I first met my friend Marc Montray in 1974 while trackside in Norman, Oklahoma. Marc was driving a van custom-painted in the Southern Pacific daylight scheme so it was obvious he was a fellow railfan. We quickly bonded over trains and began a friendship that lasted for 50 years until Marc’s passing on February 24th. I was in communication with Marc’s wife, soulmate, and fellow railfan Vikkie regarding his memorial service scheduled for March 8th in Catoosa, Oklahoma.
As it was a roughly 340-mile drive for me, I decided to drive up on Thursday the 7th so I would be fresh and rested for the service the next day at 2:00 pm. Marc was also an avid and published photographer so I knew he would not mind if I photographed any trains I encountered along the way to Catoosa. It was raining heavily when I encountered a westbound UP intermodal train only a few minutes from home climbing the grade from Fort Worth to Iona siding.
I thought it would be raining all day during my trip north from DFW, but shortly after passing Denton the blinding rainy and misty conditions on I35 broke up and I could see bits of blue sky in the distance. I exited the interstate at Davis, Oklahoma where after a short wait I encountered the southbound Oklahoma City to Gainesville local with a pair of veteran silver and red warbonnets passing the old depot.
The sun was completely out by the time I reached Purcell and drove down the hill to the depot. There was construction work going on at the platform and it was blocked off. As a southbound train with a 1×1 locomotive configuration approached, I composed this photo from the parking lot with an old baggage card on display.
As I had first met Marc in Norman, I decided to catch a train or two at the classic ATSF depot where we had sat on occasion back in the 1970’s. The afternoon sun provided good lighting for using the depot as a background for any passing trains, but time had now erected a six-foot chain-link fence on the west side of the Red Rock Sub mainline. The angles I wanted for trains passing the depot in either direction meant if I walked in from the street at either end of the fence, I would be trapped in the roughly 30-foot distance between the fence and the track while a train passed by.
That situation of a possible derailment or dragging equipment did not appeal to me, so since neither of my primary cameras have adjustable viewfinders, I needed a way to raise myself over the top of the fence from the outside. I had not brought a step ladder this trip, but I suddenly realized my sturdy Pelican camera case might do the trick. The radio clued me in the northbound Gainesville to OKC local was approaching and would meet a southbound freight at the Norman siding a half mile to the north.
I leaned my camera case on end up against a fence post and climbed up onto it. This put me head and shoulders above the fence and I easily captured the local a minute later with the depot as a background.
The old Santa Fe depot with an ex-Santa Fe warbonnet passing by. I could not have asked for anything more satisfying. I moved to the south end of the depot and a few minutes later while again using my camera case for a ladder, I captured the southbound freight with a clean BNSF unit leading. I took this first photo at a distance so as to include the blooming while pear trees.
Very pleased with these results for a trip down memory lane I headed on north to Oklahoma City where I decided to drop by the old Frisco yard south of downtown, now home to Watco’s Stillwater Central. Their yard job was making switching moves out the west end of the yard and over the North Canadian River bridge after passing the old and broken Frisco station sign.
Several more SD40-2 variants were idling away at the servicing facility easily photographed from the street.
On the final leg of my trip, I headed northeast up the Turner Turnpike towards Tulsa. I kept an eye and a radio ear on the ex-Frisco, ex-BNSF now Stillwater Central Sooner Sub in hopes of catching either a train 405 (Oklahoma City to Owasso) or a train 407 (Owasso to Oklahoma City). There were no sightings until I got off the Turnpike west of Sapulpa and stumbled onto a train 405 tied down about four miles from where the Sooner Sub combines with the BNSF Creek Sub.
Maybe the crew ran out of time, or the BNSF could not handle the train through Cherokee Yard to the junction where Stillwater Central splits off to their yard in Owasso. There was no telling, but it had worked out to my advantage just before sunset. The train was powered by three of their ex-UP SD60’s and one SD40-2.
It was dark by the time I checked into my hotel in Catoosa and after a good dinner I settled in for a good night’s rest before attending my long-time friend’s service the next day.
