RAILROADING IN MICHIGAN

gary

gary

Member
on 1/11/19 i flew on a morning flight, jfk to detroit., met up with michael and we set out to owosso michigan, and then flint for 3 day's of steam train photo charters on 2 different railroads. first though a little detour into durand michigan, to durand union station, to enjoy the diamond and the small museum in the station. durand drew me due to fond memories of childhood reading of a book titled "the situation in flushing", by edmund g love, a wonderful warm memoir of his railroad infused boyhood in flushing michigan, in the early 1900's



the durand union station, gloriously restored

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pretty nice painting inside the depot museum

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informative display on hobo codes, scratched on fences and sides of buildings

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a small display of various telegraph keys, it was said that long time telegraph agents could tell by the keystrokes who was on the sender

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from the windows on the second floor overlooking the diamond, a local that had come east on the double track was backing around the connector onto the single track line and into the small durand yard

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so let us get to the star of our show for saturday and sunday, pere marquette 1225, owned and operated by steam railroading institute in owosso michigan, built in 1941, 1225 is a 2-8-4 berkshire class of locomotive, very nice powerful, large steam locomotives, very close to the pinnacle of american steam design before the age of diesels arrived, similar in appearance and design to nickel plate 763 and 765. this is the model for the polar express film, and all of the locomotive sounds in that film were recorded from this engine, at many of our shoot locations and grade crossings. a lerro productions start, on the train at 0615 and out on the line for sunrise, one of my shots to start the day

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throwing that smoke in the predawn light

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track speed runways were full of sights and sounds of large steam

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here we are, at the famed meth-head bridge, i know, i am supposed to not have some photo line in the shot, but this is what i had, and the only other wide angle i liked at this location has 2 very visible little heads sticking up over the rail. perhaps someday over an adult malt beverage, at some future pixel mania the dark tale of how the bridge came to be so named shall be told



pete lerro does a pretty good job at getting period correct vehicles into the scenes



now here we have an example of why multiple runbys are usually the norm, not only to get varied angles, but because this is a runby for the video guys, the whistle is wide open in this shot, that's why all the steam obscuring so much of the cab, making the stills crowd unhappy

 
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thanks to the friendliness of the owners we were able to shoot from a farm property, through the trees, next to a farmhouse that's older than the engine

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working that engine for the runby

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carland grain elevator, out of business now for over 10 years, but still standing at least so far

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a little night posing at carland elevator, some work was done on the lower roof and other stuff to make this scene better, unfortunately this building is for all intent abandoned to the fates of a harsh climate



a scene that in the early 1950's could easily have happened, a night freight, with a couple of brakemen on the ground, doing some car switching, pulling out full cars for empties



and that wraps up saturday, next to arrive will be some sunday shots, and a sunday night yard shoot of women in period work clothes, we forget how much of american labor was women in ww2, a vital necessary contribution to winning the war
 
sunday morning, 1/13/19 dawned with a promise of sunshine, and it did, although it never got that warm, it did not go above 28 all day, it was tolerable for shooting

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running into the sun

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back to the bridge, although no awkward interactions today with anyone

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and the truck is back today, in a different location

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so sunday evening, after arriving back at the yard, there was an extra session of night shooting, a rosie the riveter type shoot, these are women who are connected with the reenact community, world war 2 era, posing in period work clothes, such as they would have worn to work 2nd shift in a rail yard in 1943-44 , here the crew poses with 1225 on the turntable

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break time

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great effort is made to make everything authentically detailed, right down to the lunchboxes and the newspapers

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and a few work poses, greasing the running gear, and that is a big, heavy grease gun, of the type used for this, then and now

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there would have been assigned chores, a specific order to do them, and a timeframe for expected completion, much like a pit stop for racers, time was valuable, the arsenal of democracy needed to be kept moving

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and while women were not mainline engineers, they could and did hold down yard hostler jobs, moving locomotives around, making up trains, etc

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and we did a series of portrait poses with work tools, such as coal scoop, wrench, etc

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and our rosie crew again

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1/14/19, monday morning, after a good nights sleep and a hot breakfast burrito, moved on to slightly northeast of flint michigan, to the huckleberry railroad, a narrow gauge line, dog bone shaped with a loop at each end, all of 3 miles long, with 2 engines, a rio grande k-36 and an army engine , plus some wooden passenger cars. turned out to be a very interesting little railroad, with a number of nice scenes available.
an old road grader at the entrance, in that sweet morning light, we had a nice start to the day, we were welcome to shoot around the shop area, and train time was 10:00



rio grande 464 on the left and army 152 on the right, steaming up on a frosty morning, although it did stay bright sunny all day





crossroads village, a recreated turn of the century village as part of the parks attractions, did not have time to check it out any further than this, taken from the depot where we boarded to start the day



first runby of the day, they ran 2 trains for us



 
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we got some golden light on the west end loop followed by a supper break and then a short night shoot, we even had time to go to a local diner and have a sit-down hot meal, living large



and a couple from the night session









and that concludes our michigan railroad trip, next day tuesday michael went on to detroit with another charter attendee, to an all day rosie shoot at the yankee air museum by willow run airport, site of the b-24 factory in ww2, while i went on back to detroit airport and flew home uneventfully, able to arrive back home at the nice and comfortable hour of 7:15 in the evening
 
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