Hotsheet 10-6-16

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The Santa Fe and Grain Story tells the history of the Santa Fe’s role in the transportation of grains and grain products over the last century. Wheat was the most important grain to the railroad, which had extensive lines throughout the midwest, including the major wheat- producing states of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. Eastern Kansas, Missouri and Illinois added corn-growing territory to the story, and eastern Texas featured rice. Other important grains were barley, oats and grain sorghums, all of which are discussed to some extent.

The farm economy for the entire life of the Santa Fe followed a boom-and-bust cycle. There were prosperous years when the railroad carried large amounts of  grain where grain traffic was light. This made it difficult for the Santa Fe to plan for efficient use of cars and to project revenues.
The Santa Fe entered the trade by carrying grain in 25-ton capacity boxcars travelling relatively short distances. Over the next 125 years, grain cars increased in type and capacity – first to 50-ton boxcars, then to covered hopper cars (initially with 70-ton capacity), to today’s cars with a capacity of over 140 tons. As the type and capacity of cars was changing, there were also more grain cars per train travelling longer average distances so that by the end of the period, grain was moving long distances in solid unit trains.

This book is the first in a series to be produced by the Santa Fe Railway Historical and Modeling Society discussing the Santa Fe’s involvement with important commodities shipped on its lines.
212 pages, 11×8½ perfect bound, 216 black & white and 81 color photos, appendix.

The Illinois Division of the Santa Fe Railway provides an informative and lively account of the story of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway in Illinois, from the charter of predecessor Road Chicago & Plainfield in 1859 through merger with Burlington Northern in 1995.

Although the Illilnois Division ultimately stretched to Kansas and Oklahoma, the geographic scope of this book is confined to the Illinois Division as it existed for over half a century: from the bumping post at Dearborn Station to Fort Madison, Iowa. Chapters on the Pekin branch and the Toledo, Peoria & Western – which for a brief time in the 1980s became part of Santa Fe’s lines in Illinois, are also included. Author James A. Brown’s narrative places the Santa Fe in Illinois in its historical and geographic contexts. For the first time the full story of the route selection and construction of the airline to Chicago is told. The shuffling of passenger consists at Dearborn, transfer and local jobs out of Corwith and Joliet, the demise of the doodlebug and other passenger service, freight train operations and the shift of the Kansas City – Chicago mainline to a high speed intermodal corridor are all revealed in great detail.

The book also contains insiders’ accounts of the transformation of Willow Springs into one of the nation’s largest intermodal facilities. Indeed, lengthy first-hand accounts of railways employees fill the book. These stories are the fruit of interviews with 30 former Santa Fe employees – conductors, engineers, roadmasters, station agents, and senior management – whom the author interviewed for this book. Stories of how those employees came to the railroad and their career progression are included in a solid oral history chapter, “Hiring Out.” at the end of the book. The interviews, plus author Brown’s meticulous research, provide information on the Santa Fe that is simply unavailable elsewhere. The Illinois Division of the Santa Fe Railwy is also lavishly illustrated with hundred of photographs dating from the 1880s through the end of the 20th century. 464 pages, 8-1/2 x 11 library bound with dust jacket, 246 black & white and 157 color photos, 44 maps, notes, bibliography, appendix, and index.