Nostalgia & History > Last and first - Amtrak on the B&A in 1975

JPB's excellent photos posted this morning of the Boston Lake Shore Limited inspired me to look at my own scans of Amtrak 448/449 and the Bosoton and Albany route.  Here are three from 1975, when I was a sophomore in High School with an ancient 35mm rangefinder camera inherited from my grandparents.

1) From 1971 to 1975, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts sponsored a single daily train over the B&A from Boston to Springfield.  Initially a through train to New York and DC, the Bay State was soon truncated to just an extension of one of the ubiquitous New Haven - Springfield RDC shuttles.  In the Spring of 1975 I heard that the state had pulled the plug on funding, and the Bay State would be discontinued, I think with the April timetable change.  So I packed the camera for my walk to school and caught the last Bay State run stopping at Wellesley Square to pickup exactly zero passengers.  Often the train was made up of the two "Roger Williams" cab cars, but on it's last run an ex-NH RDC-2 filled in for one of them.

2) After six months or so with no passenger trains running west of Worcester, service returned across the entire B&A main with Amtrak's new Lake Shore Limited.  The first run took place on Halloween of 1975.  I blew my meager savings on a Boston - Springfield ticket, with a return on Peter Pan Bus Lines.  SDP40F 594 did the honors, with a three car consist of a 10-6 sleeper, coach and lounge.  The train proved popular, and soon acquired a second coach and baggage car.  The SDPs didn't last long on the B&A though - after a few months, normal power to Albany was one or two E units, often in pealing PC black.

3) Two car men removed the bunting placed on the last car for the inaugural run ceremony.

Dave

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Nice look back!  Pretty good for a high schooler.

texchief1

Great pictures! I had no idea that way back when, one could board an Amtrak train at Wellesley Square and it would be the Roger Williams Budd cars! And an SDP40 for the inaugural run of the Lake Shore, too! I'm guessing you might also have captures of D&H  PAs pulling MBTA trains on the Framingham line?

JPB Wrote:
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> Great pictures! I had no idea that way back when,
> one could board an Amtrak train at Wellesley
> Square and it would be the Roger Williams Budd
> cars! And an SDP40 for the inaugural run of the
> Lake Shore, too! I'm guessing you might also have
> captures of D&H  PAs pulling MBTA trains on the
> Framingham line?

Unfortunately I don't have an PA pictures from their year in Boston...was living on the Vineyard by then and didn't get off-island that much.  I do remember once taking a rush hour train out to Wellesley (the only kind that ran in the '70s) with a PA leading, but probably didn't have the camera with me.  The PAs were the stars of course, but the eclectic mix of ex-New Haven Shoreliner coaches and ex-PRR P70s was also pretty cool as well.

Dave