| A picture from the sidewalk overpass of Highway 13 on the west side of Marshfield, Wisconsin, from last November. About two weeks before it snowed. |
Veteran's pictures on the south supports of the sidewalk.
Note, name plaque in the shadows. I didn't see it when I was there, I was too busy retreiving camera and kite when wind quit.
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Above is a small panoramic picture (1/10 size of original) of the area taken from kite on March 15, 2008 The wind was too low to keep the kite and camera up for more than one try for 4 pictures to stitch together. This is the fifth flight of the pawl panoramic camera. Due to short flight for lack of wind, I broke at least 2 rules for good panoramic picture stitching. The camera was still being towed toward the subject. Salvaged the pictures sufficiently for web page use, but I wish I could have gotten other angles of the curved walkways. Maybe some other year I will get back there again. And missed having a train in this picture by 10 minutes.
Same picture below is one third size of the original, which is not shown. |
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After seeing this page, Keith added some history about this west side of Marshfield.
If the kite flight would have been better, I would have gotten more aerials of the area. Here's an old map, 1980's.
St Joeseph Ave now lines up from intersection under the west / left end of brown RR bridge.
Keith wrote this about what used to be here for RR track.
(and I deleted some the non-historical comments)
You didn't miss much for trackage in this area. The Passing Siding stopped at Maple when they built this concrete memorial . . . .
The Hub City Foods spur came off behind the Municipal Garage (lower right in one of your panoramic views) and lead off to the right.
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The Greenwood Line came off where the new single track
bridge is and took off to the left of your panoramic views. It is now a part
of the City's . . . 'trail system' . . . This area you shot was picked to become the area for a new classification yard had the Greenwood Line become the Marshfield cut-off to Bateman. The yard tracks would have fanned out starting behind the Municipal Garage on the north side of the right-of-way and extend well up into the curve and cut ahead of the CN engines in your first photograph. I have a Soo Line-drawn map showing all this poorly blanked out. Straight ahead (west) in the 'Vee' made by the Main Line curving right towards Spencer and the G-Line curving left to go directly west, WC and Soo planned an 11-stall roundhouse, turntable, and wye connecting the G-Line to what is now the Main Line. There was more that would have happened had the cut-off been completed beyond Greenwood. A second yard would have been laid on the south side of the main where you stood, to accomodate Minneapolis-Marshfield trains, and from studying old Marshfield Times and Marshfield Demokrat (German language newspaper) issues on Microfilm, plans may have been in the works to locate the carshops and Division Offices in Marshfield had the cut-off become reality. Marshfield's addled City Fathers at that time really put their support behind the completion of the Marshfield cut-off because they had grandoise dreams of Marshfield growing three-fold with the railroad expansion and employment, had it come about. It WAS ideal; in later years, with larger steam locomotives and, later, diesels, Chippewa Falls would have been eliminated as a crew change, Park Falls would have been eliminated as a crew change, as would Exeland (Exeland was eliminated anyway by 1960). The WC/Soo would have only had to change engines and crews TWICE going across Wisconsin, a distinct advantage over C&NW, Milwaukee Road and Burlington. Marshfield would have been where ALL the passengers trains met and were switched out instead of Spencer and Owen.
Alas, none of it ever came to pass, and Marshfield became unbelievably
suspicous and distrustful of anything not born within and nutured here,
something that continues today, some 100 years after the Marshfield cut-off
died at Greenwood. |
A picture of the train heading off the main, west to Greenwood.
(Rails and ties removed 1983.)
Keith adds more:
The Marshfield cut-off was actually a brain-child of Northern Pacific,
who leased the WC for a short time before the Panic of 1893. The Marshfield
cut-off was a part of a three-step approach to making the line to
Minneapolis/St. Paul shorter; the other two were the Spencer-Owen Cut-off
and the St. Croix River Bridge. The other two were completed, but the
Marshfield cut-off never was.
What killed it was the Federal Government (Pre-Interstate Commerce Commission) stepping in and killing the cozy relationship between NP and WC moreso than the Panic of 1893. The Government found glaring impropriety in NP's lease of WC, but levied heavy fines against both roads, as WC was just as guilty as NP was.
NP was not in terrific financial shap in 1893 anyway from expenditures on
it's lines from Western Montana to Washington, so leasing the WC and trying
to pump scarce cash into it for main line relocation projects just wasn't
there, and WC was still feeling the effects of Phillips & Colby's triathalon
of illegal ventures while they were building and later running the WC.
Now you know more of the story.
Keith
wrote Mar 15, 17; 2008