Nostalgia & History > Watchman Tower in Kokomo IN 1991

You just never know what you night find. In twilight, at the end of a day railfanning with DocJohn on Oct 29 1991 we came upon this watchman tower in Kokomo IN. Even then, twenty five years ago, there could have not been many of these structures left. One more thing, the street decorations for Christmas were already up. I didn’t know whether to say “Trick or Treat” or “Merry Christmas”.
ALLEN



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/06/22 13:59 by krm152.

According to Google Street View , it's still there .... well, it was there in September 2013 when the Google camera car drove by.

Here is a news article about it's restoration in October, 2015.

http://www.kokomotribune.com/news/hall-of-fame-honors-those-who-helped-preserve-watchman-tower/article_d463137c-7f4a-11e5-849b-cb07022f1921.html

That's the former NKP Indianapolis-Michigan City line. The photographer is facing South. It is my understanding that an interurban crossed the line from the other street into the 1920s.The NKP 587 had rambled up and down the I-MC back in the steam era and no doubt ran on this very section of track. But IIRC, the I-MC was the first NKP line dieselized (1949-1950?) with EMD GP7s while steam continued on the mainliine.

I lived in Kokomo from February 1980 to November 1982.I kick myself now for not taking photos or movies, even if it was N&W. The first day I arrived in Kokomo for an interview one cold day in February 1980, a GP30 was running down the street with its train, really smoking it up. The freight house (still there) is to the north and the Wildcat River Thru-Truss Bridge (still there?) to the South. (You can see it in the distance.) The track in town is now out of service from what I understand.  I have often marveled that this section of street running through town from the freight house to the Wildcat River would make an awesome model railroad scene.

Victor A. Baird
​http://www.erstwhilepublications.com

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Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 10/22/16 12:27 by wabash2800.

Good one krm152. The image reminds me of a photo caption in a humor segment in the old Coronet Magazine titled "Back Home in Indiana". The picture showed a tower at a crossing diamond somewhere in that state.

The caption read: "We were sure proud of our railroad crossing. We had an awful good watchman once, but he got kind of hard of hearing and when trains took to sneaking through on him he took sitting on the tacks so he would't miss any. He's gone now."

I have no idea why, after 50 plus years that bit of trivia remains in the leaking sponge of what remains of my mind.

Cheers,
Jack
 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/22/16 19:06 by africansteam.

The tower is indeed still there to this day.  Very well maintained by someone.

Thanks to all for the interesting and informative replies.
ALLEN