If Only You Could

If you could take your digital camera and go back in time to anywhere for one day where would it be? There are thousands of possibilities but Sayre, Pennsylvania, on the Lehigh Valley might be a good choice.

This photograph wasn’t made through time travel but during an earlier time when LV Alco C628 was reposing at the engine service facility along with fellow Alco 635 wearing a different livery.

The date is July 24, 1973. What an era that was to be out and about making photographs.

Photograph by Robert Farkas

Lehigh Valley Alcos in Sayre

Yesterday on Akron Railroads, Ed Ribinskas described how he thought he was going to get double heritage unit combination of the Lehigh Valley and Reading heritage units of Norfolk Southern.

But the LV H unit was pulled off the motive power consist in Bellevue so Ed had to settle for just getting the Reading.

Let’s use the wayback machine to not only take a trip back in time but also across the border into Pennsylvania in search of actual LV heritage.

In the top photograph, we’ve arrived in Sayre, Pennsylvania, which is near the border with New York and 18 miles away from Elmira.

Sayre was an important point on the Lehigh Valley, which built a large locomotive shop there in 1904.

A pair of Alco C420s, Nos. 405 and 414, sit at the engine facility on July 24, 1973.

In the bottom image, we moved down the line to find LV EMD SW8 No. 262 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, on Aug. 12, 1973.

Photograph by Robert Farkas

Period Piece

The Alco RS2 in Lehigh Valley paint probably was the first thing you noticed about this image. But I see in this a nice period piece.

The grass growing between the tracks in the yard in Sayre, Pennsylvania, on July 24, 1973, says something about the lack of funds to do weed spraying.

Then again, maybe the railroad didn’t think grass and weeds growing in a yard was any big deal.

I also noticed the buildings across the street, which signify the type of working class neighborhoods that sprung up around railroad facilities or any other type of industrial facility.

Generations of railroads workers lived in those houses and patronized the stores, diners and taverns housed in commercial buildings in those neighborhoods.

Most of the tracks in this view appear empty although there may be cars out of view to the right or left.

Whatever the case, this suggests the state of railroads in the 1970s that would lead to the creation of Conrail just under two years after this image was made.

Lehigh Valley was among the bankrupt railroads folded into Conrail.

The story of the declining industrial base of the Northeast has been told many times and can be seen in its own way here.

Yet engine 213 goes about its business on this summer day because there are still cars to switch and trains to run even if there aren’t as many of them as their used to be here.

Photograph by Robert Farkas

Variety of Lehigh Valley Motive Power

A variety of Lehigh Valley motive power sits in Sayre, Pennsylvania, on July 24, 1973. In the background is the bridge over the yard, and further back the LV shop complex can be seen.

Photograph by Robert Farkas

Railroading as it Once Was: Overcast Skies Didn’t Dampen Enthusiasm of Seeing LV Engine Pit

An overcast day couldn’t dampen my excitement of seeing the Lehigh Valley engine service tracks in Sayre, Pennsylvania, for the first time.

For an Ohio kid often surrounded by Penn Central, this was pretty cool.

The steam era shops can be seen in the background as well as some switchers in need of attention.

The LV was living on borrowed time by late 1975 just like my beloved Erie Lackawanna was back home.

Many of the units in this photo would go to the D&H instead of the new Conrail to help with the expanded D&H network.

Regardless, all was right with the world as I stood on that bridge all those years ago, taking in the sights, sounds, and smells (EMD and Alco smoke mixed together, what a concoction!) of a railroad I had only known through photos in magazines and books.

Article and Photograph by Roger Durfee