Towns and Nature

Monday, April 27, 2026

Ridgeville, IL: Ridgeville Tower: Pennsy vs. Pennsy/GR&I

(Satellite, both routes are now abandoned.)

GR&I = Grand Rapids and Indiana

Mark Teer posted
Ridgeville Ind.PRR,50’s

1960/61 Ridgeville Quad @ 24,000

Sunday, April 26, 2026

Union City, IN: Art Association/Depot and Moved Junction Tower: Pennsy vs. Big4 vs. B&O

Depot: (Satellite)

Original Tower: (Satellite)

Current Tower: (Satellite)

The tower is on the right and the depot is on the left. But the depot is obscured by trees.

Street View, Sep 2024

The original location:

Street View, Sep 2013

Mark Teer posted four photos with the comment: "Union City, Ind. Recently moved from railroad property for preservation, now across the street from station."

Street View, Sep 2024

Martin Mason, Sep 2021

The B&O branch terminated here. The B&O and Pennsy routes are now abandoned and the Big Four route is owned by CSX.

1960/61 Union City Quad @ 24,000

Hartford City, IN: Pennsy Hart Tower, Freight House and Signalling Pipelines

(Satellite?, I could not find an aerial photo with decent resolution.)

Mark Teer posted
Hartford City,Ind.1909,shows Hart tower.

Matthew Lappin: there were 4 tracks through from west of the depot to a location called Renner. The tower controlled it and it was 4 track bi direction running, coal dock was half way between.

When steam went away they removed the 2 outside mains. they also had industrial leads both sides.

A railroad cop was stationed there around the clock.

my grandpa (Ol WW Im sure you remember him out at Montpelier in his white car train watching or waiting for me to go thru) use to say it was impossible when he was a kid to get across SR26 due to trains at the coal dock.

PRR had a switch engine to work the 4 glass plants and Overhead Door plant

[A good view of signalling pipelines branching out from the main run. Also, there are two buildings that house speeders. We can see the tracks from the buildings to move them to the main track.]

Pennsy was the east/west route.

1960 Hartford City West and East Quads @ 24,000

Lackawanna, NY: Seneca Iron & Steel Co.

(Satellite)

Brian R. Wroblewski posted thee photos with the comment: "Predecessor to Bethlehem Steel, taken over as part of the Lackawanna, NY plant in 1932 & still exists today."

Rafer Rokeach: Location ?

Dennis DeBruler: Rafer Rokeach Based on Photo 3: https://maps.app.goo.gl/yVKZB2PzdTy5qDtC7 and https://maps.app.goo.gl/2quoLoozj3wJkFhJA

Saturday, April 25, 2026

Rockhill, PA: 1872 East Broad Top Railroad and Trolley Museum

EBT Roundhouse: (Satellite)

Depot: (Satellite)

Trolley Museum: (Satellite)

East Broad Top (EBT), "which was built beginning in 1872, is the only surviving three-foot gauge common carrier railroad east of the Rocky Mountains....Our roundhouse still houses steam locomotives that have called this site home since they were built in the early 1900s. Our machine shop, the largest and most intact belt-driven facility of its kind in the United States, still echoes with the sounds of craftsmanship from a bygone era." [EastBroadTop]

Stephen Boothroyd posted
old photo of the East Broadtop roundhouse at Orbisonia, PA in the 1970s

Don Richardson commented on Stephen's post
2009

Chris Ohl, Apr 2025

Street View, Sep 2023

1 of 12 photos posted by Greg Obst
A few photos from the shop tour today at the East Broad Top Railroad in Rockhill Furnace, PA. The fellow who gave the tour was super knowledgeable and very accommodating of his time and making sure everyone had their questions answered. It was a great experience. This place is chock full of history. I’ll be posting more photos over the next few days.
Chris Nicholson Sr.: I had heard that someone bought the the EAST Broad Top RR, has there been any word as to whether it will be open to the the Public again for Train Rides ? I have had my Children over there for rides a number of Years Ago, Now I would like to take my 10 Grandchildren there for a RR RIDE. IT WAWS ALWAYS A QUITE SCENIC RR RIDE, AND THE WORK BUILDINGS AND RR STATION WERE ALWAYS SOMETHING TO TOUR. I LIVE IN WAYNESBORO, SO IT WOULD NOT TAKE LONG TO GET THERE.

AltoonaWorks posted
Slim Gauge Sunday
8/2022 - When you visit the East Broad Top, make sure to do a shop tour if one is available. You won't regret it.
www.eastbroadtop.com
Bernd Varg shared
The East Broad Top Railroad National Historic Landmark in Orbisonia, Pennsylvania, USA
Photo: L.R. Myers, 2022
Dustin Lehman: Last time I was there was back in the 90s, with my parents. I see alot of improvements since I was there from this drone photo. Never got to do the shop tour or see the roundhouse tho. Back then the area was chained off to visitors. Did get to ride the trolley tho. My late father would have loved to see this being brought back to life.

I knew about East Broad Top because it is famous for pulling its trains with steam power.

They have preserved and use six of the railroad's original steam locomotives. [EastBroadTop_SteamLocomotives]

The EBT went south of Mount Union, PA, to this location where it branched and went southwest to Alvan and southeast to Neelyton. [1928 RR Atlas] (The font for the terminal towns is in the smallest font, and I'm not sure about the spelling of Alvan because Google Maps doesn't know about it.)

EBT now offers train rides north to Colgate Picnic Grove and south to Pogue. [EastBroadTop_ride]

The trolley museum uses the other EBT branch to here.

They have preserved not only the locomotives, but the equipment necessary to keep them running. This is a wheel lathe. I believe they also do work for other museums to help them keep their steam locomotives running.

EastBroadTop_equipment

Note the lineshafts in the above and following photos.

EastBroadTop_ShopTours

By the 1950s, the southeast branch had already been cut back to today's trolley museum's run. The southwest branch went to what is today call Wood.

1954 Pittsburgh and 1950 Harrisburg Quads @ 250,000

Mt. Union, PA: Lost/Pennsy Depot and East Broad Top Interchange

(Satellite, based on the topo map below.)

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted
Pennsylvania Railroad Station located in the town of Mt. Union, Huntingdon County in 1908.

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted
Pennsylvania Railroad Depot in the town of Mt. Union, Huntingdon County in the early 1900's.

Anthony Imperioli: my grandfather tried to buy the station and ground...RR would not sale.....years later they tear it down....go figure????

This would be the depot before the tracks were elevated.

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted
Pennsylvania Railroad Depot along Pennsylvania Avenue in the town of Mt. Union, Huntingdon County in the early 1900's.

And this is the elevation work.

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted

The soon to be completed subway under construction for the Pennsylvania Railroad in Mt. Union, Huntingdon County in the very early 1900's. Prior to completion, the main line ran along the tracks located on Pennsylvania Avenue (East Broad Top).

(Photo form Bill Pyles via https://www.facebook.com/groups/181311765268540/)

1959/61 Newton Hamilton and Mount Union Quads @ 24,000

The above topo map did not label the tracks that stayed on this side of the Juniata River and headed south. So, I checked my 1928 RR Atlas. It was the East Broad Top Railroad (EBT). I recognize that name because the EBT is now a tourist railroad that is famous for using steam locomotives on its trains from Rockhill, PA. See Rockhill, PA, for information about the EBT route.

The EBT terminated at the Pennsylvania RR in this town. Since the EBT was a narrow-gauge railroad, a gantry crane was used to change the trucks under the freight cars as part of the interchange.

Robert Wanner posted
That overhead timber transfer building with the lift crane in Mt Union on the East Broad Top R.R. & Coal Company that made it possible to exchange the trucks of standard gauge cars to a set of narrow gauge trucks to expedite delivery on line. Great innovation for the small railroad. Photo by Fred Cupp in 1950.
[TotalRacing diagrams how the standard-gauge trucks were replaced with narrow-gauge trucks using the timber transfer crane.]

C Stewart Rhine commented on Robert's post
1955 photo by Charlie Mahan.

Bev Smith commented on Robert's post
Jack Fornadley: A Reading box car- part of the “alphabet route” west. I guess we should add EBT to the alphabet routing?

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted

East Broad Top Railroad and Coal Co. Engine # 3 along Pennsylvania Avenue near the Station in Mt. Union, Huntingdon County in 1945.

(Photo from Dorothy Cramer via https://www.facebook.com/groups/181311765268540/)

George John Drobnock: Location on Pennsylvania Avenue, Mount Union. The yard Shifter is on the fourth track, near the wall constructed by the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1905 for the East Broad Top Railroad. The PRR provided an agreement stating the wall would be the responsibility of the railroad and its successors. Between 1904-1905 the PRR purchased 20 feet from the properties fronting the railroad.

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted
East Broad Top Railroad Mail Drop at Pennsylvania Avenue and Jefferson Street in Mt. Union, Huntingdon County.

Jackson-Township historical preservation posted

Train Wreck in the town of Mt. Union, Huntingdon County in February of 1917. Twenty-one people were killed including nine mmbers of one family on the way to a funeral of a relative. The cause was listed as missed signals during a heavy fog. All of the dead were occupants of the sleeping car Bellwood. So powerful was the impact that the two last sleeping coaches of the all-steel train were wedged so tightly together that they had to be cut apart. Every passenger in the rear Pullman of the express train, the steel Bellwood, was killed outright. The Bellwood split in two, against the next steel Pullman, the Bruceville, which cut into the Bellwood like a knife. The living in the Bruceville and the dead in the Bellwood were imprisoned by the telescoping of the latter sleeping car, making rescue work and identification difficult.

The nine members of the family of Chester A. Minds, a coal operator of Ramey, Pa., and a former football star of the University of Pennsylvania were on their way to Brooklyn, where Mrs. Minds's Father, William Caflisch, died Sunday. They boarded the train at Tyrone, buying tickets for Utica, where, it is thought, they intended joining other members of the family. Others killed included Mrs. A. F. Delling who was only a Bride for a short time, Mr. and Mrs. Fanning who were on their honeymoon and bound for New York and Frank Landry who was on his way home from St. Vincent's College.

(Text from http://www3.gendisasters.com/)

George John Drobnock: Location South Jefferson and Canal Street (near Water Street) Mount Union Pa. Current location of the Sheetz Store. [So we are looking at Jefferson St. Based on the topo map above, I think the depot was just east of Division St.]