Nostalgia & History > Where is/was AT&SF Signal 1332

Roger took this in September 1983.  Two cantilevered blades.  Was a that very common?

Thanks,
Marty Bernard

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MartyBernard Wrote:

> Roger took this in September 1983.  Two
> cantilevered blades.  Was a that very common?

Not in 1983.  By then, just about the only cantilevered blades left on the AT&SF were in Kansas.  There was one at the west end of Bernalillo, NM that lasted into 1983, but that's about it outside the Sunflower State.  Within Kansas, the only place I can recall seeing pairs like that is on the line south from Ottawa, KS heading toward Tulsa, OK, and that indeed appears to be the line in the photo.  Earlton, KS was 133.4 miles from Atchison, and "Earlton" is probably what used to be written on that blackened station sign just beyond the grade crossing.  Google Maps' contemporary street view does show a sign saying "Earlton" at the 150th Rd. crossing, but the signal system went away over a quarter century ago and both cantilevers are gone.  The line is now owned by WATCO's South Kansas & Oaklahoma RR.

https://goo.gl/maps/qufLPN7HvUs

Santa Fe used cantilevers to reach across one track to put the signal head on the engineer's side of the track being governed when there wasn't room for a mast-mounted signal between the tracks.  Earlton had overlapping sidings once upon a time, so there used be another siding on the other side of the main spanned by that more distant cantilever.

Similar pairs of semaphores on cantilevers also once existed on this line at Humboldt and Iola, and probably other places, too.

Evan, thanks for the detailed comment.  I'm not surprised Roger found one of the last.  He was an AT&SF employee in the late 1960s.

Every time you comment on something I post I get it twice as an email, i.e., two basically the same emails of your comments.  I think the second one is an edited version.  This happens with noone else.  Strange.

Marty

MartyBernard Wrote:

> Every time you comment on something I post I get
> it twice as an email, i.e., two basically the same
> emails of your comments.  I think the second one
> is an edited version.  This happens with noone
> else.  Strange.

Sorry for the clutter in your inbox; I know what's wrong and I'll try to rein it in.  I'm afraid I'm one of those people that can never just post something and be done with it.  For the next several minutes after hitting "post message," my brain keeps revisiting what I wrote, compelling me to go back and clarify this or that, fix typos, dig up land mines I inadvertently laid, etc.  I deleted and reposted that reply about five times before I finally let it be. 

...and I'm about to do it again with this reply, but I wanted to add that I like your editing on the most recent sets of Puta images.  They are looking good on my monitor, and this one in particular is just right!

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
>>on the line south from Ottawa, KS heading toward Tulsa, OK, and that indeed appears to be the line in the photo.  Earlton, KS was Earlton, KS was 133.4 miles from Atchison>>

I agree that it's Earlton, south of Chanute, KS, but the mile posts are numbered from Kansas City Union Station on that part of the old Southern Kansas Division. I just dug out a 1962 Eastern Div timetable and shows the Third District (Ottawa to Chanute) at Ottawa, KS continuing the same mile post (57.1) as from the Second District (KCUS to Emporia). In other words, the mile posts are continuous south of Ottawa to Chanute and beyond through Earlton.

From Atchison, would be a convoluted routing via Topeka, back to Lawrence and south via the long abandoned line through Baldwin City to Ottawa.
Dave in Missoula

Thanks Dave.  Missed that land mine entirely.