Big Blow 23 leads an extra east from North Platte, Nebraska, on October 22, 1966. The 8,500-hp turbine is typical of UP railroading in the mid-sixties, but for a moment take a closer look at the seemingly endless string of freight cars – a pair of stock cars, rare even then; scattered grain hoppers, a harbinger of the future; a wide load of some kind; and dozens of standard 40-foot boxcars all painted boxcar red. This in the days before unit trains and containers was the look of classic American railroading.
Photos of North America's favorite First Generation locomotives. EMD, ALCO, Baldwin; essentially anything that represents the OG wide cab diesel locomotive