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Photo day—Tiptoeing through Tecumseh
It’s a typical Michigan winter day on 22 January 1981 as the southbound Conrail “Clinton Local” trundles south through Tecumseh, Michigan. Photographer Ed Hodges caught the train just after crossing Chicago Blvd. (M-50) and passing the town fire station. The […]
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Photo day—Transition times
Any visit to Toledo in the early 1980s always included a stop at Land Yard on the city’s north side. Formerly the main yard of the Detroit & Toledo Shore Line Railroad, it had become a Grand Trunk Western facility […]
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Photo day—Highball Blissfield!
On a grey autumn day in Michigan some 45 years ago, Conrail GP-8 #5457 and caboose CR #19865 have entered the “Old Road” at Lenawee Junction, and are departing for Blissfield and Toledo over the Lenawee Highway crossing. It’s November […]
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Photo day—Hard times at the Junction
The leaves were turning on October 6, 1980, when Edward Hodges photographed Conrail’s southbound “Clinton Local” passing Tecumseh Junction, in Tecumseh, Mich. Tecumseh Junction, located at S. Evans and E. Cummins Streets, was where the New York Central’s north/south Jackson […]
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Photo day—Conrail’s Jiffy delivery
On the afternoon of 09 April 1981, Edward Hodges was in Chelsea, Michigan, where he happened upon Conrail’s local switching the Chelsea Milling Company plant. The Chelsea Milling Company is a family-operated business based in Chelsea, Michigan, that has been […]
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September song at Defiance
In early September of 1989, I received a phone call from the Indiana Hi-Rail Corporation in response to a resume I had sent them. They told me that they were planning to open a new division based in Defiance, Ohio, […]
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LCRC in the yellow era
The Lenawee County Railroad Company was a railroad that generally operated only from Monday to Friday. But photographer Edward Hodges had some luck when he stumbled upon LCRC Alco S2 #1 switching in the Adrian, Mich. yard on Saturday, 31 […]
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Photo day—Slipping into Tecumseh
Evidence of recent snowfall abounds as Conrail GP-7 #5903 approaches the Bidwell Street crossing, marking its arrival in Tecumseh, Michigan on March 27, 1982. The train is coming from Clinton on Conrail’s Clinton Secondary Track, and is bound for Toledo, […]
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Photo day—Summer of the black switcher
On a summer August afternoon in 1976, Edward Hodges photographed Conrail locomotive #8922 leading the northbound “Clinton Local”, nearing Staib Road between Tecumseh and Clinton, Michigan. Conrail is already four months old at this point, but on this remote branch […]
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Trundling through Tecumseh
In a scene that repeated itself over the course of more than 150 years, a freight train moves slowly through Tecumseh, MI, running on a narrow strip of right-of-way on the east side of Evans Street. For many years this […]