The Lake Erie & Pittsburgh Railroad

When I was a kid we used to play on the train tracks. The tracks were about a half mile away across the “field”. I could watch the trains from my bedroom window and trains and airplanes stirred up the juices inside me to travel and see the world. When I was eleven years old most of the trains which were all freight trains had steam locomotives. By the time that we moved five years later they were practically all diesel powered.

All of the locomotives said New York Central Railroad on their sides so quite naturally I thought that it was the NYCRR that was over there. Sixty years later, while cruising through Google during this Covid 19 virus quarantine, I discovered a map that showed that the line was called The Lake Erie & Pittsburgh Railroad not to be confused by the Erie & Pittsburgh RR or the equally confusing Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad.  

The Lake Erie & Pittsburgh Railroad was a “paper” railroad which means it didn’t have any rolling stock of it’s own and was basically owned by NY Central.

When we were little snotnoses, we could put an ear to the rail and hear the chugging of a steam locomotive. Later on, when they started using steam turbine and diesels, things got a bit dicier.  The newer locos didn’t have the pounding sound that carried through the rails and a few times as we were listening we nearly got run over by a damned old train.

I still love trains to this day and would be happy to jump on one without reservation. As I’ve said time and time again, I love all forms of transportation trains, planes, cars, motorcycles, bicycles, ships and boats.

It is much harder to hit a moving target.