Nostalgia & History > Fifty Or More Years - B&M 1724

(Higher quality redo) B&M 1724 is leading a westbound EL train in the EL yard in Kent, Ohio in the late 1960's. On the far right is the concrete base of the old water tower from ERIE steam days.
Bob



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/17/21 04:41 by refarkas.

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Looks good! I was never really a big fan of the B&M until a trip to New England, now I can't get enough of it. Thanks for sharing.
Ralph

Great catch!  Was the B&M power here a regular deal back then?

They're a fir piece from home. Nice image.
—Mac

I only saw the B&M power on a few occasions. I couldn't tell you if it was more common than that.
Bob

PB-99/100 is the likely train. EL power was suppose to go as far east as Mechanicville NY and BM power usually got to Binghamton before being turned but on occasion the power swap did not happen as is the case here. Apparently EL power got lost more often on the BM than BM on the EL. Nice catch cool shot thanks for posting.

Posted from iPhone

Nice scene with those B&M Geeps.
Probably the D&H and B&M guys were enjoying SD45's !

pal77 Wrote:
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> PB-99/100 is the likely train. EL power was
> suppose to go as far east as Mechanicville NY and
> BM power usually got to Binghamton before being
> turned but on occasion the power swap did not
> happen as is the case here. Apparently EL power
> got lost more often on the BM than BM on the EL.

Nice shot of B&M GP9s before they got the "blue dip" scheme that I most remember seeing.  I didn't get a chance to railfan the B&M until just before the Guilford era, but haven't seen much photographic evidence of their western connections' power running through in the 1960s.  Does anyone have pics they can share?

Dave

Conch Wrote:
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> Great catch!  Was the B&M power here a regular deal back then?

Back in '66 or '67, I would see B&M geeps passing through Kent on the Erie.  It wasn't a "regular thing", but it wasn't unusual, either.  They were always GP7s and GP9s, and they all seemed to be showing their age.  Though I knew nothing of railroad economics then, I could sure tell that things probably weren't going very well for the B&M.
I'd frequently see power from western roads - usually 2 or 3 Rock Island or Burlington units - all "late model", 6 axle units, and in good shape.... no rolling wrecks.  It was a regular occurrence; I'd see western power every few days.  I usually saw them on eastbounds; I'm not sure why I seldom caught them heading west.
With the coming of DERECO, D&H units started showing up frequently in Kent - and they were always clean, modern units. 
By '68 or 69, some of the Burlington units started showing up in the Q's pre-merger green paint, and after the merger, GN, NP, and BN units would pass through town as well.  
There was also a long stretch where we'd see MILW units regularly; I understand (from an EL employee I knew later) that MILW power continued to arrive on run-throughs, almost until Conrail.
It would be interesting to know the dates of the run-through agreements that EL had with the western carriers.
Contrary to my EL "foreign power" experiences, I never saw any run-through power come through Kent on the B&O, nor on the PRR/PC on the north side of town.
And for all the interesting EL trains I saw coming through Kent over those years with all that western power, I never saw one with CNW, Soo Line, or Santa Fe units. 
Those were fun days to live in Kent.