The Least Time

March 9 is an important date in Milwaukee Road history.  In 1908 on this date the first train arrived in Harlowton, MT from the East.  Harlowton would become a small town of major importance to the Milwaukee, and Central Montana as well.

Here at Harlowton, the Milwaukee would construct a large yard and engine facility.  The line to the Golden Triangle would originate from the east-west main here at Harlowton, providing the outlet for wheat crops to reach far away markets.  Other shipments from the areas north of Harlowton worked their way south as well including oil from the Lewistown area.   Harlowton was also the beginning of the Rocky Mountain Division for trains heading west.  Here in the big yards, the famous electric locomotives that defined the Milwaukee's Mountain operation for decades would be swapped in and out.  March 1908 marked the beginning.  In a bit of irony, March 1980 marked the end of the Milwaukee's operations across the west.  The last train headed east through Harlowton and scrappers soon followed, pulling rail.

It has been 103 years since the Milwaukee first rolled into the small town of Harlowton, 31 since it left.  I find myself reflecting on these passages of time more and more as I get older.  As a friend of mine recently observed, time becomes the thing that is most valuable because it is so easily syphoned and committed away every day.  The push of life and the frenzy of the days ensure this.  At the same time, our memories of special times or special places grow more fond and more meaningful by comparison.  Even the photo above is aging:  the scene reflects the Harlowton depot as it existed on a hot summer day in 2003.  The yard tracks are long lifted and the roundhouse is dilapidated.  I had time to pursue the old railroad then, but didn't appreciate the significance of it at the time.  Now, only as the years continue to mount, do I realize the gift that times like that are.

Comments

Ole M. Amundsen, Jr. said…
Leland: Again, beautiful writing. In my 70's, fasination with time becomes even more rich: experiencing physical places which carry real memory of what was juxaposed with what is becomes a very emotional event; "how could this be? what if? this is hard to believe." And, "the real loss is of what might have been." Really appreciate your poets eye and writing. Thanks.
3/11/2011 04:05:00 AM
SDP45 said…
Lelend,
Let me know when you get your time machine. I'll go back and explore the Milwaukee with you in detail.

Dan
3/11/2011 08:07:00 PM
Anonymous said…
Thanks for the comments. The "how could this be?" thought really resonates with me as I observe the changes that abound around us.

... now a time machine would be an interesting approach Dan, perhaps I should switch my thinking from, "how can we put it back"? to the pressing engineering needs of time travel?

Best,
-Leland
3/14/2011 08:17:00 AM
Anonymous said…
Love your blog! 103 years, not 113 years, eh?
3/23/2011 07:18:00 PM
Anonymous said…
Really enjoy the blog. Plan on biking the Milwaukee route from the Wash./Idaho line east to Miles City, MT beginning early June. Should be a great adventure.
3/27/2011 07:25:00 PM
LinesWest said…
Hi folks - thanks for the catch on the math. 103 years it is.

Enjoy the biking, that sounds like a fabulous trip - you should blog it...

-Leland
3/28/2011 07:24:00 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Place Where She Only Sleeps

Image
 Location: MP 1566.8 Grant-Kohrs Ranch Not far from Deer Lodge, headed west on the transcon we arrive here, at Grant-Kohrs Ranch where the Resourceful Railroad only sleeps.  Instead of empty right of way and scattered gravel, steel rail still binds the land in this place that is unlike the many other hundreds of miles along Lines West.  Across the Grant-Kohrs Ranch, on federal Park lands, the railroad only seems to rest and slumber while waiting for a new time to come.  Against the backdrop of Montana clouds that hold no rain, the catenary poles can still be found here standing against the endless skies.  The lineside poles that mark an era of railroading now gone still hold to the right of way.  It is not hard to imagine them whipping by outside the windows of an Olympian under the electrified power of a Quill or Joe.  Perhaps an XL Special could easily whisk across the scene above as though decades had never passed. Things don't seem so forgotten or beyond hope in a place like th
Read more

Rock-a-bye bye bye?

Image
There are footnotes to history and there are chapters. Dependent on your perspective, sometimes those footnotes deserve a book unto themselves. As the economy sagged in the seventies, railroads were hit hard. The East saw a general collapse in the form of Penn Central. As the seventies wore on, the PC would be combined with several other bankrupt roads to form Conrail, a government backed corporation who's sole goal was to save rail transportation in the eastern half of the country. Collapse worked its way through the western lines during these years as well. The Milwaukee Road pulled out of the West just over 30 years ago at the beginning of March. Bankrupt and reeling, its retreat to the Midwest would last only a few more years until its absorption by Soo Line. Its competitors in the West and Northwest managed to hang on, but healthy balance sheets were not to be found in the board rooms of the Cascade Green lines in those years. The Rock Island had a long flirtation with
Read more

Hidden in the Trees

Image
 MP1613.1, Ravenna, MT.  Substation 9  I once met the man who owned the old Substation at Ravenna.  In one of those strange twists of history, so I'm told, it was supposed to be torn down and sold for scrap as the bricks had value.  But the original sale didn't work, the scrapper never came and it remains standing near the howling roar of I90 to this day. I90 is just one part of  the U.S. system that moves upwards of 90% of freight by truck and highway.  But tucked in amongst the tall pines like a mirage, Ravenna looks out blankly towards that interstate and shouts quietly back about a different time. The year was 1972 and General Electric had put together a unique proposal: completion of the electrified railway portion of the Milwaukee Road.  In a formal proposal, offered by GE itself ("Proposal for the Completion of the Electrified Railway Operation of the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad Company") via the Locomotive Products Department, the proposa
Read more