Monday, September 10, 2018

The Schmidt Photo Collection

We have just acquired a wonderful collection of traction photos from long-time IRM stalwart Pete Schmidt.   Most of these were taken by his father William Schmidt and have not been published before.   They cover a wide range of electric railways across the country, and it will take me a while to scan them all in.  Once they're scanned, they will be deposited in the IRM library files for preservation.   We can't thank Pete enough for this donation.  Many of these images are of lines seldom seen.

Almost all of these are B&W prints, and none of them are very big.  Some of them are smaller than anything I've seen before, less than 2" square.  As a result, the scans may not be the best, since I'm doing these at 600 dpi with a run-of-the-mill flatbed scanner.  Anything finer takes a long time, but could be done if there's a need for a particular image.

Most of the photos have very detailed information written on the back.  Some of it is exposure information which the photographer wanted for his own use, and I won't bother reproducing it.  But in many cases there's not only the date, but the exact time the picture was taken.  You don't see that every day! 

Railroad Miscellany


TRACTION LINES:
Atlantic City and Shore

Baltimore 

Boston Elevated Ry.

Boston Revere Beach and Lynn

Branford Electric Ry.

British Columbia Electric

Capital Transit

Charles City Western

Chicago and West Towns

Chicago Aurora and Elgin

Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee

Chicago Rapid Transit 

Chicago South Shore and South Bend

Chicago Surface Lines

Cincinnati Street Railway

Cleveland Transit

Denver and Intermountain

Des Moines and Central Iowa

Fort Dodge Des Moines and Southern

Hagerstown and Frederick

Illinois Terminal

Interurban Lines (miscellaneous)

Kansas City Public Service

Key System

Lackawanna and Wyoming Valley

Lake Erie and Northern

Lehigh Valley Transit

Mason City and Clear Lake

Milwaukee Transport

Montreal and Southern Counties

Montreal Tramways

Niagara St. Catherines and Toronto

Omaha and Council Bluffs

Pacific Electric

Philadelphia and Western

Philadelphia Suburban Transit

Pittsburgh Railways

Portland Traction

Quebec RL&P

Rochester Transit

Rock Island Southern

St. Louis Public Service

San Francisco

Shaker Heights Rapid Transit

Sioux City Transit

Texas Electric

Third Avenue Railway System

Toronto Transit

Twin Cities Rapid Transit

Waterloo Cedar Falls and Northern

West Penn Railways 

1 comment:

Art said...

It's no secret what the good professor has been doing today. Who is having more fun? Us or you?

I enjoyed seeing the streetcar directional sign from the Brookfield Zoo. Those hand-carved signs used to be all over the zoo giving directions by a carving of the animals. Are there no survivors? They would be treasured today.