loop around the interior of the island. At the capital city of Ikenosawa a 1-mile stub connects the loop line with the island's port facilities. Built some time before World War II, the Great Eastern carries passengers from port to capital, but is otherwise taken up with the transporting of sugar cane. The roster contains both steam and diesel locomotives (the former are prewar coal-burning iron horses). Minami Daito Jima must be one of the smallest of all Pacific islands to claim a freight and passenger railroad of its own. Railfans take note: there is not a single bus on the entire island. The Great Eastern reigns supreme!

THREE-CYLINDER PACIFIC SAVED: The C53class 4-6-2's of the Japanese National Railways were built between 1928 and 1931. The first unit left the builder's plant only a year after the JNR had decided to construct steel coaches. These were the glory years, and the C53's, totaling 97 locomotives at the zenith of their existence, were seen stepping high with name trains between major Japanese cities. In 1934 C5343 was streamlined after the fashion of steam engines in the western world. However, citing reasons for dissatisfaction familiar to American railroaders of the late '30's, JNR dropped the experiment. Today only C5345 and C5357 remain on the roster, the former at Osaka and the latter standing by at Hamamatsu (between Tokyo and Osaka). The future looked black indeed. Then the JNR issued an order: refurbish the C5345 and place her in the national railway's Osaka Museum. The three-cylinder Pacific will continue to be admired by the crowds who rode behind her.

SOME TIDBITS: The U. S. Army has brought to Okinawa a two-car mobile substation "train" to bolster the island's power system. Built by Westinghouse in 1955, the units generate 5000 kw. of electricity and rest on a 300-foot "railroad." . . . The last steam engines built by Hitachi of Japan were 2-8-2's outshopped in 1959-1960 for Bolivia where they operate in freight service high in the Andes Mountains. The 2-8-2's are similar in design to the D51class Mikes of the Japanese National Railways.... The New Zealand Railways is taking a hard look at its rural branch operations, the realm of the 2-6-0 with mixed train.

SHORT LINES

WILLIAM S. YOUNG

PASSENGERS WANTED: James M. Easter II, the young president of Maryland's Baltimore & Annapolis Railroad, is a brave man: he wants to go back into the rail passenger business. The 28-mile B&A, which was one of the East's best-known interurbans, gave up electric passenger

runs between its namesake cities in 1950, substituted buses, and bought a 70-ton GE diesel to carry on its freight business. Since then the suburbs have kept on growing, the highways leading to them have become more crowded, and Baltimore, like other cities, has been talking rapid transit. B&A's Easter thinks his line, as the rail backbone of the suburbs south of Baltimore, would be a natural part of any publicly financed rapid transit plan. Meanwhile he is going to try to assess present demand for rail service by borrowing an RDC from Budd for a limited trial. Easter envisions B&A trains operating as far as Baltimore & Ohio's now. closed Mount Royal Station in Baltimore, where a central airlines terminal would be established from which passengers could go by B&A to Friendship International Airport. The short line's own buses are now carrying more instead of fewer riders for the first time in a decade, a hopeful sign to transit planners.

SUDDENLY, LAST SUMMER: When Edaville's F. Nelson Blount was unable to get his standard-gauge Monadnock, Steamtown & Northern Railroad into immediate operation over Boston & Maine tracks out of Bellows Falls, Vt., he made alternate arrangement with a New Hampshire short line. For about a month last summer, Blount's ex-Canadian National 4-6-4T No. 47 pulled a string of old B&M coaches between Bradford and Sunapee, N. H., over Claremont & Concord Railway. Then along came an I.C.C. inspector who discovered that No. 47 was not properly certificated to run on common-carrier trackage and ordered her out of service. Monadnock employees picketed the state house at Concord; New Hampshire authorities sought means to protect the new tourist attraction; and the I.C.C., feeling the heat of opinion, even issued a press release on the matter. Commission Chairman Everett Hutchinson said he hoped the engine could be cleared for operation soon. Word is that No. 47, or another standard-gauge engine from the Edaville collection, will be running somewhere in New Hampshire come next summer.

FIND: Even some experts on Pennsylvania motive power were surprised when a group of steam fans recently turned up a veteran Pennsy B4a at an abandoned steel plant in Harrisburg, Pa. The lowslung 0-6-0, one of many built around the century's turn and later widely resold by equipment dealers, last served Phoenix Steel Company No. 5. Williams Grove Steam Engine Association bought the old B4a and an 0-4-0T from the plant's dismantlers for preservation at nearby Williams Grove.

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MERGER MITES: Two "big-little" roads have entered the N&W-NKP-Wabash merger picture. The 171-mile Akron, Canton & Youngstown, fearing "encirclement," wants to be included. And N&W has offered to buy the 132-mile Pittsburgh & West Virginia, which has been supporting the merger.

NOT MERGED: Washington's 32-mile Pacific Coast Railroad [page 15, November 1961 TRAINS] is still running as an independent. Talked-up merger with parent Great Northern is contemplated only if the Hill Lines merger takes place I

Let yourself go! Let yourself go to the Mardi Gras! Here is the most colorful of all celebrations ... more than a week of gala day and night street parades culminating on Mardi Gras Day, March 6th. Be there this year.

But no matter what your reason may be for visiting New Orleans, your journey there and back will be more enjoyable if you travel the "Main Line of Mid-America." When you head for New Orleans, choose the allPullman Overnighter Panama Limited or the all-coach Dayliner City of New Orleans.

ILLINOIS CENTRAL

Main Line of Mid-America