Nostalgia & History > Maroon Monday: S-L-O-W pace chase!

I’ve told this story many times! To be a loyal fan Rock Island in the road’s final years was a true heartache. But to be a fan of the Rock while living in Manhattan, KS was also an exercise in dogged persistence. The Rock’s track was in bad shape everywhere, but it seemed to be in worse shape on the branches and secondary mainlines. The line through my hometown of Manhattan was no exception!

Chasing a train on the McFarland~Belleville branch was a huge misnomer! The term “chase” had to be used very judiciously. The reason will be familiar to any railfan shooting the Rock Island in its final years. The average track speed was S-L-O-W! Here’s a fictional (but highly accurate) scenario: You could be driving from Topeka to Manhattan via I-70. You spot a train at McFarland and get a shot. The train is leaving the Golden State Route mainline and is angling up toward Manhattan on its way to Belleville on the Rocky Mountain Rocket mainline. You make the 20 minute drive home (21.2 track miles), sit down and eat dinner at a regular restaurant. Then you go down to the UP-Rock Island crossing and wait for the train to arrive. You have to be patient, but you get another shot. Next you go run a couple of errands, taking your time. Then you make the short hop west (8.9 track miles) to Keats, KS. You can see the headlight down the tangent track. You successfully bag your third shot of the train. Elapsed time: Close to 3 hours!

The 1979 Rock Island system timetable lists the maximum speed for the Des Moines Division subdivision 20B (McFarland-Belleville) at 30 MPH. But from when I first started paying attention in 1973 as a budding teenage railfan up to the very end in 1980, I don’t remember ever seeing a Rock Island train going any faster than 10 MPH on that line through my hometown. There must have been constant blanket slow orders everywhere!

Needless to say, if you wanted to shoot the Rock Island in my neck-o-the-woods you simply didn’t have the luxury of waiting for good weather. When you actually found a train you took what weather you could get, and hoped for better luck next time. The train I’m posting in this thread didn’t involve a 3 hour ordeal. No, I think I only spent about an hour shooting it. But my first shot was in the west part of Manhattan, and the only other shot was here at Keats. Oops, better make that 1 hour & “10 minutes”! I used that extra 10 minutes to drive the 9 miles back home…

1. CRI&P 385 on a very slow manifest loping through Keats, KS on a crappy overcast February 15, 1978.
(Ektachrome slide)

Thanks for waiting…

and waiting…

and waiting!
Lance Garrels
santafe199



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/15/22 21:12 by santafe199.

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An engineer friend of mine at Salina worked for the Rock out of Herington before hiring on the UP. In the 1970s, the track was so bad on the McFarland to Belleville branch that they could not make Herington to Belleville in 12 hours so, Manhattan was made an intermediate terminal tie up point. Most of the branch was 10mph with a lot of 5mph slow orders.
Sad.

Bob
PRose

Well worth the wait....even if it was cloudy! The Fairbury - Beatrice line was the same way...very SLOOOW.

Overcast or not. Great shot!!

PRose Wrote:
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> Most of the branch was 10mph with a lot of
> 5mph slow orders.
> Sad.
>
> Bob
> PRose

Wow... at least up in my neck of the woods, the track was kept in reasonably good shape due to the suburban service. Unbelievable to see a RR like the Rock running 5-10 mph. Wow.

- Jeff Carlson