can some one give me a little history on those railways?
Burlington and Burlington Route both refer to the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy. A simple history source for the latter would be Wikipedia. Same for BNSF. I will note that the Burlington through two mergers is a part of BNSF.
Ed
burlington and burlington route are the same thing, in 1970 BN was formed when it took over burlinton route, great northern, northern pacific,pacific cost RR, and one more but I can’t remember what is is and in 1980 BN added frisco to there collection. and in 1995 or 1996 (I’ve seen thougs two dates, I’m not sure wich) Burlinton Northern and Santa Fe merged.
Here is a link to an excellent resource. I am a member of this group and recommend the publications.
http://www.burlingtonroute.com/
Duh!! Link added later when it was pointed out that I forgot to post it!
BNSF’s website has the “official” history of its predecessor railroads.
Here’s link to history…
Burlington, or Burlington Route and it’s two subsidiaries, the Colorado and Southern and Fort Worth and Denver was the midwestern “Granger” route that did everything RIGHT! It was a really major player in Midwestern railroading. It had stock in the other “Hill” railroads–Great Northern, Northern Pacific and Spokane, Portland and Seattle. Burlington’s slogan was “Everywhere West”, and from its connections, it pretty much lived up to the slogan.
A great railroad then , and an even greater railroad now under the BNSF logo.
Tom [:D]
In 1911 the Great Northern and Northern Pacific purchased most of the stock of the Burlington (something like 98%). The Burlington’s income (and consequently stock dividends) got both of those railroads through the great depression. While the Q remained the “head and brains” of the Hill lines, legally and financially it was a subordinate.
An excellent history of the CB&Q from the beginning as the “Aurora Branch” up until 1962 is documented in Overton’s book “Burlington Route - A History of the Burlington Lines”. The book was not written for the model railroader and covers lots of financial data, but I love it none the less. It is a must read for anyone truely interested in the history of the Burlington.
The Spokane, Portland & Seattle was the fourth: GN, NP, CBQ, SPS
As I understand it, the NP & GN were joint owners of the CBQ? The GN & NP reached Chicago over CBQ rails, or at least the GN did.
Yes, GN and NP co-owned the Burlington (to give them access to Chicago) and the SP&S. The Empire Builder, North Coast Limited, Mainstreeter, Western Star etc. all travelled from St.Paul to Chicago behind CB&Q engines.
When the BN merger happened, President Louis Menk of the Burlington became the president of BN, which was surprising since NP and GN were the big partners in the merger. Mr.Menk had been responsible for ending CB&Q’s steam excursions of the 1960’s by the way.
25 years later BN merged with AT&SF to create Burlington Northern - Santa Fe.
Here is a useful page of links with info on the Santa Fe (AT&SF)
http://www.atsfrr.com/links/santafe.htm
Dave Nelson
Umm…I"m not sure about that part. NP and GN were headquartered together in the Empire Building in St.Paul, I would think that was more the center of power rather than the Burlington folks in Chicago. When the merger happened, the Burlington Northern HQ remained in St.Paul. I don’t recall anybody saying before that the subsidiary railroad was running the show - not that the Burlington wasn’t an excellent railroad of course, the NP and GN wanted it due to the high standard of it’s trackage etc. - but it wasn’t the ‘senior partner’ based on anything I’ve seen.
When I lived in Iowa in the 90’s, I’d occasionally drive down to Mt. Pleasant to see BN/BNSF action (and surprisingly I saw very little - I always had rotten luck down that way). But once I did catch a BNSF work train stopped waiting on a signal east of Mt. Pleasant and I spoke with the engineer & conductor. This was right after the BN/ATSF merger and they were fairly down-in-the-mouth about it. I asked if things had changed a lot yet? They were both longtime BN guys and said ATSF management was pretty much runnin’ the show. I said that’s surprising as I always thought BN was the stronger of the two. They said they were surprised too and BN was in better shape than ATSF, but the railroad was being run more like the Santa Fe than the BN.
Stix is correct. The GN(owned by James J Hill) bailed out his competition(NP) when the ‘financeers’ wrecked it; to keep the government of his back. He later financed the Chicago, Burlington, & Northern extension of the CB&Q(and the purchase of it by the ‘Hill Lines’). He also built the SP&S(another ‘Hill Lines’ property jointly owned by the GN/NP).
The Burlington and it 2 subsidiaries(C&S/FW&D) were ‘owned’ by the GN/NP. The ‘Railroad Bldg’ in St Paul was the operational headquarters. The Burlington offices were in Chicago, and reported to St Paul. The Burlingtion subsidiaries had offices/shops in Texas to comply with Texas law.
Lou Menk had left the Burlington before the merger, and was in charge of the NP. John Budd was president of the GN and Lou Menk(NP) were amoung the first officers of the BN. IIRC, John Budd was named president of BN, and Lou Menk was named CEO of BN Inc.
I worked for the CB&Q in 1968-1969 and it was indeed a 1st class operation. But we always knew that the folks in St Paul controlled the purse strings. The GN & NP got their SD45’s right away, and the CB&Q had to wait until we got our ‘Christmas’ present in 1968. I was out driving along the La Crosse ‘Sub’ this week-end(rock climbing and watching eagles). It still is a very nice piece of railroad…
Jim Bernier
WIAR:
You’re right. For some strange reason, I got it backwards. Oops.[:I]
Tom [:)]
Back in 1994-95 I worked with a gal whose husband was a BN Trainmaster in St.Paul. I was only a seasonal worker (i.e. only worked part of the year each year) and she had told him about me liking trains and that I was looking for a FT job. He had said he’d keep an eye open about getting me a job with BN…then the BN-ATSF merger happened which resulted in layoffs so no hiring was done for a few years; and by that time he had retired. [banghead]
On a happier note, in the late thirties my Dad was a telegrapher in Galesburg IL. The then brand-new streamlined Burlington Denver Zephyr and Santa Fe Super Chief stopped there about an hour or so apart in the evenings, and he said on a nice summer evening in those pre-TV days it wasn’t unusual for a crowd to gather to watch the first train arrive, look it over, and watch it depart, then walk a block or two to the other depot to see the other train and give that one a good looksie too. I wouldn’t mind going back to 1938 for a day and doing that !![:D]
Stix, it must have been an amazing site seeing those Shovel nose units come through! I still consider it to be one of the finest looking passenger trains ever run.
Here is my tribute
Simon …that’s a nice picture of the Pioneer Zephyr, and it’s really a good scene.
Our family moved to Illinois in 1949, and our house there was within a very short distance to the CB&Q. I did see the shovel noses in action. They were really fast. Now you see it; now you don’t. I never road on one. Our Zephyr trips were mostly on the TCZ. Normal power for the TCZ was either E5 lor E7 locomotives. Some shovel noses were converted to rather awkward looking B units and MU’d with E units. When the Burlington donated the PZ to Chicago Museum of Science and Industry, I saw the PZ being towed by a suburban passenger train coupled to the rear of Budd bi-levels. Also, I rode on some of the Burlington steam specials in my teen years.
Garry: I’ve got the 4-car model of the PZ, which I love like crazy. A friend of mine was watching me run it not too long ago and mentioned that I should remove the BURLINGTON decals and turn it into a kinda/sorta original Rio Grande PROSPECTOR. I just looked at him. “It’s BURLINGTON,” I said. “Um,” he said, “Then what’s it doing on Yuba Pass?” I just laughed and said, “What’s the RIO GRANDE doing on Yuba Pass?”
He blinked. “Oh. Yah.”
That PZ is one of the prettiest trains I’ve ever seen. And it’s gonna STAY Burlington!
Tom [:D]
Tom … you can find old photos of the PZ traveling the country for publicity prior to entering service. One picture shows the little train entering Moffat Tunnel.