Nostalgia & History > Concordia, KS, railroad structures

Attached are a couple of Concordia, KS, building pictures taken next to rail lines. I really can't provide any description but thought some of my fellow Kansans can help me out.

Does the first picture show three different depots? Or a couple of depots and one freight house?

The second picture has a Missouri Pacific sign attached. I'm guessing that is the MoPac freight house.

I have read in recent years that an Orphan Train Museum has been established in a depot building at Concordia but I don't know which one. Hopefully, somebody can educate me on what I have in my slide collection.

Both of these pictures were taken in the spring of 1981.

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if I remember correctly, there were two railroads in Concordia. The Mopac was one and if you look at the end of the one depot you can see the santa fe logo. I believe the far passenger station has been restored.
Randy Allard

MP and ATSF (Strong City sub) were the original roads. Now Kyle and BNSF.

Mexrail

Actually, at one time Concordia was served by four Railroads. CB+Q, ATSF, MoPac, and UP. I have not been to Concordia in a while but I think the photo is taken looking NW. The closest depot is the MoPac, the white depot is the ATSF freight depot, and the depot in the background is the UP depot. There is a chance that the closest depot is the CB+Q depot but it looks more like the MoPac depots you see on the old central branch.

If the rear depot is the UP depot, it has been restored and is the home of the Orphan Train museum. Here is a link to the museum site:

http://www.orphantraindepot.com/

Check out the old passenger car. It is a real relic of Kansas history. During my last visit, March of 2007, the depot restoration was nearly complete and I think all three of the depots in the photo remained.

mmisin2 Wrote:

> Actually, at one time Concordia was served by four
> Railroads. CB+Q, ATSF, MoPac, and UP. I have not
> been to Concordia in a while but I think the photo
> is taken looking NW. The closest depot is the
> MoPac, the white depot is the ATSF freight depot,
> and the depot in the background is the UP depot.
> There is a chance that the closest depot is the
> CB+Q depot but it looks more like the MoPac depots
> you see on the old central branch.

Back when I visited Concordia in 1992, I managed to convince myself that the furthest depot was CB&Q, but that apparently isn't the case. I'm pretty sure the brick building is MP, and the white structure looks like a typical, albeit stuccoed, Santa Fe combination freight and passenger depot, not just a freight house. Here's the view in the other direction, looking southeast.

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I remember riding the UP that ran from Jct. City, KS, through Wakefield, where I boarded the old freight caboose, (free and courtesy of the friendly crew). We headed northwest to Clay Center and on to Miltonvale, where the UP switched to the ATSF line and ran on into Concordia.

This was back in 1954-55 and the short train of 15 to 20 cars was pulled by an old steam engine. We had to stop at the foot of a fairly steep grade east of Miltonvale and build up a head of steam to make the climb over the hill. The engine's boiler was 'limed up' according to the conductor.

When we arrived in Concordia, we stopped at the UP depot (pictured in the left foreground of the last picture taken by Evan) and switching commenced. After switching mostly grain and lumber boxcars (probably some gondolas and flats with rock and ag equipment), the engine turned around at a wye, reconnected with the consist and headed back to Jct. City.

The conductor told me that the lumber cars came down the Q from the NW U.S. and were routed on the most indirect route from the mills to the lumberyards. This would increase the routing time so that the lumber would have time to cure on the long haul....seemed like a good explanation to me at the time.

By the way, we are looking mostly east-southeast in the photo......the ATSF depot/freight station is the white building in the center and the MOP depot/freight station is in the right background.

I know the Q was running to Concordia in the 50s but I don't remember seeing the depot.

When I was a college student in the mid-sixties, I rode on the UP branch line again (again free and courtesy of the crew) and took black and white photos of the activity. We had a couple of small diesel engines (switcher types) and two cabooses plus a lot of rock gondolas in between. The running speed was a lot slower and we stayed overnight at Concordia by the UP station, sleeping in one of the cabooses.

Of course that branch UP line is shut down now, originally because of the Milford Dam near Jct. City flooding the river bottom and right-of-way.

I got kind of carried away with nostalgia seeing those photos that Evan posted.

someone asked about the rail car waiting to be restored at the UP depot. Here is part of an article from the museum web site. Not sure if the CB+Q depot is still on site. I may run up there this weekend to check.

So, how did the antique passenger coach find its way to
Concordia last December? It all began with the fall issue of
Territorial Magazine, a regional quarterly printed in Garden City.
On page 18 was an article, "The Marion Belt and Chingawasa
Springs: Kansas' First Excursion Railroad." Robert Collins,
railroad historian from Wichita, was its author. Collins' work
appears frequently in Territorial, where it is known for exploring
Kansas' unique railroading past. How could Collins have known
that his article would spark a positive initiative to save the last
remaining artifact of Marion, Kansas' 1889 foray into railroad
tourism?

Collins' wrote a prophetic line when he stated, "Although the
MB&CS didn't last very long (about 3 years), it nonetheless has a
colorful and interesting story with (so far) a hopeful ending."
Collins' continues with "No one seems to know what happened
to the locomotive...but the two passenger cars became
community fixtures. One...became the "Owl Car" restaurant which
earned the name because it was open all night." The diner
seated eight until 1961..."when a new owner expanded," and the
car was moved to an area farm and became a chicken coop.
"The other passenger car served as a doctor's office until it, too
was moved to a farm." David Mayfield, Marion city Manager,
believes that sometime after the car was moved, it burned to the
ground. Then, only one car remained. The former Owl Car
restaurant and chicken coop is now a Concordia resident.
To say it looked sad and forlorn and forgotten would have been
an understatement. Its trucks (wheel units) were long gone
leaving the undercarriage resting on two I-beams Weeds had
grown up around the bottom obscuring the underneath
condition of the car. Its sides were covered in places with
ancient rolled roofing and an assortment of grey shingles; little
doors for chickens to exit and enter had been cut into each end.
A plywood door was hinged and wired to one end. When
Marty, the Marion city employee, took off the padlock so we
could get a look inside, the spirits of the committee members
lifted - a little.

Of course, some of the car's interior shows deterioration, but
the grooved wooden floor is original as is the stenciled curved
mahogany molding on the side ceiling. The chairs or seats
have long disappeared, but the screw patterns remain in the
floor to help restoration workers track down the size and type of
the original brackets. Other interior and exterior features retain
enough originality to assist replication efforts. After taking
many photographs and measurements, the committee
contingent started home. The return conversation once gain
centered on what a rare find we had come across and the car's
potential as an enhancement for the Orphan Train Complex. At
our next committee meeting four days later, members voted to
raise the money for moving the car to Concordia.

The day after the decision, I called the Marion City Manager and
told him we wanted the coach. Thankfully, I couldn't see his
eyes rolling. I then called author Robert Collins and told him of
our plans. Our conversation put a whole new spin on the
history and presumed age of the coach. Knowing a thing or two
about railroad history, Mr. Collins informed me that the coach,
because of its length, was older than people thought. "The
Legend," as it's been named by the NOTC committee, is under
30' in length. According to Collins, by the mid-to-late 1860's,
new passenger coaches were 45-60' in length. Other
distinguishing features pinpointing age came into being
around this time. One was the clerestory, a ridge in a car's
roofline that added interior headroom and needed ventilation
through small windows along the upper sides. A related
feature was the smooth bullnose transition design of the
clerestory at each end of the car.

Judging by Collins' knowledge of railroad car history and the
intact physical features of "The Legend," there's a good chance
it could have been constructed just after the Civil War! If this is
the case, its date of origin may put it 10-20 years from the start
of the Orphan Train movement, 1854. Much research remains
to be done, but what if "The Legend" is 140 years old-or
thereabouts? Abraham Lincoln was just assassinated;
Reconstruction was not yet in full swing; and Kansas was only
five years into its statehood. Only further research will tell.

With compliments to a grant from the Duclos Foundation, the
National Orphan Train Complex was able to afford transporting
"The Legend" to Concordia. Smith Construction worked
diligently on both ends of the journey and in between getting its
precious cargo delivered. When "The Legend" arrived, several
committee members remarked about the car having fewer
shingles. Mover Dave Smith sheepishly admitted the shingles
started flying off after he turned his truck onto 81 highway at
McPherson. Minus a few shingles that would have been
removed anyway, "The Legend" made it to its new home safely
and soundly.

"The Legend" is currently sitting on the brick platform north of
the Union Pacific depot and is protected from the weather by
blue tarps and pallet wrap. If anyone reading this article knows
of a storage shed or protective shelter to donate to the National
Orphan Train Complex for the duration of the car's restoration,
the committee would certainly appreciate hearing from you.

Exterior of Owl Car

As Collins concluded his article, "Incredibly, the second car has
survived to the present. This author (Collins) was informed of its
discovery during research for (his book), Ghost Railroads of
Kansas. It was moved from its rural location into Marion for
preservation. Unfortunately, the man who was spearheading this
effort died. The car sits in town patiently waiting to learn its fate."
Reading this line from Collins' article proved to be the National

Here is the CB&Q/BN depot in Concordia. It was south and a little east of the Mopac depot. The Q line ran out of Wymore, NE and provided mixed service to Concordia until the late 1960s. The branch was abandoned in the mid to late 1980s, I believe.
This depot has been torn down.

Bob Helling
PRose

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I shot the CB&Q depot in 1984. It was razed the following year in 85. And I will agree, the first pic is MP passenger, ATSF freight, and UP passenger. The sign on the second photo makes that one easy.