Western Railroad Discussion > Big Time with a Big Boy (pt 1)

My first encounter with the 4014 almost didn’t happen. I had been in Pennsylvania when the 4014’s shakedown tour happened. But with its upcoming trek across Nebraska less than 4 hours away from home base I was arguing with myself. On the one hand I knew seeing & shooting the 4014 would be one of the biggest railfan events of my life. On the other hand the idea that the pacing line would be a complete circus was not exactly appealing. I called my friend in Lincoln, NE on a whole different matter, and he dangled a carrot in front of me: “If you beat-feet up here tonight, Ken & I are gonna go chase the Big Boy tomorrow!” I caved in. With a place to stay the night before, the ‘one hand’ won. Once again ‘santafe199’, aka Willie Wildcat was headed for some hospitality from the heart of Husker Nation.

And once again, captions will greatly aid in the delivery of the back story of my latest adventure. One caveat: “UP 4-8-8-4 Big Boy #4014” is such a long and unwieldy cluster of alphabet soup letters & numbers I will heretofore use ‘4014’ as the main working moniker.

1. 2. & 3. My first-ever look at the 4014 happened at ‘3rd Rd’ just east of Grand Island, NE. Image #3 is related to this link ( https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,4827583 ). With the low morning sun this sequence just might be the best of the entire chase! But we’re jes’ gittin’ started…

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The principal characters in this adventure are retired UP man Ken Church, a long-time Omaha area railfan and TO member Tom Jurgens, who answers to ‘twjurgens’ on your dial. Our master plan was to ‘hopscotch’ the 4014’s service stops and run ahead to set up for killer photo sequences anywhere we could find wiggling room. Tom was our chauffeur extraordinaire. Translated that means Ken & I survived to chase again some day. Just kidding, of course. Tom was great, and he even let me ride shotgun! Speaking of shotgun…

4. & 5. Image #4 has us coming into the first of 4014’s service stops at Central City, NE. This is the viewing angle of the 4014 we had for about 80% of the live long day. I took this and many more photos from the good ol’ shotgun seat. But for image #5 I had Tom leaning way back in his seat with his window open. As we were rolling right along. I believe I’m shooting up C Avenue in down town Central City.

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6. 7. & 8. We threaded our way through downtown Central City and decided to go for the cantilever signal shot of the 4014 leaving town. So did the occupants of this vehicle with a familiar magazine logo on the doors! Photo line forms here: That’s TRAINS Magazine skipper Jim Wrinn setting up his equipment. His wife Cate is out of frame, but that’s Richard Schmelling in the cleaver camouflage vest, with Ken Church taking up station along “Railroad” St. One last image before departure shows a scattered, but well-behaved bunch of onlookers.

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9. 10. & 11. SHOWTIME! Here’s a 3 shot sequence of the 4014 departing Central City, with…

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12. …the obligatory ‘away’ shot. Central City will soon be in the rear-view mirror.

13. & 14. We load up and get back into the “Conga Line” as Tom calls it. Here’s UP 5987 west meeting the 4014, and an overhead squadron of photographers suddenly out of work on the highway 92 overpass. Both images are close enough to be called Clarks, NE.

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15. & 16. Shooting photos while riding shotgun always takes a great deal of skill & daring. So it’s a damn good thing I know how to use sheer dumb luck! Coming into Silver Creek, NE I spotted another westbound headlight a ways down the line. I had my camera in the ready position in anticipation of working up some sort of composition. I was only at 52mm when the semi cleared my field of view. I lost control. It was strictly muscle memory that depressed my right hand index finger for #15. I recovered in time to go to 140mm for image #16. I like ‘em both…

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17. On the western flank of Silver Creek our already sluggish Conga Line ran smack-dab into a railfan nightmare. The good ol’ one lane road construction pinch point. When this red light occurred about 40 cars of the mile-long line of loonies had already gone through. But one of the construction guys saw that our line of cars was stretching clear back to doomsday. So he had another guy hold the one single westbound auto and started waving us through the red light. But that first car must have had a Driver’s Ed instructor at the wheel, because he was by-God NOT about to go through that red light. I imagine the honking operetta of the next half-dozen cars behind him helped him finally change his mind.

18. Coming into the 2nd service stop at Columbus, NE US hwy 30 veers away from the UP main line. This would be the best angle I would get from inside the dreaded Conga Line…
(18 photos taken July 12, 2019)

Part #2 coming soon to a theater near you!
Lance Garrels
santafe199

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Great picts, Lance.
sd-45

Lance:  Thank you so much.  Your series makes me feel like I was there!  Beautiful shots and they captured the chase.  Give my regards to Ken Church.  It's been a while.
John Bromley

You captured the events!  I gotta agree, the GI shots were among the best of the day for lighting......Central City was a close second.

Central City used to be a great place to stop for an ice cream! Love the shots, everyone leaves out the crowd
and the chaos, nicely captured. That light in the middle of town must have been a total disaster for trying to chase,
'the thing has a mind of it's own, never mind trying to figure out where to stop.

Out

Nice chase shots Lance.  Central City is a great place for good photo locations.
Brian Stevens

Thanks Lance ... A very nice and realistic series of images, well done!
Nice to show both the Big Boy and the finer points of an event ... the
personal side is important!

Odyssey
Evergreen, CO

santafe199 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My first encounter with the 4014 almost didn’t
> happen. I had been in Pennsylvania when the
> 4014’s shakedown tour happened. But with its
> upcoming trek across Nebraska less than 4 hours
> away from home base I was arguing with myself. On
> the one hand I knew seeing & shooting the 4014
> would be one of the biggest railfan events of my
> life. On the other hand the idea that the pacing
> line would be a complete circus was not exactly
> appealing. I called my friend in Lincoln, NE on a
> whole different matter, and he dangled a carrot in
> front of me: “If you beat-feet up here tonight,
> Ken & I are gonna go chase the Big Boy
> tomorrow!” I caved in. With a place to stay the
> night before, the ‘one hand’ won. Once again
> ‘santafe199’, aka Willie Wildcat was headed
> for some hospitality from the heart of Husker
> Nation.
>
> And once again, captions will greatly aid in the
> delivery of the back story of my latest adventure.
> One caveat: “UP 4-8-8-4 Big Boy #4014” is such
> a long and unwieldy cluster of alphabet soup
> letters & numbers I will heretofore use ‘4014’
> as the main working moniker.
>
> 1. 2. & 3. My first-ever look at the 4014 happened
> at ‘3rd Rd’ just east of Grand Island, NE.
> Image #3 is related to this link (
> https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,
> 4827583 ). With the low morning sun this sequence
> just might be the best of the entire chase! But
> we’re jes’ gittin’ started…

Past debates aside, thank you for taking the time to chase and share your wonderful results with the rest of us.

Regards,

Dave

Thanks for the fine photos and descriptions.  It's the next best thing to experiencing it in person.

Bet you are glad you caved and went.........what a beautiful day to shoot the 4014....great write up and pics.

Thanks for an interesting chase Lance! Made me feel like I was there.

Larry

Excellante!

BB