This last Friday afternoon February 11th, Judy and I drove to Marshall, TX to spend the night so as to not get up so early Saturday morning for a visit with an old friend. Marty Stuart & His Fabulous Superlatives would be arriving from Baton Rouge on their bus for a Saturday evening performance at the Music City Theater in Linden, TX. Superlative Harry Stinson is a good friend and camera-toting railfan, so we planned to spend some time along the UP Little Rock Sub Saturday afternoon.
Not knowing when for sure the bus would arrive in Linden, I decided to get up early on Saturday morning and visit the beautiful Marshall depot to catch Amtrak 21 and anything else that might happen by while I waited to hear from Harry. The morning forecast was for complete overcast and rain showers, but when I stepped outside the motel at 7:09 am I was greeted with a nice partial sunrise. Judy took this opportunity to sleep in and stay dry and warm as the temperature was in the mid-40’s.
I was in position in the station compound when Amtrak 21 pulled to a stop at 7:55 am.
Nobody rides this reduced train according to the Amtrak bosses in Washington, right?
I climbed the staircase to the walkway around the second floor and spotted this possibly prophetic statement on the signboard. I hope the efforts of local supporters along the routes of all Amtrak long distance trains are successful in keeping them from being permanently cut.
Passengers detrained and then the outbound passengers were allowed to board before the train departed to the east down the siding towards Longview.
The radio indicated Amtrak 21 was waiting on a northbound UP freight on the Little Rock Sub which showed up at 8:18am.
In addition to the three units up front this over 10,000-foot mixed merchandise and intermodal train had one DPU mid-train and one more shoving on the rear.
At 8:47am a second northbound freight in the form of a pure intermodal train came by my second-floor perch.
As soon as the northbound cleared on the Little Rock Sub the dispatcher cleared a northbound maintenance-of-Way train off of the Reisor Sub behind the depot.
Passing the old Ginocchio Hotel, now a restaurant.
It became obvious this train was loaded with new ties.
At this point I received a text from Harry and gave him a call. Their bus was parked at the Linden Music City performance hall and they were going to get a ride to a motel in Atlanta to clean up. Judy and I would pick Harry up there shortly after noon for lunch and railfanning.
Here in Marshall, listening to the radio this train was going to Keokuk to meet a northbound BNSF train out of Longview. The BNSF train with one unit and around 20 cars passed by at 9:29 am as a moderate rain was falling. Luckily I was on the downwind side of the building and could find shelter from the rain under the eve of the roof.
At 9:35am I had to expose myself to the rain for this view of three light engines out of Reisor Yard west of Shreveport that went around the wye to the Little Rock Sub on their way to tying down in the siding at Woodlawn north of Marshall.
Back in my dry and calm spot as the wind and rail increased I heard another northbound BNSF train approaching on the radio and the headlights came into view at 10:05am.
This turned out to be an empty coal train off of the BNSF at Longview, and after the head end went by I braved the wind and rain to move to the north side of the building for a going-away view of the inevitable DPU’s. This turned out to be a good move as the rearmost DPU was a KCS SD70ACe.
Now both cold and wet, I decided to go back to the Explorer to warm up and drive around a bit before heading back to the motel to pick up Judy. I went down the outside stairs and through the tunnel under the Reisor Sub, taking note along the way to the parking lot that the Amtrak office was now closed. When I reached the exit shelter at the top of the last set of stairs around 10:15am, the gate between myself and the lot was now locked with me on the wrong side.
I considered calling the Marshall city offices, but then I remembered the sign on the door of the depot museum indicated it would open at 11:00am so I decided to wait. About then I heard a horn to the west anyway, so I walked back through the tunnel to the top of the stairs at ground level. A few minutes later a northbound with a single UP unit passed by with a train of gondola cars in tow.
I noticed after this train passed that the signal off of the Reisor Sub had changed from red over red to red over yellow. In spite of the rain I made my way back up to the second floor balcony and at 10:43 a merchandise train headed west onto the Little Rock Sub towards Longview.
I am not a fan of freight car graffiti because it interferes with my official photo work, but someone had spent a lot of time on the last car.
From my high perch I witnessed the arrival of the museum docent and saw her unlock the gate to the parking lot. She was surprised to see me come down the stairs and I thanked her as I passed by on the way to freedom. I would have liked to check out the gift shop but now I was on a schedule. On the way out I did paused to capture a close up of the T&P logos that are part of each metal step up to street level.
Before taking the final steps to the car I made these two compositions of the hotel.
I picked up Judy and we drove north on Highway 59 in the rain. Passing Woodlawn, the three light units were in the north end of the siding with the crew waiting on a van. Between Linden and Atlanta I picked up a highball from the light power at Woodlawn to a nortthbound train passing their location behind us. We picked up Harry at the motel and knowing their was a train catching up to us, we drove to the depot in downtown Atlanta where at 12:36pm Harry and I photographed an intermodal passing by at a fast clip with two mid-train DPU’s.
After this we stopped for lunch in at a local Mexican restaurant a few blocks east of here on Main Street. Two more northbounds went by while we were eating, but we had the signature shot passing the depot and caboose. After lunch we drove south to the south end of Bivens siding where at 2:30 we were graced with a northbound intermodal led by an SD70ACe passing through the piney woods.
We needed to get Harry to the venue for a 3:30pm sound check so this was our last train for the day. We dropped Harry off and decided to kill a bit of time by driving back to Atlanta so Judy could do some shopping at CVS. The sun was starting to come out now and I drove back by the depot for this photo with interesting lighting.
We drove back to Linden Music City and later that evening enjoyed a fabulous performance by Marty Stuart and the three multi-talented Superlatives. From left to right is Kenny Vaughan, Harry Stinson, Marty Stuart and Chris Scruggs.
The Linden City Music City Hall is a completely rebuilt old American Legion Hall, and has some of the best acoustics we have ever experienced in any venue. Later after the performance Judy and I went backstage to visit with Harry and Marty before the bus would depart at midnight for Tomball, Texas. I am proud of the fact that Marty has made me a committee member for the building of his Congress of Country Music museum and venue in his hometown of Philadelphia, Mississippi. We discussed some of that business and then after I took Judy’s photo with Marty and Harry, she in turn took mine. It has been a while since we were all together due to Covid protocols.
We all departed the hall and Marty and Harry headed for the bus while Judy and I got in the Explorer for the drive back to Marshall for the night. We arrived back home Sunday afternoon after a great trip!
