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Amarillo
Symphony
by Mike Cox
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| Santa
Fe Train Number One, with a 3751-class 4-8-4 steam engine up front, pulled up
to the red-roofed, Mission revival-style Amarillo station on time. |
| | The
Sante Fe Depot in Amarillo
circa
1910
Photo
courtesy texasoldphotos.com |
One of the people
stepping off the train at the busy depot was William Gibson, a Santa Fe employee
traveling on a company pass.
With his small suitcase in one hand and his
well-worn tool and instrument valise in the other, Gibson walked from the station
to the nearby Capitol Hotel at Fourth and Pierce. The Herring, across the street,
was a bigger hotel, but Gibson liked the 200-room Capitol. At the front desk,
Gibson went through a familiar routine: He asked for a south-side room on the
fourth floor or higher. |
| | Hotel
Herring
TE
postcard archive |
As soon as he closed
the door behind him, Gibson walked to the window and looked out. His room, as
he knew it would, looked down on the busy Santa Fe yard. The roundhouse had 32
train stalls and almost always was full. In the distance, Gibson saw a plume of
black smoke as a freight train hit an eastbound grade on a big curve. After taking
in the view for a moment, he raised the window a few inches. It opened easily
— wood did not often swell with moisture on the High Plains. At nearly 3,700 feet
above sea level, spring and summer nights usually are cool and humidity-free.
On this night, the wind blew strong from the southeast, sucking through the cracked
window. Gibson liked the fresh night air, but he had opened the window more to
let in sound.
Number One had boarded its Amarillo passengers and was moving
slowly through the Amarillo yard. Gibson checked his watch. It was still on time.
Her hogger — railroad talk for engineer — blasted the whistle as the train headed
toward the 24th Street crossing. |
| | |
Polk
Street in the early 1900s
Photo courtesy texasoldphotos.com | |
One
long, two shorts, and then a continuous blast until the engine cleared the crossing.
The shrill sound created by the high-pressure steam echoed off the concrete grain
elevators lining the tracks and the high rise office buildings along busy Polk
Street. The whistle was music to the railroad man’s ears. With tongue-in-cheek,
he called it the “Amarillo Symphony.”
Periodically
through the night, other trains moved in and out of Amarillo as most of the city
slept. In addition to the Santa Fe track, main lines of the Fort Worth and Denver
and the Rock Island Line intersected at Amarillo. The piercing notes of train
whistles spread across the city and cut onto the vastness of the plains. |
| | Fort
Worth & Denver RR Depot in Amarillo
circa
1910
Photo
courtesy texasoldphotos.com |
| | The
Rock Island Depot in Amarillo
Postcard courtesy rootsweb.com/
%7Etxpstcrd/ |
For several generations
of Amarilloans, the whistle signals of the steam engine either comforted them
at night like a homemade quilt or haunted their dreams. For some, the whistles
made good company, dispelling any sense of isolation; others heard the trains
and felt lonesome, remembering or imagining trips taken or not taken. For all
Amarilloans, those whistles — long since replaced by more prosaic air horns —
represent the sound of a city’s history.
Amarillo
is the largest city in Texas owing its existence solely to the railroad. Houston,
Dallas, San
Antonio, El Paso,
Fort Worth and Austin
all had other reasons to be, though railroads certainly benefited each. But Amarillo
would not exist, or if it did it probably would not have amounted to much, had
it not been for the iron.
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|
| | Another
view of the Sante Fe Depot
Postcard courtesy
rootsweb.com/
%7Etxpstcrd/ |
©
Mike Cox
"Texas
Tales" >
November 3, 2005 column
See
Amarillo, Texas
More Texas
Railroads
Forum:
Subject: Depot Identified
I enjoyed
looking at photos and postcards of Texas RR Depots on your website. However, in
[Mike Cox's article] "Amarillo Symphony" - regarding train depots in Amarillo,
the depot [photo] marked 'Pecos Valley' is actually the Fort Worth & Denver RR
Depot. The Pecos Valley Southern RR runs south from Pecos,
Texas (towards Balmorhea.)
- Clif Jones, Bastrop, Texas, July 09, 2006
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