Checks can be sent to:  R. Donald Ross, 3821 Crater Lake Ct, Irving, TX 75062-4015

It wasn't long after I got home from service, when one of the boys got the idea of taking the Pere Marquette (by now C&O) carferry to Ludington, Michigan. We hoped to see if we could find the Ludington & Northern when we got there. After 55 years, I must admit that I don't remember anything of the lake voyage. I do remember that when we got off the boat, we found several switchers still lettered and numbered for the PM even though the C&O takeover had been a couple of years earlier. We walked through the yard and then down to the L&N interchange. We were lucky to find the 16 switching there. A little conversation with the crew resulted in an invitation to ride. I happened to have my Canon IIB with me and took slides along the line. The amazing thing is that I still have them, as I did not particularly carefully file slides in the same way that I handled my negatives. Slides were somewhat of a novelty until I switched in 1980. We open our pictures with a portrait of the one and only locomotive, 16. This SW8 was built by Electro-Motive in January, 1952, #15755. It remained Ludington & Northern until just recently when it was sold to one of the short lines, the Michigan Shore. The railroad itself was long gone by this time.

The whole purpose of this railroad was hauling the white sand from the pits north of Ludington at North Epworth. I felt that the line seemed to be more like an interurban line. Here is a series of pictures taken from the back deck of the locomotive on the way to the sand pit, and then some pictures switching at the pit.

AMDG

2/3/2021

Memorial of St. Bieuzy of Brittany

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Choose Life.

Mom did.