Great northern railroad

One of the famous Great Northern publicity photos featuring its flagship transcontinental service, the "Empire Builder," rolling downgrade over Marias Pass near Browning, Montana outside of Glacier National Park circa latter 1950's. The "Builder" of this period featured the very best in rail travel including Great Dome reclining seat coaches, standard coaches, Ranch Lounge, Pullman sleepers, diner, Great Dome lounge, and a lounge-observation.

High quality photograph of Burlington Northern Railroad EMD GP9 # BN 1739 at Butte, Montana, USA.

No, the title of this blog is not a new country duo--nor is it the name of my legal team. It is what happens with Passenger Rail in the U.S. with Amtrak and Congress, that singularly mismatched duo, running things. During the first decade of my life, Passenger Rail was full flow. Post WWII streamliners came on line faster than Sbarro on Manhattan Island. No matter what the railroad was running things, a serious effort to please the traveling public and make Passenger Rail competitive with…

The dome car, built by Budd, was delivered to the Great Northern Railway in 1955 for service on the Empire Builder train. The car ran on the Empire builder as the "Prairie View." Amtrak acquired the car from successor owner Burlington Northern in 1971. The car ran on Amtrak until 1979 when it went into storage. Burlington Northern required the car in 1993, selling it to Holland American in 1996. Holland American named the car "Deshka" for its Alaska train service. Holland American sold the…

The Great Northern Railway was the second company to reach Seattle doing so in 1893. It was part of the James Hill's vast empire.

High quality photograph of Burlington Northern Railroad EMD SD70MAC # BN 9400 at East of Lockridge, Iowa, USA.

MARYSVILLE TRAIN CRASH KILLS TWO Seattle P-I June 6, 1969 MARYSVILLE- Two trainmen were killed and two others injured early Friday in a thundering, flaming crash of two Great Northern freight trains here. A southbound express freight, clocked by two Marysville policemen "at over 50mph," rammed the caboose and three cars of the second freight on the GN main line near the depot. Freight cars hurled off the main line and into the second freight engine and two cars, which were switching on a…

High quality photograph of Burlington Northern Railroad EMD GP30 # BN 2223 at Bellingham, Washington, USA.

The countdown begins for Expo 74, the World's Fair in 1974 in Spokane, Washington. This building and the Union Station were part of the Riverfront Park when they put it up to a levy vote in 1971. It got 56 percent yes but it needed 60 percent to pass. Then Expo 74 plan shows up with the stations removed from the plan. What happened? Being in advertising and a railfan nut I got involved with saving these structures. I got the Spokane Ad Club involved as you can see on the poster. We had about…