Let's Visit the Old Railroad Depot Complex

     Regarding our most recent discussion of the old Chicago and Northwestern depot and hotel, Vern Modeland, BHS-50, has given us a very unique "walking/virtual tour" of that railroad complex.
     Vern wrote, "come with a fella who remembers every step and scene. We'll meet at the two-story wooden gatekeeper's castle. It was on the southeast corner of the meeting of rails and street. Across the street west was a 10-foot or so walkway that stretched all the way past the Chicago and Northwestern (stet) complex. All red brick. Some redder than others, the "hotel" building the reddest. There was a little manicured park with a couple of elm trees. Sitting north-south, next to it, was the building where the dispatcher for the on-call crews came in the middle of the night. I remember those too. Dad would answer with just one word and Curly Davis would know who that was and would expect him on time. After a little green space, came the imposing building to the west, on the south side of the tracks, which housed the ticket windows, luggage storage, benches for passengers and stairs up to the second floor which, when I was young, was offices but I suspect was a hotel once with a few units. On west was more support structures for the railroad with a two-story addition, then parking, then the crew quarters where passenger crewmen stored their tools-of-the-trade, a tin can with "few-zees" in it (with spikes on the unlit end so they could be thrown between the rails and stick upright. The tin can also held a red flag for appropriate use, and some "torpedoes." They were dynamite caps packaged in a clip that could be left on the rail and, when the next engine  put its huge weight on one at speed, it would blow up. Made a noise loud enough to be heard by the on-coming crew. A series of one or more of the "torpedoes" would alert them to various things per the Chicago and Northwestern (stet) Employee's Handbook and "rule book." Beyond that wooden building was, what, Boone Street? And, of course, there were rails for the east-bound trains, since the Chicago and Northwestern was built by the English and, therefore, went opposite to U.S. rules of forward-on-the-right. There were two and a half runs of light rail there too, for switching out the cars for Otis Lumber Yard, which occupied most of the block north of the depot complex. There was another section of paved or brick space north of the station waiting room for passengers heading to Chicago. No cover either, it rained, you got wet. Stored at the crew quarters down toward Carroll street were the red and green signal lights that operated on a fuel and were changed at train stops. Red for port and green for starboard side of the train, ahead of the on-coming traffic. This was a time before radio communications, remember."
     Vern concluded with, "Alll uh boart!"
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     BOONE CONNECTED DEATHS: Anita Morgan, 69, Des Moines. Services this evening (Saturday) in Boone at Stonebridge Church.
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