Railroaders' Nostalgia > Tales from the Towers No. 4 : Working at McCook, Illinois

Today on the Nostalgia & History section is a great discussion about McCook, Illinois, "Somewhere on the IHB."
It reignited memories for me of working there in the early 1970's as a Leverman/Operator on the B&OCT.

After the tower was destroyed by fire in 1971, all the switches on the IHB became hand-throws, operated
by B&OCT switchmen as directed by the Operator on duty.  There were no switches on the Santa Fe, and
after the smoke cleared, signals worked.  A little trailer was placed a few inches from the IHB/Santa Fe
diamonds.  We had a nice GRS olive green control board for the interlocker.  Or maybe US&S; I don't recall.

All moves on the Santa Fe were straight through, but on the IHB almost every move was different than the last,
which meant the switchtenders had to get up (usually out of a sleeping bag on a lounge chair recliner), put on
their winter gear if necessary, and walk out to throw the switches needed for the next move.  Usually a 30-minute process for each.
If they had to go out and work more than once per hour, the complaints would go on for that long too.

The IHB was always busy, and taking a 30-minute hit for each move meant there was always traffic backed up. 
On the plus side, it was interesing to see the action on the Santa Fe and the variety on the IHB, especially when
new power was pulled out of EMD and headed for Blue Island Yard.

I worked McCook off the extra board, and first chance I had, bid a regular job, which was 2nd trick 75th Street Tower.
75 was much busier, but at least I was able to keep traffic moving.

It was years, like perhaps 6 or 7, before power switches were finally installed at McCook.  Control of the location was
then moved to C&A Tower using a similar, or maybe the same, olive green control stand.

Definitely fun to look back, and I must still say, man, those were good times.

 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/07/26 10:39 by Seventyfive.

Great addition to the post, thank you.
—Mac

Seventyfive Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Today on the Nostalgia & History section is a
> great discussion about McCook, Illinois,
> "Somewhere on the IHB."
> It reignited memories for me of working there in
> the early 1970's as a Leverman/Operator on the
> B&OCT.
>
> After the tower was destroyed by fire in 1971, all
> the switches on the IHB became hand-throws,
> operated
> by B&OCT switchmen as directed by the Operator on
> duty.  There were no switches on the Santa Fe,
> and
> after the smoke cleared, signals worked.  A
> little trailer was placed a few inches from the
> IHB/Santa Fe
> diamonds.  We had a nice GRS olive green control
> board for the interlocker.  Or maybe US&S; I
> don't recall.
>
> All moves on the Santa Fe were straight through,
> but on the IHB almost every move was different
> than the last,
> which meant the switchtenders had to get up
> (usually out of a sleeping bag on a lounge chair
> recliner), put on
> their winter gear if necessary, and walk out to
> throw the switches needed for the next move.
>  Usually a 30-minute process for each.
> If they had to go out and work more than once per
> hour, the complaints would go on for that long
> too.
>
> The IHB was always busy, and taking a 30-minute
> hit for each move meant there was always traffic
> backed up. 
> On the plus side, it was interesing to see the
> action on the Santa Fe and the variety on the IHB,
> especially when
> new power was pulled out of EMD and headed for
> Blue Island Yard.
>
> I worked McCook off the extra board, and first
> chance I had, bid a regular job, which was 2nd
> trick 75th Street Tower.
> 75 was much busier, but at least I was able to
> keep traffic moving.
>
> It was years, like perhaps 6 or 7, before power
> switches were finally installed at McCook.
>  Control of the location was
> then moved to C&A Tower using a similar, or maybe
> the same, olive green control stand.
>
> Definitely fun to look back, and I must still say,
> man, those were good times.
>
>  

There were two switches on the Santa Fe. The westbound siding was not needed and probably just made hand throw in case of need or just taken out of service altogether.

The other was the Long Siding switch. Long Siding, between MP 14.2 (Hodgkins now) and McCook was connected to the IHB interchange setout tracks. Maybe Santa Fe made it hand throw and just had their crews handle the switch.There weren't many Santa Fe east men that didn't have a setout there.

TAW

Seventyfive Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

>
> I worked McCook off the extra board, and first
> chance I had, bid a regular job, which was 2nd
> trick 75th Street Tower.
> 75 was much busier, but at least I was able to
> keep traffic moving.

I could never have imagined a time when 75 would be an improvement over McCook.

TAW

TAW Wrote:
 I could never have imagined a time when 75 would be an improvement over McCook.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Which shows how exasperating it was to deal with most of the switchtenders.
They were good guys, but some took even an entire hour for one move, which
included waking up, getting out of the sleeping bag, putting on winter gear, and
then walking down to the switches at restricted speed.

Never had a switchtender there throw one on the Santa Fe.

The Santa Fe dispatchers in Fort Madison still called the 891 train "The Super C", which was always cool to hear.

Seventyfive Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> Which shows how exasperating it was to deal with
> most of the switchtenders.
> They were good guys, but some took even an entire
> hour for one move, which
> included waking up, getting out of the sleeping
> bag, putting on winter gear, and
> then walking down to the switches at restricted
> speed.

Must have been the very bottom of the bottom of the list. Imagine working like that at Rockwell, Brighton Park, 80th Street, Pullman Jct, Rock Island Jct, or even 79th.

TAW

The fact that they took so long to use power switches I suppose is not surprising unless there were some union issues.

Victor Baird



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/03/26 18:53 by wabash2800.

wabash2800 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The fact that they took so long to use power
> switches I suppose is not surprising unless there
> was some union issues.
>


I'm sure a big part of that was that the entire logic was in the melted locking bed. It had to be interpreted from a locking chart then turned into a relay interlocking.

Shortly before that, IHB went in the ditch at Calumet Park. Some self-aggrandizing management hero decided to speed the process by using a CAT. He had the CAT come in from the noprth side and had it drive over the pipeline runs, destroying them. The logic was ok, of course, but pipeline parts were getting to be extremely hard to come by. The plant was hand throw and switchtenders for a very long time.

After B&O 7 went in the ditch at 75 in 1968, the morning of my first afternoon shift, the pipeline run was trashed. The plant was out of service for four months while the signal department scrounged up parts and replaced them.

TAW