Mt. Carmel, IL: Big Four Railyard, Roundhouse and Backshop

1938 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

This Big Four yard was on the Egyptian line that went from Cairo, IL to the Chicago area.

A 1930s Flickr photo of the roundhouse was the motivation for this posting. They also have an exterior shot of the backshop and a couple of interior shots: 1 and 2. The exterior shot shows a transfer table running along the side of the high bay building with the big overhead crane.

I include a closeup of the roundhouse and backshop. In a satellite image, it appears you can still see the land scars of some of  the stalls northwest of the Burger King parking lot. I went to that corner of the parking lot to see if I could see anything, but I could not. And the ground was too muddy and snowy to walk out there for a closer look. But the backshop has been expanded since the 1938 photo and Pacific Press Technologies has maintained the old buildings as part of its facility. But they removed the transfer table along the north side of the shop building to make another parking lot.
I added a red circle where I think the turntable pit used to be.

Satellite

Starting with the original part facing Walnut Street, I walked along...

...the Burger King parking lot taking pictures of  the northish side of the building.

Taking a shot straight on of the main part. You can still see where some of the doors were that allowed the engines to access the building from the transfer table.

And then I took a shot looking back at what I had walked by. In these pictures I minimized the amount of sky trying to reduce the backlighting. But the white snow in the foreground did not help to reduce the backlighting.

I then moved the car to their parking lot on the other side of the main entrance. It was the weekend, and I did confirm the door was locked so that I could not go in and ask about the building's history. But the comments on the Flick pictures above confirm that the current company does use the overhead crane to help assemble its product.

A couple more pictures concluded my walk past the eastish end of the buildings.

They have obviously added some newer buildings between the original Big Four buildings.

I then moved the van down to the corner of 7th and Bellmont Streets to get a picture of the other building that is on the 1938 photo. While doing that, I walked across the grass to check out the one track that is remaining from the original yard. It was rail service into the westish end of the Pacific building. It looks like the access door has been covered over so the rail service is no longer used.

I then turned and got a picture of the brick "tower" on the side of the other building in the 1938 photo. They have obviously torn down a little building that used to be east of the tower. But I think the rest of the building may be from that era except they have replaced all of the windows in the walls as well as in the roof. And painted everything white.



Update: Rex Settlemoir posted two photos with the comment:

The former Big 4 steam/heavy repair shops at Mount Carmel, Illinois survive under private ownership, and still in use for industrial purposes. I took these photos in October, 2007 but didn't try to venture inside. The tan colored, metal building was obviously added after NYC sold the main structure.

1

2

Eric Berg commented on Rex's posting
Same shops at right in 1951....
[And the roundhouse in the left background.]

Eric Berg commented on Rex's posting
Then in 1910. Both photos unknown photographer.
[All that glass, including along the top of the roof, is a reminder that electric lighting was a recent development in 1910.]