Nostalgia & History > SP Power over the Milw. at Clinton, Ia.

Five Southern Pacific diesels are the power for westbound Milwaukee Road train #226 seen crossing the C&NW mainline at 5th St. interlocking in this summer of 1983 photo. You can see the old C&NW depot on the left and the joint Milw./BN/RI depot on the right.

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Gotta love those SP units!

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Eastbound Milwaukee Road train #227 has a trio of SP GE's this day as it crosses the plant at Fifth St. over the C&NW.

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Nice shots as usual Angus.

#226/227 were the hottest trains on the MILW KC Line back in that era. It handled a lot of auto parts traffic off of the GTW.

Also nice to see a photo of the old BN/RI/MILW depot. Some folks may not know this but the Rock did run a local out of West Davenport to Clinton. It dated back to the BCR&N days. I read in Dr. Hastings RI book that the crew was from Cedar Rapids per the union agreement and got paid 100 miles deadhead pay to go work that job. And you also had to have a lot of whiskers to hold the job.

Again, thanks for sharing.

MILW86A

Your absolutely correct Dave. The Rock Island did serve Clinton with a local out of the Quad Cities. Here's a picture of a couple of RI GP-7's parked out front of the depot along side the BN local as well. Photo taken in July of 1979.

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Thanks for the photo Angus.

RI 4502 became CNW 4156. 4523 became CNW 4177. Whats the chances you ran those units up and down the West Yard lead?

MILW86A

The early 80's must have been an interesting time on the Milwaukee's line to KC. Besides SP power, you could also see UP and MKT power on a regular basis.

cdub Wrote:
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> The early 80's must have been an interesting time
> on the Milwaukee's line to KC. Besides SP power,
> you could also see UP and MKT power on a regular
> basis.


lived along that line from 87-95 and that was interesting era too, just swap SOO for MILW and you had the same mix. And, the trains used cabooses up thru nearly the end of the SOO era (pre IMRL/ICE), since the sidings were all hand throw switches. That includes the SP trains. Cotton Belt power was seen also.

I think the WB SP train was a #227 that ran into Armourdale in KC right? (even #'s east)

chico Wrote:

> I think the WB SP train was a #227 that ran into
> Armourdale in KC right? (even #'s east)


Nope then it was North-South by timetable direction, so WB out of Chicago were even numbered. That lasted up until the SOO Line days, I think the switch came in 1991.

I used to railfan the SOO a lot in the early 1990's in Ottumwa, Quad Cities, and Savanna. Oh yes, I bet I had 97X on my truck stereo as well:}

MILW86A

MILW86A Wrote:
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Oh
> yes, I bet I had 97X on my truck stereo as well:}
>
>
> MILW86A

because a waste is a terrible thing to mind, right? :)

HA HA HA yes it is!

I loved the X back then. Just not the same now. I remember when Dwyer and Michels were over there. And who was the sports guy? Cant recall now but he was funny as heck too.

MILW86A