MONON BOARD
Monon Property => Buildings and Bridges => Topic started by: Pete Pedigo on February 09, 2012, 06:58:33 am
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This is a March 16, 1967 aerial photo of the location where the last Monon Depot was located in downtown Bloomington, In. The bank that bought the lot has a drive through bank on the property in this photo, and automobiles are parked on the footprint of where the Limestone Depot once sat. This would indicate that the Depot was torn down prior to this date. The freight depot on the left, or West, side of the tracks has already been replaced with a parking lot also. This photo is from the City of Bloomington and is in a series of dozens of photos taken the same day and all marked March 16 1967.
Pete
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Nice photo Pete that helps nail down the exact date of the demolition. It is kind of crazy that such a landmark would be lost with so little fanfare, but it was. There is apparently no news in the papers about the demolition. A few articles about the Grimes lane depot and progress but not much about memories.
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Wow the old tracks to the roundhouse are there across 5th/Kirkwood to the west of the main.
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After looking at the picture, was there a track behind the depot at one time? Vic
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Vic, yes there was a track behind the depot at one time. It shows on the attached map.
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Thanks Joe I guess I can still catch a thing or two from these pictures. Vic
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Wow the old tracks to the roundhouse are there across 5th/Kirkwood to the west of the main.
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Oh it was a pair of engine houses and a turntable. Anyone ever seen pictures?
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The only view that I have ever seen is from the top of the old Monroe County courthouse looking west toward the engine houses. The view is blocked by the buildings on the west side of the square, but part of a locomotive is visible. There is also an oblique angle of the original depot in the same panoramic photo of all sides of the Bloomington Square. The reproduction of this photo is in the maps and reference section of the Monroe County Library. Pete and I discovered it by accident several years ago when researching microfiche. Regarding the switch track on the east side of the original depot, there I a photograph taken across 5th St. from the top floor of the building (hotel-later Holden's Music) looking south toward the depot. If you look closely, there are freight cars visible on the east side spur. The photo also shows lots of people on the platform boarding or departing a south bound passenger train. Circa 1910. If time permits I will search the photo Listserv for these photos.
G3
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I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=39.352915,-85.972514
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I found the photo I described last night. If you look to the far left of the image you can see a box car on the switch track. If I am correct the depot in the picture was the second structure built at this location. For those of you from Bloomington, if you look in the far upper right hand corner of the photo, you can see the top floors of the old "Central School" now the location of the hotel at the convention center.
G3
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I am sure you meant upper Left. This is a telling photo that the Sanborn maps are always correct.
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Pete, you are correct. I did mean upper left. In the upper right is the gas plant which is there to this day.
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Thanks for the post George, Nice work, Vic
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Vic, yes there was a track behind the depot at one time. It shows on the attached map.
Which was tighter, the tracks through downtown Bloom'ton or in New Albany on Market St., by Tommy Lancaster's restaurant?
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Tommy Lancaster's was a lot tighter than Bloomington, but Middle Salt Creek bridge at Guthrie and Mill Creek bridge at Wallace Jtc. were tighter than Tommy Lancaster's, and on occasion the parking lot across from the Royal Oaks roadhouse in Bloomington was tighter than the bridges. / Ron
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I can also see on the Sandborn map that there was at one time a run-through depot at that location.
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We have yet to see a clear picture of such through track, but geometry from a photo or two will authenticate a through track.
Pete
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I don't think the depot in the photo I posted earlier was a run through station. That photo was the second of three known depots at that location. The question that I have always had is were all run throughs built the same. I forget when the first depot burned, but it also was a brick structure.
G3
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I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=39.352977,-85.972645
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George, what's that big Google map that comes up at the bottom of all your posts, and shows where your street is located? What's the purpose of it? It's shown up twice in this thread. / Ron
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1887 Sanborn drawing overlaid on Google Earth image.
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I think that may be the same building Geof, and they just closed the ends on it. / Ron
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I know that there are few known photographs of downtown Bloomington roundhouse (the only one I've seen is of a snowplow). So here's another, from the 1906 IU Yearbook:
http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/archivesphotos/results/item.do?itemId=P0033885 (http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/archivesphotos/results/item.do?itemId=P0033885)
The text says they haven't confirmed the location, but since I don't believe that the track was configured like that around the McDole roundhouse, I think it was downtown. If anyone can confirm this location, I'm sure that IU Archives would like to know.
-Chris Stone
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[not allowed]opher, that was the wooden roundhouse they built at Hillside Drive (kind of middle of McDoel yard on the East side, across from the dispatchers/yard office). It burned in 1908, and that's when the brick one we all remember was built farther south down in the yards. / Ron
PS, they never had a "roundhouse" downtown. All they had downtown were square engine houses with the tracks into them leading off a Sellars turntable. See Joe Land's overlay.
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As far as IU archives goes they have had several problems with innacuaracies regarding the Monon that they need to correct. The most glaring is that they have the LNAC being labeled as the Louisville, New Albany and Corydon in the 1891 photograph of downtown Bloomington showing the old downtown turntable and depot. This error in names has since then appeared on the official Bloomington downtown historical signage.
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[not allowed]opher,
It was nice meeting and talking with you at breakfast during the convention.
I had that photo from IU in my possession a couple of years ago when I was researching it for them to verify it's location. The roundhouse and track work matches a roundhouse that was built after the one downtown dissappears from the Sanborn maps in the 1890's. This roundhouse was located in "Railroad Park" which was south of Grimes "Pike" on the Samborn Maps. This photo matches the roundhouse that was located at South St. (later Hillside). See the attached Sanborn map of 1907. The matting on the photo appears to be hiding a couple of flaws in the photo. On the right side it appears someone moved during exposure and put a big blur on the right. On the left the Sanborn Maps indicates that the roundhouse had a hole in the back wall for a run through track across the turntable. It must have detracted from the photo of Mr. Menke and the locomotive as the matting also covers that part of the photo. Needless to say if that were our photograph I would have removed the matting.
See the attached Sanborn map of 1907.
Pete
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I found this photo on the Internet and I hadn't seen it before. The photo is labeled:
Depot; Bloomington, IN; 1906; IU Archives collection; IU students leaving for home.
George L.
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George, notice the similarities between this depot and the Gosport depot. We believe this was the run through depot that was later modified as was Orleans and several others. / Ron
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Ron,
Sure looks like it could have been a run-through depot. The doors look big enough. The 1906 date is a good time frame.
George L.
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Yeah, Ron, But with a train you can nudge the cars and get a little room to navigate. Right? I recall hearing that story
a few years ago.
David
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Thanks for posting these photos, I have never seen the old depot before, and I agree, it looks like the same plan as Gosport. Also never knew there were engine houses downtown.....
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George's entry of the older Bloomington depot; how far back was that depot in construction? I am thinking 1868.
Thanks David
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I love those old passenger cars. Vic