Chicago Great Western – CGW
The Chicago Great Western is one of two lines that got me interested in putting old rail line on maps. With a hub in the town of Oelwein Iowa, it had branches to Chicago, Minneapolis, Kansas City, and Omaha. It started in the later 1800′s and was bought up first by Chicago North Western which was bought by Union Pacific. Most segments were abandoned shortly after the consolidation.
CGW Map v4 includes changes in the segment from Waterloo to Des Moines based on reader feedback in the comments (thanks Tom!). I’ll be adding more stations soon. Pervious versions here.
Looking for a larger map? Please visit the CGW Map Page
Detailed History to follow
Not sure how you are mapping your lines and I am certainly no train authority… but…
I can tell you that the route you have shown for CGW’s line from Marshalltown, IA to Des Moines, IA is off quite significantly.
The line passed throught the towns of Melbourne, Baxter, Ira, Mingo, and Bondurant along the way.
Part of the line is still easily visible using the satellite imaging on your map. The old roadbed from Baxter (where I am from) to near Bondurant is now a bike trail and from Bondurant into Des Moines still has tracks on it. (although I noticed that they cut the tracks out at the street crossings in Bondurant this past Summer..
My Great-grandmother’s house was right next to the tracks in Baxter when I was a child in the 70′s and, although it was CNW by then, I recall standing in the back yard with her, waving at the engineers and men in the cabooses.
At the time I had no idea that it was of any significance but I recall always watching to see if the caboose would be yellow or red.
I recall the occasional red engine as well… (F7-ish style..?)
Sadly, the old Depot was taken down when I was in high school…
I wish I knew much more about the CGW operations in this area…
Thanks,
Tom
Tom,
I’m quite sure the mapping is wrong as most of it is mostly me guessing. Your comment will help me quite a bit!
thanks
-Mike
Hope I didn’t come across as critical. I sure didn’t mean it that way.
As I look over Google maps satellite view, I notice that, starting from Melbourne, IA, you can actually still trace the old CGW line North out of town and most all the way to the main line West of Marshalltown.
The section from Melbourne South to Baxter is almost all completely dozed out and gone but, again, if you zoom in and look carefully, you can still make it out. (I would be more than happy to help with this when the time comes, if necessary.)
As an aside, the CGW crossed the Milwaukee at Melbourne as well and you can easily see that old roadbed going both East and West out of town.
I admire this undertaking. Thanks for doing it! Please let me know if I can help in any way.
-Tom
No problem! Sharing knowledge is never critical. The best help you can be is to keep up the comments of locations. I’m planning on updating the map with a bunch of changes (including yours) in early Jan. So, fire away with any updates you see!
-Mike
Tom,
I made a bunch of changes based on your information. Please take a look and let me know how I did. Obviously, there is much work to do yet including adding all the stations on that branch, but I hope these changes are a good start.
- Mike
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