Nostalgia & History > MoPac memories in Missouri.

It's July 12, 1976 in the St. Louis suburb of Crestwood, and a trio of MoPac SD40-2s led by 3107, leads a westbound freight up the Carondelet Branch, a now-abandoned secondary route for MoPac freights between St. Louis and Kirkwood. On the extreme right is a split-rail fence separating the MoPac right-of-way from the August A. Busch estate known as "Grant's Farm," where, until the train began blowing for a nearby grade crossing, young and old Clydesdale horses grazed, waiting for their turn at the helm of the famous Budweiser Clydesdale hitch. The branch was abandoned in the 1980s and is now a bike trail, and the non-dynamic SD40-2s wearing "Screaming Eagle" livery survive only as 1:87 scale models and at various railfan slide shows.

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MP 3107 survives, it's just orange and black and carries the number CN 5366.

Bill Miller
Galt, ON

Used to enjoy laying in bed at night and listening to them grind up the hill and whistle for Sappington Rd. when we lived in Crestwood.
Used to enjoy laying in bed at night in Maplewood as a youngster and listen to the steam doubleheaders run for Kirkwood Hill and their exhausts would get slower and slower. Some nights you could hear them for ten minutes. I could hear the Frisco leaving Lindenwood and go up the hill as well as switching over in the yards on a quiet night.

I always liked the line as well, and it was in operation when I moved to St. Louis oh so many years ago. Always seems that when I would see a train on it I was never in a position to get a picture. I think I have only one - a westbound crossing Union Road and passing under I-55. I remember driving to work early one morning up I-55 and seeing the UP business train on the line at Weber Road heading north toward Lesperance Street yard. That was certainly a surprise!

The line is still in existence from Broadway Junction to the recycling facility at Weber Road. It's a bike/walking trail beyond there, except for the quarter mile or so of track at the other end (Kirk Jct).

Thanks for posting the photo!