The story of steel-making in Youngstown was also the story of railroads, which transported raw materials to the mills and finished products from them. Almost every picture of the old steel mill complexes features a rail yard beside it.
I first witnessed this as a youngster when my dad took me to the observation deck at the Gateway Yard offices and control tower, located between Campbell and Lowellville. According to Wikipedia, the yard was operated by the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad, and it was used as a sorting and switching yard for freight cars with the Baltimore and Ohio, and New York Central Railroads. Youngstown Sheet and Tube, and Republic Steel had huge complexes nearby. We were there at night and it was an amazing scene of long lines of rail cars being sorted and connected to locomotives in the foreground, with the glow of blast furnaces from the nearby mills in the distance. The Gateway Yard opened in 1957, and I must have visited it within five years of it opening. The facility operated until 1993, when CSX shut it down.
Passenger rail service also was an important means of transportation growing up. I served as a safety patrol boy for a couple years in elementary school and there would be annual Safety Patrol Days at Municipal Stadium in Cleveland. We would take the Erie Lackawanna line from downtown Youngstown for an hour or so trip to downtown Cleveland, see the Indians play, and then ride back to Youngstown. These were the only times I ever rode a train between cities, other than an round trip on Amtrack between Toledo and Cleveland in the 70s. I’ve often wished there were trains between Columbus, and places like Cincinnati, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and Chicago, places I visit often. I loved the sound of the cars on the rails and the smooth gliding sensation.
By Jack Pearce [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Many of the old train yards have now been torn up, going into oblivion with the steel mills they once served. There is still rail traffic in the area, particularly serving the General Motors complex at Lordstown, northwest of the city. Genesee and Wyoming operate several short rail lines in this area including the Youngstown Belt Railroad, the Youngstown and Austintown Railroad, the Mahoning Valley Railroad, and the Youngstown and Southeastern Railroad. These in turn connect with CSX and Norfolk Southern lines, national rail carriers. The Mahoning Valley Railroad Heritage Association keeps the history of Youngstown’s railroads and their connection to the steel industry alive, including displays at the Western Reserve Village during the Canfield Fair.
What are your memories of railroads in the Youngstown area? Did you have relatives who worked for the railroads and what was this like for them?
I absolutely LOVE all of the articles you have written. I remember standing on the bridge between Wood Street and downtown with my dad and watching trains. My dad died when I was 10 but I think I was like 4-5 when this happened. We also took the train to Cleveland and Mom and I would shop while Daddy and Tom went to the baseball game. Wonderful memories
Thanks, Joyce. I’ve enjoyed hearing all the wonderful memories of others.
My dad worked on the railroad over 40 years. First Pennsylvania rr, Penn Central, then Conrail. He was an engineer when he retired. I remember when I was young he would take one of us with him to the Hazelton rail yard to pick up his pay and then out of breakfast, usually The Dog House, then do errands and sometimes stop off at Parkers icecream for a root beer float.
I wonder if that rail yard building is still there. ? I’d like to see it if it is.?
My dad worked on the railroad over 40 years. First Pennsylvania rr, Penn Central, then Conrail. He was an engineer when he retired. I remember when I was young he would take one of us with him to the Hazelton rail yard to pick up his pay and then out of breakfast, usually The Dog House, then do errands and sometimes stop off at Parkers icecream for a root beer float.
I wonder if that rail yard building is still there. ? I’d like to see it if it is.?
During my YSU days I was very lucky to have worked on the railroads during summer break, the summer 1967 I worked for the Pennsylvania RR out of the Hazelton yard near Struthers plus the Niles yard and the Lordstown yard , the summer of 1968 I worked for the B&O , where learned to be very good breakman,the B&O yard was more complicated than uthe nearby Hazelton , Pennsylvania RR yard at B&O yard was very long plus switched cars out in Republic Steel, worked mostly 3rd shift to be able to take summer classes at YSU, the summer of 1969 I worked Penn Central out of Hazelton and the old heads were impressed with my greatly improved railroading ability since my 1967 stint with P Company . I have very fond memories of my summers working on the rail road , I learned something from each and every railroader I worked with and recall the memories of that experience. And yes thanks to the money I earned in the summer enabled me to go to OSU dental school, Class of 1972. RR was such a great experience with indelible memories that I recall everyday.
My father Leo worked for the B&O from the end of WW2 until the mid-1960s. Even after finishing college and law school and securing a job as Judge Woodside’s chief deputy clerk at the Probate Court, he stayed on the “extra board” and worked a few days a month. We spent many summer evenings train-watching at the Center Street crossing.
In the summer of 1964, when I was 3, we went on an epic adventure that began on the eastbound platform at the B&O station. We went to Pittsburgh on #8 that morning, which arrived on schedule at 7:36. I had French toast in the diner. Aftre a ride on the incline and a streetcar ride to Forbes Field, we went to a baseball game that afternoon, courtesy of “Uncle” Myron O’Brisky, a friend of Dad’s who ran the concessions at Forbes Field.
While we were waiting for the train, I struck up a conversation with a young lady in her twenties. “Are you going to Pittsburgh too?” “No. I’m just here to watch the trains.” To 3-year old me, that seemed perfectly understandable–who wouldn’t want to watch B&O trains if they had the chance?
After decades of railfanning, I can say beyond all doubt that the number of young women in their twenties who are full-bore train nerds is vanishingly small. The number who would go to a railroad station on a weekday at 7:30 AM just to watch trains is a very small fraction of that very small number. The number of young women railfans who would do that in 1964 was even smaller than today’s really small number. I must have sensed that on some level, because that detail has always stuck with me.
Many years later, I saw a photo of my birth mother taken when she was in her early twenties, and then it all made sense. She’d been in touch with the foster family that had me before I was adopted, and for my first few years sent me birthday and Christmas presents through them. I can imagine Mom and Dad letting her know that if she wanted to see me, she could meet us on the platform on a particular day.