At 10:53 am on February 19, 1988, I photographed this Conrail intermodal hotshot passing the 413 automatic signals near Corfu, New York on the former New York Central Water Level Route.
It was on this tangent section of track, that on May 10, 1893, New York Central & Hudson River Railroad staged its famous speed run with the specially proportioned 4-4-0 999.
In my illustrated book, North American Locomotives, published by Voyageur Press in 2012 (dedicated to the Memory of Robert A. Buck), I covered 999’s famous run with this description:
In 1893, New York Central & Hudson River Railroad staged a speed run under the direction of George H. Daniels, Central’s General Passenger Agent (and unofficial chief publicity stunt coordinator) with a specially designed 4-4-0 with exceptionally tall drivers, number 999. On May 10th, this engine with engineer Charles Hogan at the throttle sprinted west toward Buffalo with a special section of the Empire State Express. On a downgrade tangent near Corfu, New York, he opened the throttle wide; to passengers on board telegraph polls along the line blurred by ‘like a picket fence’, and those timing the train claimed to have hit 112.5 mph!
Tracking the Light Post Daily!