Illinois Northern Railroad Alco S 4 diesel switchers idling outside the enginehouse on a winter morning. Chicago Illinois. Circa 1960's.

 

I found this photograph on the internet recently.

 

I was born in the city of Chicago Illinois, during 1962.

A local Chicago industrial railroad I had grown up with,

was the Illinois Northern Railroad, which was partly owned

by the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroad, and the -

International Harvester Company.

 

This industrial short line railroad, interchanged with the

parent company A,T & S, F at their Corwith Yard, and

on the east end with the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy

Railroad at South Western and Blue Island Avenues.

 

The Illinois Northern was my neighborhood railroad, as

it switched the once numerous industrial spur sidings in

Chicago's Little Village neighborhood where I grew up

during the 1960's until 1972, when the Santa Fe had -

purchased the I.N from International Harvester, which

by then had already left the city of Chicago Illinois.

 

Online traffic dwindled on the former I.N during the

1970's and 80's. In 1996, the A,T & S,F and the

Burlington Northern Railroad merged, and became

today's BNSF Railway. The BNSF switched the

I.N branch, until approximately 2001, when it

contracted the Central Illinois Railroad, to switch

the remaining on line industries as needed. The

Central Illinois Railroad went defunct in 2010, and

the I.N branch portion from Corwith Yard to Western

Avenue, has been abandoned today.