Train Ride Through Crittenden County

 I love the old trains, and I love Arlo Guthrie's "City of New Orleans" , so I came up with a wonderful train ride through Crittenden County.  This was one of my article I used in The Crittenden Press.

A Magic Carpet Ride Made Of Steel

Taken from a line of a favorite song on mine, let's take a ride on a magic carpet made of steel. This will be a fun and historical train ride through our beautiful Crittenden County and along the way we'll go through towns and fields and stop at the depots along the way. The time period of our trip will be during the early and late 1900s. Our Illinois Central train ride will begin as it crosses the old draw bridge between Webster and Crittenden County.

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This historical bridge has it's own unique history. The Tradewater River railroad bridge at Blackford was a vital link for the Ohio Valley Railroad that ran from Henderson, to Princeton, Kentucky. The first bridge to be constructed was a Draw Bridge. It was shortly after 1886 when the Draw Bridge was constructed. In 1914 a new 528 ft. long bridge was build by the Illinois Central Railroad with help from the U.S. Government that included a pedestrian walk bridge. The Illinois Central Railroad design was an upgrade in structure. The IC wanted to run a larger and heavier class of locomotives to pull coal trains from Union and Webster counties to the Illinois Central Kentucky division's main line at Princeton, Kentucky and to be able to handle the car loads of fluorspar from Crittenden County to travel up north.

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As we exit to the Crittenden County side of the bridge, we'll roll by the Blackford Church Camp ground where they have a wonderful summer time camp meeting. These meetings were started as early as 1917. People from several states throughout the country came to the week-long meetings of worshiping the Lord. The camp grounds, and dinning hall would be full of folks.

The singing of my wheels will hum them to sleep each night and my whistle call will awakening them each morning as I announcement my return arrival at the bridge.

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We'll roll a short distance through the beautiful country to the community of Nunn Switch. We'll make a stop here to drop off the load of empty milk containers I brought back from Evansville, a stop here later in the day from a sister train from the south, will pick up milk filled containers for their trip back to the Evansville creamery. I'll also pick up a few passengers that are going to Marion to spend the day in town. There are several passenger trains that run back and forth during the day.

This little hamlet is known through the county as having three names, Nunn Switch, Hoods, and Gladstone, the Hood Creek school sits upon the hill not far from the depot, named for the tumbling creek that rolls through the center of the village, The children watch for me as I chug by each day, the depot was named for the Samuel Nunn family, as it sits on Nunn family land, and Gladstone for the post office located in the general store. Nunn's switch has a blacksmith, grocery store, post office and stock pins located near the depot. It's a central location for the area.

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We pick up our speed and the rhythm of my wheels rumble through fields and along bluffs as we go through the edge of the community of Mattoon. Its a busy location as roads from different parts of the county run through the town. Mattoon adopted it's present name in 1894. The business center, which had led the county in the sale of farming implements during the early 1890's, lost its tobacco stemmery and flour mill to fire in the early 1900s. The town dwindled to only one general store. The construction of U. S. Highway 60 through Mattoon was vital for the village and for a time set it back on the growing path.

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A short distance farther down the rails is the little hamlet of Repton. It's a beautiful little town situated on the I. C. railroad . It consists of two general merchandise stores, one church, school house, blacksmith shop and a number of dwelling houses and a post office is located here. There is a small ticket and freight depot located here with a stock yard near by for farmers to load their stock on train cars and send them to the stockyard at Evansville. A few more passengers board my train and get seated in the passenger cars as we head on towards Marion.

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We pass through more scenic country side and over the railroad bridge known as Harrison Trestle that is built over Brushy creek. Winslow park is located here. Not so many years ago, it was a rather bare, uninviting tract of land with a few trees, a small house in the center of it, but I see today, as I cross over the bridge, there are benches, tables, and electric lights to make it possible for a picnic to be given there with as much ease and convenience as a meal is served in the dining room of one’s home.

Mr. Virgil L. Stone, who is responsible for the many changes and improvements which have taken place at Winlow, has spared neither time nor money to make the park an attractive and inviting place for picnickers and tourists. He has also constructed some cottages for people to stay awhile if they would like.

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From Winlow Park the rhythm of my wheels hum along the rails until we get to the town of Marion. The Depot here is a center of activity. I let off my passengers from Nunn Switch and Repton, plus several business men that loaded on in Evansville. For the visitors from Evansville and beyond, there will be a horse and buggy waiting to take them to the Crittenden Hotel for their stay in Marion and Crittenden County. These are business men looking to invest in the county's rich deposits of fluorspar and other minerals such as lead and zinc. And there will be some salesmen included with the passengers also wanting to peddle their goods.

I'll unhitch a couple of my empty loading cars at the depot and they will be filled with this wonderful mineral called fluorspar. On a return trip the cars will be reattached and taken to points up north for the steel mills in some northern cities.

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On the move again we travel past country houses, farms and fields heading toward our next stop of Crayne. I'll roll over the railroad trestle that crosses the A. H. Clement road. This trestle is now gone, taken down during the last of the golden days of the train and railroads through the county. (1999).

Gone with it are the days when it was a place to explore and climb on the wooden structure, a wonderful place for young boys to spend a day.

We roll into Crayne, or in my earlier days, Crayneville. The Crayne depot sits by a large lot, known as the loading yard. Piles of fluorspar and timber will be kept here until it can be loaded in my cars. Crayne folks that rode into Marion on an earlier train, will ride back with me and depart at the little Crayne depot.

The Crayne school is located a short distance from the Depot and as I go by the children out playing will be watching and waving at me as I chug by, blowing black smoke from my smoke stack. I'm a special sight and sound and my friendly conductor will be riding on my red caboose at the end to wave back at the children as we pass by. A special time in those days gone by.

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From Crayne we travel through more beautiful rural country sides and farm lands until we reach the next community known as Mexico and a just a short distance is the community of Frances.

Children that live close to the railroad tracks watch and listen for me, my conductor looks for the children and will perhaps have some candy or gum to throw to them. Mexico also has it's own depot, and located near by is a train yard filled with piles of fluorspar waiting to be loaded. This is the heart of the great mineral-fluorspar country.

The large mining company known as Lafeyatte is located at Frances My tracks run close by the great mill and here my cars are filled with fluorspar. It's faster and easier to use train transportation than it was in the horse and wagon days, or even later with dump trucks.

I continue my journey over the hills and through woods to exit Crittenden County into the town of Fredonia in Caldwell County.

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Enjoy my ride while you can, for in a few short years I will be disappearing with many memories for all that grew up with me, the sights and sounds of my rumbling wheels on the steel tracks, my lonesome echoing whistle, my bellowing black smoke and cinders as I neared the towns and cross roads. I have run over and flattened many hundred of pennies and nails to the delight of many children through my years. Perhaps you are lucky enough to have a souvenir of these days gone by when the locomotive was king of transportation in our county.