April 5, 2012
7:15 pm	to	10:00 pm

 

 

Volunteers meet at Pacific Northwest Railroad Archive in Burien, WA to work on the archival collections of Cascade Rail Foundation on the first and third Thursday nights each month from 7:15 to about 10:00.

Recently, we have been working on an initial inventory of the Doug Nighswonger collection, which is largely traffic and accounting records of the Milwaukee Road created here in Washington from the 1920s to the 1940s.  So far we’ve inventoried about 40 ‘banker boxes’ of records and we have about 20 left to do.

For the progress made so far, you can thank Rick Beaber, Ed Berntsen, Mark Borleske, Fred High, Gary Pember, Phil Schwiesow, and Phil Wenzel for their work organizing and inventorying the records from this collection and others.  Greg Carstens and Rich Randall have helped with data entry.  Thanks guys!

Here is a photo of one of the records, a Carload Report of Lumber, Shingles, Logs from May 1935.  Click on the image to see a larger version.

 

 

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Cle Elum resident Shawn Skinner recently donated this aerial photo to us.  (Thanks Shawn!)  We think it was taken in the 1940s or 1950s.  Can anyone identify any clues that would give us a better idea when this was taken?

 

[Click on the photo to enlarge it.]

 

March 31, 2012
10:00 am	to	4:30 pm

 

 

The March Milwaukee Road Meet (formerly the “Milwaukee Kent Meet”) is a gathering for slides, movies and discussion and socializing. All are welcome, as in the past this is a free event. Bring your photos, artifacts, models, memorabilia and other items for display.

This is your chance to get together and see some photos and presentations by some of the renowned Milwaukee Road photographers and historians in the Pacific Northwest.

Sorry, King County Library prevents sales or an exchange of money at their venue (No sales or swap meet items, please).

 

Saturday, March 31, 2012

10:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Maple Valley Library

(King County Library System)

21844 SE 248th Street

Maple Valley, WA  98038

 

The March Milwaukee Road Meet has a long history as an independent, grass-roots event and is not sponsored by Cascade Rail Foundation.

 

For more information, contact:

Mark Borleske (206) 938-8339 or Mike Faletti

 

 

Facebook is moving people to the new ‘timeline’ format, which includes a cover photo at the top. If you’ve changed your profile to this format, we thought you might like to show the world your support for Milwaukee Road history.  We’ve created a few different cover photos for you to choose from.  As we create more, we’ll update this post.

To put one of these cover photos on your Facebook page, just click on the one you want to get the full size image and then save it to your computer.  Then go into your Facebook page and move your mouse over the lower right corner of your cover photo to get the ‘change cover photo’ button to appear.  Then upload the image from your computer.   Enjoy!

 

U25B number 5057 leading a train out of Tacoma, WA in January 1980. Photo by Brian Ambrose.

 

Bipolar in the Cascades near Snoqualmie Pass (probably based on this Asahel Curtis photo)

 

SD40-2 number 25 rolling a train through South Cle Elum, WA (undated Gary Parson photo)

 

Cascade Rail Foundation is working to acquire the MILW 5057 and bring it to the South Cle Elum Rail Yard Interpretive Center in South Cle Elum, WA.  Below is the latest news on the 5057 Project. (more…)

Happy holidays everyone, and have a safe and prosperous 2012!

 

[click for a larger version]

 

We’re going for it!

 

This month the Cascade Rail Foundation Board of Directors voted to pursue the acquisition of Milwaukee Road U25B 5057 for the South Cle Elum Rail Yard Interpretive Center.

 

We will kick-off a formal fundraising campaign once we have a better idea of how much money we need to raise.  We are currently negotiating the purchase price and terms with Feather River Rail Society and waiting for a cost estimate for the transportation and cosmetic restoration of the locomotive.

 

In the meantime we are looking for photos of the 5057 (especially photos taken in Washington) we can use in the fundraising campaign.

 

We could also use the skills of a graphic designer to help with some of the campaign materials.

 

Please contact me at kruegerp@nwlink.com if you’d like to contribute to this project.

 

Cascade Rail Foundation treated twelve former Milwaukee Road employees and their guests to lunch at the depot on Saturday, October 8.

 

(more…)

 

 

The Feather River Rail Society is currently looking for a new home for Milwaukee Road #5057, a General Electric U-25B diesel locomotive.

 

We are aware that Cascade Rail Foundation and the South Cle Elum Rail Yard have been mentioned as a potential destination for the locomotive in some of the public discussions related to the 5057.

 

Over the past six years, the Cascade Rail Foundation Board of Directors has had several discussions related to acquiring this locomotive.  We recognize that the 5057 has strong ties to the State of Washington, spending many years working on Milwaukee Road lines in the state and finally being part of one of the last ‘clean-up’ trains moving equipment east before the railroad ended operations here.

 

Having a Milwaukee Road locomotive at South Cle Elum is important.  People have a special affinity for locomotives.  Having one at South Cle Elum would increase the interpretive potential of the rail yard and draw more visitors.  Currently, no Milwaukee Road locomotives are on display in Washington. (more…)

We began the meet on Saturday morning with a display of Milwaukee Road models brought by attendees. Doug Nighswonger started the presentations after lunch with a slideshow of Milwaukee Road passenger trains and passenger equipment. Jim Murrie followed with a presentation about the operations and consists of the Columbian between 1947 and 1955. Jim’s presentation included comparisons to the competition on the NP and GN, as well as tips for modeling the passenger cars in HO scale. We finished the afternoon with a show of Milwaukee Road freight car slides brought by Kyle Carlson and narrated by Mike Faletti.

 

 

Sunday started with Allen Miller giving us a visual history of Milwaukee Road depot paint schemes. Allen followed that by sharing his presentation about the ‘high line’ over Snoqualmie Pass. After lunch, Noel Holley gave us a comprehensive review of Milwaukee Road electric locomotives. Greg Lussier then shared some images and stories from the book he’s written about the line between Beverly and Kittitas. [The book is delayed because it needs to be redone in a different software program.  If his presentation is any indication, it will be worth the wait.] Allen Miller closed the meet with an informative slideshow about the Everett branch.

 

 

We’ve received very positive feedback about the quality of the program from those who attended the meet. However, attendance was lower than we’d like it to be. We had about 20 people each day.

 

We’d like to see more people attend next year. Rather than guess what we should do differently, we’ve created a very brief (6 question) survey to collect feedback from those of you who did not attend.

Click here to take a survey if you did not attend the meet.

Please take a few moments to let us know what we can do to make this event be something you’d make time to attend next year.

 

For those of you who attended the meet but have not filled out a survey form yet, we’ve put that survey online also.

Click here to take a survey if you did attend the meet.

 

CRF gives a big thank you to all of our presenters and attendees! We hope to see you again in 2012.

 

[Note: Our photographer had technical difficulties with his camera, so we don't have photos of all the models.  If  someone else has photos we can share, we'll update this.]

 

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