Author Topic: Before and After Pictures  (Read 18279 times)

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Before and After Pictures
« on: November 20, 2011, 07:37:43 PM »
I have acquired a nice assortment of old photos over the last several years. Some of these are very recognizable, and others not so much. I am going to post my before and after shots here, and if others have done so already, I encourage you to do the same.

Stay tuned...
Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Bill Sample

  • Museum Member
  • Fireman
  • ****
  • Posts: 344
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #1 on: November 22, 2011, 05:41:15 PM »
Looking forward to this, Mike!

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #2 on: January 05, 2012, 05:51:57 PM »
I took an hour or so today and took some shots. I will start off by using Two Feet to the Lakes photos for reference. Get your book and follow along. I can not leagally show those photos here. But I can show mine. The photos are not exact, but close. Here we go.

Harrison. Page 58. The house on the left of the photo is the same in both photos.


This one is a little more difficult to see. A lot of fill has been brought in since this photo was taken. Page 59 bottom photo. The Abuttment is above the picnic table.


Stay tuned for more. I have some original photos I can use from here on out. Nice side by side comparison, if I can figure how to do it. Maybe it can be an over/under comparison.
« Last Edit: January 05, 2012, 07:42:35 PM by Mike Fox »
Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #3 on: January 05, 2012, 07:26:38 PM »
North Bridgton.
Then.


Now



Then


Now

Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #4 on: January 05, 2012, 07:50:49 PM »
Here is a different type of photo. I estimate the original to be from the late 40's or very early 50's. Too bad the trees obscure the right of way. The horizontal tanks are still there, next to vertical tanks.



CMPs Driveway looking South
« Last Edit: January 05, 2012, 07:52:46 PM by Mike Fox »
Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Richard "Steam" Symmes

  • Museum Member
  • Fireman
  • ****
  • Posts: 445
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #5 on: January 05, 2012, 09:25:28 PM »
Those are very interesting pictures.  We've followed most of the B&H over the years. It's amazing how much is atually still recognizeable.  The first time I followed it was in 1961. A friend had a camp up on one of the local lakes. We stayed with them a few times and went exploring the B&H. Back then it was all pretty plain to see. Gravel ballast and lots of ties still in place. We pulled out a wooden milepost and took it home. It's restored today and on display at the Walker Transportation Collection, Beverly Historical Society. It's marked BJ15 on one side and H6 on the other.

At that time the railroad had only been abandoned 20 years.

Richard

Wayne Laepple

  • Museum Member
  • Yardmaster
  • *******
  • Posts: 2,123
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #6 on: January 05, 2012, 10:48:38 PM »
These are great, Mike. I always look forward to winter here in Penna. so I can go out and explore long-abandoned rights-of-way. The longer they've been gone, the more I enjoy finding them. The oldest I've located so far is part of an inclined plane railway that was started in 1845 and never finished because a regular railroad was completed nearby. I've also found the grade of a narrow gauge that was abandoned in 1923, including a couple of nice laid-up stone culverts.

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #7 on: January 06, 2012, 03:00:17 PM »
This time of year I always find something to look at. Old roadways, railroads, foundations, and stonewalls. They all interest me and gives me a chance to think how things were back then and how simple life was. And one thing I lways keep in mind, everything was built by hand or using enginuity. Very little machinery involved.
Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Keith Taylor

  • Museum Member
  • Engineer
  • ****
  • Posts: 732
  • Life Member
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #8 on: January 07, 2012, 09:21:49 AM »
This time of year I always find something to look at. Old roadways, railroads, foundations, and stonewalls. They all interest me and gives me a chance to think how things were back then and how simple life was. And one thing I lways keep in mind, everything was built by hand or using enginuity. Very little machinery involved.
Mike, I think that folks tend to think of those earlier times as more simple but in fact I am amazed by the engineering and technology of the time...and without the use of computers.

 In regards track work, they used the same science that we use today, with spirals easing the transition into curves, as well as super elevation in the curves.

I particularly marvel at the work of Henri Giffard creating the injector. Using Bernoulli's theorem, he came up with a way to take steam out of the boiler, mix it up with cold water and still have enough energy to move the now greater mass back into the boiler against the boiler pressure!

 I doubt that the folks back then considered their lives to be simple! Yes, there was a tremendous amount of hand labor, but it was back breaking work and slow. However there was a tremendous machine tool technology for building locomotives. Back in the days of the narrow gauge, America was the leader in the precision machine tool manufacturing world.

Keith

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #9 on: January 07, 2012, 05:55:36 PM »
Yes, perhaps simple wasn't the word. I still marvel at the engineering. Simple bridge abuttments are fascinating to me. Knowing there were no modern machines used to build some of these, Makes you think of just how it was accomplished.
Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Duncan Mackiewicz

  • Museum Member
  • Fireman
  • ****
  • Posts: 410
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #10 on: January 09, 2012, 09:23:06 AM »
Mike, when you compare the second of your pictures to page 59 in the book, it is astounding how much fill was actually brought in to fill that trestle AND the surrounding area. When you drive down that stretch of the old main road along side of the remains of the roadbed and look out to where the trestle was, you can really see how much fill was added. That would be a huge feat in today's technology let alone back in the 1800's to 1900's. Like you, I have wandered those rights-of-way and taken many pictures but the change from then to now in the area of Harrison ranks right up there with some of the most dramatic changes.
You have taken some really nice, well positioned shots of now for comparison to then.
Duncan

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #11 on: January 09, 2012, 05:26:43 PM »
How about a few more. These are of Bridgton. So back to the book we go for this one.

Page 146. Top photo. The Hose Tower is the white thing through the trees, on the right side of the pole.



Now look at this postcard


And my comparison


I have one more non-railroad related that I will post as soon as I get it scanned.

Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Bill Sample

  • Museum Member
  • Fireman
  • ****
  • Posts: 344
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #12 on: January 13, 2012, 11:28:49 AM »
Thanks for sharing these, Mike. You know how much Sue & I enjoy exploring up there!
I'm doing a "now and then" series on the Naugy for our newsletter.  It's not as easy as one would think, with all the construction, destruction, and tree and brush growth that has taken place over the years.  And the camera lenses have changed as well, making exact duplicates hard to reconstruct.

Mike Fox

  • Museum Member
  • Empire Builder
  • ********
  • Posts: 5,634
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #13 on: January 13, 2012, 05:37:46 PM »
Yes, you can see some of the trouble I had. One thing we can do now is crop photos to make them look appropriate. I have others that I have taken before, I just need to get them linked to this topic.

Mike
Mike
Doing way too much to list...

Ed Deere

  • Museum Member
  • Switchman
  • **
  • Posts: 50
    • View Profile
Re: Before and After Pictures
« Reply #14 on: January 30, 2012, 05:15:18 AM »
     On my trip home from the Big E ( waved at John and talked with Bob ) I was thinking about the photos that have been post on this link Before and After. Thinking I might take some time and find these spots myself, along with some others. If at all possible Mike, if you could add the GPS locations we all could plot them on Google Earth to get a better understanding were these places are today. However I look forward to seeing more photos of Before and After.

Ed Deere