James -

The display of B&O hopper car #434811 is a neat way to remember the delivery of coal to the Shippensburg University power plant. Whether there was a power or steam heating plant located next to the coal unloading area served by the trestle, I can't say. Perhaps Bob Bunge can check his aerial photo from 1955 to see if that might have been the case and that the trestle wasn't strictly there to serve an Ann Arbor coal dealer.

To answer MEC_557's question about how far the trestle/track goes today, I can tell you that it does NOT come out of the back end of that grove of trees.

Les

Unless you purchase the image from the website, they are heavily marked with copyright, so I want to honor their work and effort. Some brief instructions might help:

1) Visit the URL: https://www.historicaerials.com/viewer
2) Type in the street address in the box that says "geo coordinates or street address" and you should see a map of the area;
3) click on "aerials" in the list on the left side of the map;
4) Select the year you want to look at. It might take a minute for the image to load.

I don't see any sign of a power plant; only a big gas tank farm on the other side of the tracks, now an empty lot listed as "DTE Gas Brownfield" on the Aerials website map.

Bob

Thanks Bob. I was able to get the aerial views, including 1955, although the photos were a bit hazy which is understandable. I agree that it looks as if it was a coal dealer there in 1955.

Les

The 1925 Sanborn Maps indicate that the location was the Staebler & Son Coal Yard.

See: https://www.loc.gov/resource/g4114am.g0 ... 12,0.148,0

WESIII -

Thanks so very much! I had just found on the internet, a story from 1999 in the ANN ARBOR OBSERVOR that stated that there were two retail coal yards on the Michigan Central (New York Central) and they were right next to one another on Depot Street. One was Staebler's and the other McCudden's. I was trying to figure out which one the trestle belonged to, and now you have answered the question! According to the 1999 story, a cinder block office was built in 1941 at Staebler's and was still in existence at 115 Depot Street. The offices of the owners of the 201 Depot Street building (First Martin Corporation) list their home office as 115 Depot Street and it would be interesting to know if that is the 1941 Staebler building. If it is, it has probably been renovated, but there is also the very good likelihood that the cinder block building was torn down, and a new structure built. I haven't been able to find a photo of the current building located at 115 Depot Street.

Extremely interesting to know that the concrete/steel trestle dates back to at least 1925!

Les

The Ann Arbor District Library has copies of Sanborn Maps (on micro film) for Ann Arbor with dates from 1884 to 1948. They can be found in the micro film drawers (2nd floor, way behind the periodicals desk).

Speaking of weird preservation, whatever happened to the artist who wanted to suspend a real steam locomotive from a cable over Manhattan?

Here are two odd ones in France:

http://www.musees-mulhouse.fr/en/railway-museum/
http://www.euro-t-guide.com/See_Photo/F ... eum_22.jpg

Any other museum with a full size wreck?

Or you can have this artistic gem from Wroclaw, Poland...............



It is called "Train to Heaven", apparently! (and seems to be a genuine WW2 Kriegslok 2-10-0, later PKP class Ty2)

Les, et al,

I typed the address of 115 Depot St Ann Arbor in Google Maps. It shows the trestle and car in the background and there appears to be a early 1900's 2 story brick building at the address. I will past that screen shot here if it works.

Unfortunately I can't post the screen shot so the actual URL is below:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/115+D ... 83.7465366

If you pan to the left there appear to be some other older buildings that have been incorporated into some newer construction. Would be interesting to know more about this area.

Interesting discussion, thanks for sharing this!

Mark -

Thanks for posting the link to the photo of 115 Depot Street. The building with the blue awnings DOES appear to be made of cinder blocks, so it could be the original Staebler structure that was built in 1941. Nicely done adaptation by the current owner.

The area where all these structures are located is apparently known as Kerrytown. There is a reference in the 1999 story mentioned earlier in this thread of a sign from the Staebler coal yard now displayed in a bar/restaurant in the area known as Casey's. I'll have to check that place out the next time I am visiting our daughters family there in Ann Arbor.

Les

P.S. Mark, I just "rode" down Depot Street eastbound using the "Google Maps street map" and found not only Casey's on the opposite side of the street, but an e.b. AMTRAK train stopped at the Ann Arbor station! I wonder if that Amtrak train might be a "first" of sorts, for this Google Maps service.

Les

I didn't look around very much before posting that link. That is interesting to see. I wonder if that Amtrak is stopped at the site of where an older depot was or if this is a new location for a depot.

Appreciate the interesting things you turn up.

Mark -

The Michigan Central depot from 1887 still exists a little further east at 401 Depot Street. It is now a restaurant. Sad to say, I have not yet had the chance to give it a try. Perhaps someone might have a photo of the station that they could post.

Les

I finally was able to check out Casey's Tavern which is down a bit from 201 Depot Street and the trestle with the D&M hopper car. Walked around the place and no Staebler & Son coal yard sign to be seen! I made a query and was asked if I was a Staebler! Turns out that the sign was loaned to Casey's as a wall display but that a member of the Staebler family came in a while back and reclaimed the sign! A bit of a disappointment. However, the burgers at Casey's were very good and the onion rings (and beer) excellent. Of course, since I was there, I had to take another shot of the hopper car and have included it herein. No change that I could see.

Les

How about this one for odd preservation?

This was placed near the remains of the Anhalter station in West Berlin in the '80s.
I have not found info on the locomotive itself, how they got it upside down or whatever happened to it afterward.