Here's a photo I took on February 05, 1978, FORTY-SEVEN YEARS AGO, from the southbound SOUTHERN CRESCENT shortly after it departed Meridian, MS.

I would imagine almost all of the passenger equipment that made up this train has since been scrapped. I thought it was kind of weird that Southern Railway painted the roofs of many of their passenger cars black, as this probably made keeping the cars cooled difficult on hot and humid days that are quite common in the south.

In September of 2002 I rode the Quebec North Shore and Labrador Railway and some of the Southern Railway passenger equipment had made its way there for continued use.

Earlier in the day I took a photo of the head end of the train in Atlanta and that photo can be found here:

[www.altamontpress.com]

This was part of a trip where I had a free pass on the now-defunct airline TWA so I flew from Los Angeles, CA to Pittsburgh, PA on a 707 and visited my friend Henry Posner III for a couple of days. I've known Henry since 1970 when we started chatting on a SAN DIEGAN when he was making a big Western tour with his grandmother. Over the years he has made quite a name for himself in the railroad industry. See:

[rrdc.com]

After my Pittsburgh visit, I flew on a TWA DC-9 series 10 (N1067T) from there to Boston, MA and started working my way down the eastern seaboard to New Orleans, LA. Some hand-me-down ex-ATSF PAs were being used at the time by MBTA on their Boston-Framingham commuter run and I managed to grab some photos of them at South Station. The train I took from Boston to New York had a GG-1 added to it at New Haven -- my only ride behind a GG-1. I sampled portions of the transit systems in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington D.C., sampled a METROLINER on a portion of the Northeast Corridor and then caught the SOUTHERN CRESCENT to its terminating city, booked in a roomette. In 1978 TWA did not serve New Orleans so I flew on a Braniff International (now defunct) 727-227 (N426BN) from there to Kansas City and then caught a TWA 707 from there back to LAX. The terminal at Kansas City's Mid-Continent International (MCI) is now totally new and different from the one that was there in 1978.

After Amtrak started, I made a point to ride the non-Amtrak trains, such as the RIO GRANDE ZEPHYR, the SOUTHERN CRESCENT and the QUAD CITIES ROCKET. Due to time constraints, I rode that last one only from Chicago to Joliet.

Here's a GOOGLE link that shows the curve the train is going around in Meridian. The piggyback yard shown on the left in the photo appears to be gone now. This would be consistent with the many piggyback terminals that the railroads used to have in many of their medium-sized cities and have since eliminated.

[maps.app.goo.gl]

Rail Info

Boston (North Station), MA - Lowell, MA BM BM 25.4 January 29, 1978
Boston (South Station), MA - New York, NY NH AMTK AMTK 171 232.0 January 30, 1978
Long Island City, NY - Hunterspoint Ave., NY LIRR LIRR January 31, 1978
125th St. - Grand Central Terminal NYC CR 4.0 February 01, 1978
Newark, NJ - New York (Penn Station), NY PRR AMTK AMTK 150 10.0 February 01, 1978
Newark, NJ - Philadelphia (30th. St.), PA PRR AMTK AMTK 173 90.0 February 01, 1978
Philadelphia, PA (Reading Term.) - Norristown, PA READ CR SEPTA 5 17.2 February 02, 1978
De Kalb Street, Norristown
Media, PA - Philadelphia (Penn Center), PA PRR CR SEPTA 1758 14.0 February 02, 1978
Philadelphia (30th. St.), PA - Washington D.C. PRR AMTK AMTK 111 134.0 February 03, 1978
Washington D.C. - East City Junction, LA SOU SOU SOU 1 1153.8? February 04/05, 1978
East City Junction, LA - New Orleans, LA NOUPT NOUPT SOU 1 February 05, 1978

Flight info:

January 26, 1978 GW SNA-LAX SH3
January 26, 1978 TW 0090 LAX-PIT 707
January 28, 1978 TW 0588 PIT-BOS DC9 N1067T
February 06, 1978 BN 0250 MSY-MCI 1230- 727-227 N426BN
February 06, 1978 TW 0229 MCI-LAX 707