbern. It was not property of the AT&SF. It was built in 1909 to bring oil from Oklahoma to the Whiting Ind. oil refinery. The reason they built these pumping stations along the railroad was that the boilers powering the steam driven pumps were coal fired. The AT&SF delivered the coal to these plants. Plus it was a relative straight line from Iowa to Whiting Ind. There are still remnants of these pumping stations in Ft. Madison, Ponemah (Warren County) Dahinda (Knox Co.) Wilbern, and Kernan Il. Due to technology, they had to have a pumping station every 30 to 40 miles. ALSO: in 1914, Harry Sinclair of the Sinclair Oil Company built a pipeline along this same route. This pipeline used distillate engines and centifugal pumps, so the stations could be farther apart. There were pumping stations for this pipeline in Ft. Madison, (now gone) Ormonde Il. Warren County, now demolished) Princeville (gone) , LaRose (building still there) and Ransom (building still there.) After completing the pipeline, Standard Oil bought a 40% share in it. In the late 40s, Standard bought the Sinclair Pipeline and merged all their pipelines under the Stanolind Pipeline banner. In the early 60s, Standard Oil built a new higher pressure pipeline along this same route. It exists today under BP. Just some information for you sir, and I really like that Photo! JCC |
Depot
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| Andy Zukowski posted Santa Fe Depot in Wilbern, Illinois. 1954 Dennis DeBruler: Note the smokestack just to the right of the sign. That is the smokestack for the oil pipeline steam pumping station that is still standing. Standard Oil built the pipeline in 1909 to bring oil from the west to their Whiting, IN, refinery. That pipeline was replaced by a higher pressure pipeline that was built in the early 1960s. Richard Fiedler shared Zach Malcolm shared Pete Zimmermann: Any clue exactly where this was located because I was there a week ago and I can't figure the spot. Dennis DeBruler: Pete Zimmermann Edit: I agree with Patrick Cooney's comment in the base post: it was probably on this slab https://maps.app.goo.gl/r9axgASqepDwoA946. Steve Rippeteau: It was on the west side of the road crossing, about 100 feet or more on the south side of the mainline. The photo was taken looking East. Is the switch and spur still there? If not just follow the steep declining spur track road bed down and where the switchback was located for the pipeline pumping station is about where the concrete pad should be. You can see where the spur switchback is in the far lower right side of this photo. I’m fairly certain that this station shed was gone by 1970. Since then the ATSF/BNSF has been dumping tons of ballast on the mainline that might have covered part of the concrete pad. Or the BNSF might have removed the concrete pad? Last time I worked there was when I was conductor on a high priority work train with several side air dump gondola car loads of large rip-rap boulders and more ballast about 2005. The creek was starting to erode away the north side of the roadbed East of the crossing after a big rain storm. If you are careful to avoid getting hit by a fast train on the mainline you can see our work dumping the large boulders. I retired in 2007 and now live in Oregon. Otherwise I’d meet you in Wilbern. I lived in Chillicothe until 1992 when ATSF moved our home terminal to Ft. Madison, IA. Thanks for sharing this photo! And a request: A good friend is doing a slide show on depots on the ATSF Illinois Division in KC in November. Can we have your permission to use this photo? |
To find the depot's location, I got this aerial photo. Note that the north oil storage tank is extant as of 2024.
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| 1939 Aerial Photo from ILHAP |
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