Western Railroad Discussion > Toto Tuesday: O train at sundown!

Hutchinson, Kansas resident Mr Lynn Aldrich is my guest photographer for this week’s Toto Tuesday. Lynn is a central Kansas railfan photographer from “way back”. He’s not all that much older than I am, but his RR photography hobby got started while he was pretty young. In a roll-call of well known Kansas area railfans he was pretty well established by the early 1960s while I was still in grade school. So he had been at it well over a decade before I ever got the inspiration to pick up a camera and go shootin’ train pictures in the mid-70s.

I’d known his name since the late 1970s from long-time Kansas Gang pals Dave Franz & John Arbuckle. But It was just one of those unfortunate things that prevented us from meeting. By 1987 my RR career had taken me out of Kansas and I wouldn’t return home for 23 years. We finally met a couple of years ago in Hutchinson chasing an Amtrak-powered private passenger car special. And now we’ve been loosely trading images via email for a little over a year.

Last spring in Hutchinson there was an informal gathering of several railfans who were either past or present Kansas residents. Of course we all went out to shoot whatever we could find around the Hutch area. In one of the quieter moments Lynn & I got into a discussion about railfan photography style. I’ve always loved to do this because I feel one should never get so entrenched in his or her own style, and fail to be open-minded about others’ opinions & attitudes. I cheerfully divulged how I will go out and shoot in just about any situation with the attitude that I can always try to make the best of it. I also told him I had some early influence that steered me toward the creative, artsy side of the hobby. But I also claimed I could shoot the standard wedgie train & roster shots with the best of them. Lynn told me had been influenced by (among others); Mr Lloyd Stagner & Mr C H ‘Dick’ Humphreys [both now deceased]. From these influences he was more inclined to go for the standard angles in both train action & pure roster.

So imagine my delight to get this ‘killer’ image from Lynn in an email message a few days ago! Even though it arrived at a size of 640, I was blown away. After a couple of email message exchanges I was able to get a larger image from him. I ran it through a minimum of Photoshop editing and the image below is the final result. Kudos, Lynn! You knocked one outta the park with this shot…

1. BNSF 5719 leads O-TOPLAU into a Kansas sunset on the west side of Hutchinson, KS on November 7, 2014.
(photo by Mr. Lynn Aldrich)

Thanks for looking!
Lance Garrels (santafe199)
Lynn Aldrich (retired school teacher)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/18/14 07:06 by santafe199.

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Dang! Now that's shootin'!

Kit Courter
Menefee, CA
LunarLight Photography

Boy! Am I glad I checked out the Western page tonight. Awesome color!

If the train is from Topeka to LA Union Station and is on the west side of Hutch, doesn't it have to go over Raton? I thought BNSF had completely stopped running trains on Raton?

Excellent shot LG ...

Posted from Android

kansas1 Wrote: > If the train is from Topeka to LA Union Station

Oops... O TOPLAU is Topeka, KS to Laurel, MT. (innocent assumption though... ;^) This train was most likely routed up the Joint Line through Denver on the way to Laurel. I would assume it also went through Casper & Greybull instead of the busier main through Sheridan...

Lance



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/18/14 17:35 by santafe199.

Out_Of_Service Wrote: > Excellent shot LG ...

Nice try, but I cannot take credit for this shot. That should be "Excellent shot ***LYNN***! As in Lynn Aldrich, guest photographer for today's Toto

;^)

Oh boy is that an awesome sunset. Thank you Lynn.
John

WOW! What a sky! Congrats to you both on the IOTD!

Bob

ATSF100WEST......Out

That is a keeper for sure.
Great photo!

611

An interesting side note. Due to extreme cold weather, this train was annulled at La Junta and diverted to Clovis, NM. The Execs then used them to make an inspection trip from Clovis to Barstow, CA instead of from Laurel to Lincoln. Outstanding photo!

rww

Congratulations to Lynn for taking the photo and my personal thanks to you, Lance, for sharing the beautiful picture. Hope it made both of you smile when it became Image of the Day. L.B.

Wowie kazowie! What an image! Congrats to Lynn for IOTD, and congrats and thanks to you, Lance, for your role in sharing it with us. Outstanding!

Toto, I think I want to be in Kansas!

MC
Columbia, Missouri