Eastern Railroad Discussion > North Bessemer: a Hump Yard once upon a time?

Visited my local Borders book store today, I took a very brief look though a book called Railroad Yards by an author with the last name of Rhodes or something like that. It is a book that looks at RR yards all thoughout the US. In one chapter a mislabled photo shows the Union RR's North Bessemer yard with a Union train of blue switchers and ore hopper cars. The caption states it is BLE's yard and the train in the photo is a BLE ore train. Was this a Union, BLE or joint yard?

What interested me was that the caption stated the yard was once a hump yard. The remains of the yard in the photo don't look right to have been a hump.

Was this ever the case, or is the caption wrong.

The author is Michael Rhodes. I doubt if North Bessemer was ever a humpyard, but it wouldn't be impossible. If it ever was it would have been an old type "Rider" humpyard where a man called a "Rider" would ride each car over the hump and operate the hand brake wheel to stop the car in the appropriate location. The only reason for North Bessemer to hump cars would be for northbound coal, southbound ore would have been blended when loaded in the boat. The yard is currently owned by URR, but it was at one time owned by B&LE. They interchange traffic here, and that is the sole purpose of this yard.
BTW Michael Rhodes has also done books on British and European humpyards.