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Great Northern Railway (U.S.)

January 01, 1970

This article is about the US railway. For other railways with the same name, see Great Northern Railway.

The Great Northern Railway (reporting mark GN) was an American Class I railroad. Running from Saint Paul, Minnesota, to Seattle, Washington, it was the creation of 19th-century railroad entrepreneur James J. Hill and was developed from the Saint Paul & Pacific Railroad. The Great Northern's route was the northernmost transcontinental railroad route in the U.S.

Great Northern Railway
GN system map, c. 1918; dotted lines represent nearby railroads.
The Empire Builder traveling through Glacier Park Montana. (1947)
Overview
HeadquartersRailroad and Bank Building
Saint Paul, Minnesota
Founders
Reporting markGN
Locale
Dates of operation1889–1970
SuccessorBurlington Northern Railroad
Technical
Track gauge4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)
Length8,368 miles (13,467 km)
GN's 4-8-4 S-2 "Northern" class locomotive #2584 and nearby sculpture, U.S.–Canada Friendship in Havre, Montana

In 1970, the Great Northern Railway merged with three other railroads to form the Burlington Northern Railroad, which merged in 1996 with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to form the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway.

History edit

 
William Crooks in 1939 with the Great Northern logo above the drivers
Revenue freight traffic, in millions of net ton-miles (incl. FG&S; not incl. PC or MA&CR)
Year Traffic
1925 8,521
1933 5,434
1944 19,583
1960 15,831
1967 17,938
Source: ICC annual reports

The Great Northern was built in stages, slowly creating profitable lines, before extending the road further into undeveloped Western territories. In a series of the earliest public relations campaigns, contests were held to promote interest in the railroad and the ranchlands along its route. Fred J. Adams used promotional incentives such as feed and seed donations to farmers getting started along the line. Contests were all-inclusive, from the largest farm animals to the largest freight carload capacity, and were promoted heavily to immigrants and newcomers from the East.[1]

The very first predecessor railroad to the company was the St. Paul and Pacific Railroad owned by William Crooks. He had gone bankrupt running a small line between St. Paul and Minneapolis. He named the locomotive he ran for himself and the William Crooks would be the first locomotive of the Great Northern Railway. J.J. Hill convinced New York banker John S. Kennedy, Norman Kittson (a wealthy fur trader friend), Donald Smith (a Hudson's Bay Company executive), George Stephen (Smith's cousin and president of the Bank of Montreal), and others to invest $5.5 million in purchasing the railroad.[2] On March 13, 1878, the road's creditors formally signed an agreement transferring their bonds and control of the railroad to J.J. Hill's investment group.[3] On September 18, 1889, Hill changed the name of the Minneapolis and St. Cloud Railway (a railroad which existed primarily on paper, but which held very extensive land grants throughout the Midwest and Pacific Northwest) to the Great Northern Railway. On February 1, 1890, he consolidated his ownership of the StPM&M, Montana Central Railway, and other rail lines to the Great Northern.[4]

The Great Northern had branches that ran north to the Canada–US border in Minnesota, North Dakota, and Montana. It also had branches that ran to Superior, Wisconsin, and Butte, Montana, connecting with the iron range of Minnesota and copper mines of Montana. In 1898 Hill purchased control of large parts of the Mesabi Iron Range in Minnesota and its rail lines. The Great Northern began large-scale shipment of ore to the steel mills of the Midwest.[5]

The railroad's best-known engineer was John Frank Stevens, who served from 1889 to 1903. Stevens was acclaimed for his 1889 exploration of Marias Pass in Montana and determined its practicability for a railroad. Stevens was an efficient administrator with remarkable technical skills and imagination. He discovered Stevens Pass through the Cascade Mountains, set railroad construction standards in the Mesabi Range, and supervised the construction of the Oregon Trunk Line. He then became the chief engineer of the Panama Canal.[6]

The logo of the railroad, a Rocky Mountain goat, was based on a goat William Kenney, one of the railroad's presidents, had used to haul newspapers as a boy.[7][8][9]

Locomotives and passenger cars were repaired and overhauled at the shops in St. Paul, Minnesota, while the shops at nearby St. Cloud were dedicated to freight cars beginning in 1890. In 1892, a new shop site was established five miles west of Spokane, Washington in Hillyard (named after James Hill) to serve the western half of the GN system.

Mainline edit

 
A Great Northern H class pacific with a Belpaire firebox. Belpaire fireboxes were rare in the US, but the Pennsylvania and Great Northern both had locomotives featuring them in significant numbers. They were mostly manufactured by or to Baldwin specifications. (1914)
 
Great Northern boxcabs exiting the Cascade Tunnel.
 
Great Northern brakeman checks train from caboose.

The mainline began at Saint Paul, Minnesota, heading west along the Mississippi River bluffs, crossing the river to Minneapolis on a massive multi-piered stone arch bridge just below the Saint Anthony Falls. The bridge ceased to be used as a railroad bridge in 1978, becoming a pedestrian river crossing with excellent views of the falls and of the lock system. The mainline headed northwest from the Twin Cities, across North Dakota and eastern Montana. The line then crossed the Rocky Mountains at Marias Pass. It then followed the Flathead River and then Kootenai River to Bonners Ferry, Idaho, south to Sandpoint, Idaho, west to Newport, Washington, and then to Spokane, Washington. The company town and extensive railroad facility of Hillyard, Washington was named after James J. Hill and briefly manufactured the R Class 2-8-8-2 around 1927 which was the largest steam locomotive in the world at the time.[10] From there the mainline crossed the Cascade Mountains through the Cascade Tunnel under Stevens Pass, reaching Seattle, Washington, in 1893, with the driving of the last spike at Scenic, Washington, on January 6, 1893. The Great Northern electrified Steven's Pass and briefly owned the electric Spokane and Inland Empire Railway. The deadliest avalanche in US history swept two Great Northern trains off the tracks at Wellington, Washington by the Cascade Tunnel killing 96 people.

The mainline west of Marias Pass has been relocated twice. The original route over Haskell Pass, via Kalispell and Marion, Montana, was replaced in 1904 by a more circuitous but flatter route via Whitefish and Eureka, joining the Kootenai River at Rexford, Montana. A further reroute was necessitated by the construction of the Libby Dam on the Kootenai River in the late 1960s. The United States Army Corps of Engineers built a new route through the Salish Mountains, including the 7-mile-long (11 km) Flathead Tunnel, second-longest in the United States, to relocate the tracks away from the Kootenai River. This route opened in 1970. The surviving portions of the older routes (from Columbia Falls to Kalispell and Stryker to Eureka), were operated by Watco as the Mission Mountain Railroad until April 1, 2020, when BNSF (GN's modern successor) took back control of the Kalispell to Columbia Falls section.

The Great Northern mainline crossed the continental divide through Marias Pass, the lowest crossing of the Rockies south of the Canada–US border. Here, the mainline forms the southern border of Glacier National Park, which the GN promoted heavily as a tourist attraction. GN constructed stations at East Glacier and West Glacier entries to the park, stone and timber lodges at the entries, and other inns and lodges throughout the Park. Many of the structures have been listed on the National Register of Historic Places due to unique construction, location, and the beauty of the surrounding regions.

In 1931, the GN also developed the "Inside Gateway", a route to California that rivaled the Southern Pacific Railroad's route between Oregon and California. The GN route was further inland than the SP route and ran south from the Columbia River in Oregon. The GN connected with the Western Pacific at Bieber, California; the Western Pacific connected with the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe in Stockton, California, and together the three railroads (GN, WP, and ATSF) competed with Southern Pacific for traffic between California and the Pacific Northwest. With a terminus at Superior, Wisconsin, the Great Northern was able to provide transportation from the Pacific to the Atlantic by taking advantage of the shorter distance to Duluth from the ocean, as compared to Chicago.

 
A 1909 ad aimed at settlers, from a St. Paul newspaper

Branch lines in Fraser Valley, British Columbia, Canada edit

Between 1891 and 1917 GNR built a number of railway branch lines across the border with Canada. These lines were built to provide service to the city of New Westminster, Victoria (via ferry connection) and the new city of Vancouver. The first line was built between 1891 and 1893 providing a connection between Seattle and New Westminster. This line crossed at Blaine, passed through Cloverdale and terminated in Brownsville. In 1903 GNR constructed a line running from Cloverdale to Port Guichon (Present day Ladner, BC). A ferry service from the port provided service to Victoria and Vancouver Island. In 1909 this line was extended from Cloverdale to Huntingdon. Service from Blaine to New Westminster was redirected in 1909 over a new line past White Rock, across Mud Bay, through Annieville and on to Brownsville. After a new railway bridge was completed across the Fraser River from Brownsville to New Westminster the GNR extended its railway line to Vancouver. Between 1910 and 1913 GNR excavated the Grandview Cut to give it access to False Creek and used the resulting dirt to fill in the east end of False Creek. In 1915, on this infill, the GNR opened Union Station, the terminus of its rail line in Vancouver. Its service to Vancouver and Victoria experienced competition from a partnership between Northern Pacific and Canadian Pacific. This competing service terminated at Pacific Station in Downtown Vancouver and from there offered direct steamship service to Victoria, thus offering a superior alternative to both services offered by GNR.

Settlements edit

The Great Northern energetically promoted settlement along its lines in North Dakota and Montana, especially by Germans and Scandinavians from Europe. The Great Northern bought its lands from the federal government – it received no land grants – and resold them to farmers one by one. It operated agencies in Germany and Scandinavia that promoted its lands, and brought families over at low cost, building special colonist cars to transport immigrant families. The rapidly increasing settlement in North Dakota's Red River Valley along the Minnesota border between 1871 and 1890 was a major example of large-scale "bonanza" farming.[11][12][13]

Later history edit

 
The Big Sky Blue Empire Builder with an SDP45 in the lead. (1970)[14]

During World War II, the Army moved its Military Railway Service (MRS) headquarters to Fort Snelling, Minnesota. The MRS worked collaboratively with commercial railroading in the U.S. The Great Northern sponsored the 704th Grand Railroad Division. It was the second Grand Division that the Army stood up. The Great Northern also sponsored the 732nd Railroad Operating Battalion (ROB). They were one of two spearhead ROBs. The 732nd operated in support of the Patton's 3rd Armored Division crossing into Germany with them. The Officers of the 732nd were all previous employees of the Great Northern.

On March 2, 1970, the Great Northern, together with the Northern Pacific Railway, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad and the Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway, merged to form the Burlington Northern Railroad.[15] The BN operated until 1996 when it merged with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to form the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway.

Passenger service edit

GN operated various passenger trains, but the Empire Builder was their premier passenger train. It was named in honor of James J. Hill, known as the "Empire Builder." Amtrak still operates the Empire Builder today, running it over the old Great Northern's Northern Transcon north of St. Paul.

Named trains edit

  • Alexandrian: St. Paul–Fargo
  • Badger Express: St. Paul-Superior/Duluth (later renamed Badger)
  • Cascadian: Seattle–Spokane (1909-1959)
  • Dakotan: St. Paul-Minot
  • Eastern Express: Seattle-St. Paul (1903–1906) (replaced by Fast Mail in 1906)[16]
  • Empire Builder: Chicago-Seattle/Portland (1929–present)
  • Fast Mail No. 27: St. Paul–Seattle (1906–1910) (renamed The Oregonian in 1910)[16]
  • Glacier Park Limited: St. Paul–Seattle (1915-1929) (replaced by Empire Builder in 1929)[16]
  • Gopher: St. Paul-Superior/Duluth
  • Great Northern Express: (1909–1918) Kansas City-Seattle[17][18]
  • International: Seattle-Vancouver, B.C.
  • Oregonian : St. Paul–Seattle (1910–1915) (replaced by Glacier Park Limited in 1915)[16]
  • Oriental Limited : Chicago-St. Paul-Seattle (replaced by Western Star in 1951)
  • Puget Sound Express: St. Paul-Seattle (1903–1906) (replaced by Fast Mail in 1906)[16]
  • Red River Limited: Grand Forks-St. Paul (later renamed Red River)
  • Seattle Express[19]
  • Southeast Express: (1909–1918) Seattle-Kansas City[17][20]
  • Western Star : Chicago-St. Paul-Seattle-Portland
  • Winnipeg Limited: St. Paul-Winnipeg

Rolling stock edit

In 1951 the company owned 844 locomotives, including 568 steam, 261 diesel-electric and 15 all-electric, as well 822 passenger-train cars and 43.897 freight-train cars.[21]

Paint schemes edit

The Great Northern had numerous paint scheme variations and color changes over the years, but Rocky the goat was consistently featured.[14]

Preservation edit

Preserved steam locomotives edit

Locomotive no. Class Type Built Retired City Location Extra information
1 - William Crooks 1 4-4-0 1861 9/1897 Duluth, Minnesota Lake Superior Railroad Museum In June 1962, the Great Northern transferred ownership to the Minnesota Historical Society
Was at Saint Paul Union Depot from June 1954 to 1975
1147 F-8 2-8-0 8/1902 6/1956 Wenatchee, Washington Lions Locomotive Park
1100 South Wenatchee Avenue		 Location also called "Mission Street Park"[22]
1246 F-8 2-8-0 11/1907 7/1953 Snoqualmie, Washington Northwest Railway Museum Purchased from Fred Kepner Collection upon his death in 2021[23]
Was stored by Kepner in Merrill, Oregon. Acquired by Northwest Railway Museum in April 2023.
1355 H-5 4-6-2 Rebuilt from E-14 1020 5/1924 7/1955 Sioux City, Iowa Milwaukee Shops Completed cosmetic restoration
2507 P-2 4-8-2 10/1923 12/1957 Wishram, Washington Wishram Depot Hidden under shelter
2523 P-2 4-8-2 10/1923 4/1958 Willmar, Minnesota Kandiyohi County Historical Society
2584 S-2 4-8-4 3/1930 12/1957 Havre, Montana Havre Depot Largest surviving GN steam locomotive
3059 O-1 2-8-2 2/1913 12/1957 Williston, North Dakota Williston Depot

Preserved diesel locomotives edit

Rails to Trails edit

In addition to the Stone Arch Bridge, parts of the railway have been turned into pedestrian and bicycle trails. In Minnesota, the Cedar Lake Trail is built in areas that were formerly railroad yards for the Great Northern Railway and the Minneapolis and St. Louis Railway. Also in Minnesota, the Dakota Rail Trail is built on 26.5 miles of the railroad right-of-way. In Kalispell, Montana the original Great Northern grade from 1892 has been converted into a trail. The trail starts in Kila, MT, and goes to Kalispell Montana, travelling through downtown, right past the Kalispell Depot. The section of rails from Kila to West Kalispell was taken out in the early 1900s, while the section from downtown to where the current end of rail is was taken out in 2021. Further west, the Iron Goat Trail in Washington follows the late 19th-century route of the Great Northern Railway through the Cascades and gets its name from the railway's logo.[24][25] The Spokane and Inland Empire Railroad that James J. Hill purchased in 1929 became a bicycle path between Spokane, Wa and Coeur d'Alene, Id. and Spokane, Wa. and Pullman, Wa.

In popular culture edit

 
A Great Northern Railway train pauses for the photographer four miles west of Minot in 1914.

Appearances in popular culture:

See also edit

Footnotes edit

  1. ^ Martin (1991), chapter 12.
  2. ^ Malone (1996), p. 38-41.
  3. ^ Malone (1996), p. 49.
  4. ^ Yenne (2005), p. 23.
  5. ^ Hofsommer (1996).
  6. ^ Hidy & Hidy (1969).
  7. ^ The Great Northern Goat. Vol. 10–15. 1939. p. 11.
  8. ^ Downs, Winfield Scott (1940). Encyclopedia of American Biography. American Historical Company.
  9. ^ ""Kenney's Goat" Story Recalled". Spokane Daily Chronicle. November 12, 1931. p. 1.
  10. ^ "GN Steam Locos". www.gngoat.org. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
  11. ^ Murray (1957), p. 57-66.
  12. ^ Hickcox (1983), p. 58-67.
  13. ^ Zeidel (1993), p. 14–23.
  14. ^ a b "GNRHS : GN Paint Schemes". www.gnrhs.org. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
  15. ^ Lennon, J. Establishing Trails on Rights-of-Way. Washington, D.C.: United States Department of the Interior. p. 50.
  16. ^ a b c d e "Glacier Park Limited". Ted's Great Northern Homepage. from the original on March 26, 2012. Retrieved March 6, 2012.
  17. ^ a b "Transcontinental Trains". Ted's Great Northern Homepage. from the original on March 26, 2012. Retrieved March 6, 2012.
  18. ^ "Great Northern Express". Ted's Great Northern Homepage. from the original on March 26, 2012. Retrieved March 6, 2012.
  19. ^ "Archives West: Great Northern Railway Company Wellington Disaster records, 1907–1911". nwda-db.wsulibs.wsu.edu. from the original on August 23, 2011. Retrieved May 4, 2018.
  20. ^ "Three Daily Trains". Great Northern Railway. c. 1912. Archived from the original on May 4, 2018. Retrieved March 6, 2012.
  21. ^ "Great Northern History". Retrieved September 17, 2022.
  22. ^ rgusrail.com
  23. ^ Wrinn, Jim. "Major private collection of steam locomotives is sold to Oregon Coast Scenic Railroad". Trains.com. Retrieved December 30, 2021.
  24. ^ Andrew Weber; Bryce Stevens (February 1, 2010). 60 Hikes Within 60 Miles: Seattle: Including Bellevue, Everett, and Tacoma. Menasha Ridge Press. p. 232. ISBN 978-0-89732-812-8. from the original on May 4, 2018.
  25. ^ Mike McQuaide (2005). Day Hike! Central Cascades: The Best Trails You Can Hike in a Day. Sasquatch Books. p. 30. ISBN 978-1-57061-412-5. from the original on May 4, 2018.
  26. ^ Rand, Peikoff & Schwartz (1989), p. 92.
  27. ^ Cusic, Don (2003). It's The Cowboy Way: The Amazing True Adventures of Riders in the Sky. University Press of Kentucky. p. 227. ISBN 0813122848.

References edit

  • Doyle, Ted. "Great Northern Flyer". Teds' Great Northern Homepage.
  • Hickcox, David H. (1983). "The Impact of the Great Northern Railway on Settlement in Northern Montana, 1880–1920". Railroad History. 148 (Spring 1983): 58–67. JSTOR 43523868.
  • Hidy, Ralph; Hidy, Muriel E. (1969). "John Frank Stevens, Great Northern Engineer" (PDF). Minnesota History. 41 (8): 345–361.
  • Hidy, Ralph W.; Hidy, Muriel E.; Scott, Roy V.; Hofsummer, Don L. (2004) [1988]. The Great Northern Railway: A History. Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press. ISBN 978-0-816-64429-2. OCLC 54885353.
  • Hofsommer, Don L. (1996). "Ore Docks and Trains: The Great Northern Railway and the Mesabi Range". Railroad History. 174 (Spring 1996): 5–25. JSTOR 43521883.
  • Hofsommer, Don L. "Rivals for California: The Great Northern and the Southern Pacific, 1905-1931." Montana: The Magazine of Western History 38.2 (1988): 58–67.
  • Malone, James P. (1996). James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest. Norman, OK, USA: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 978-0806128603.
  • Martin, Albro (1991). James J. Hill and the Opening of the Northwest. Minnesota Historical Society Press. ISBN 978-0873512619.
  • Murray, Stanley N. (1957). "Railroads and the Agricultural Development of the Red River Valley of the North, 1870–1890". Agricultural History. 31 (4): 57–66. JSTOR 3740486.
  • Rand, Ayn; Peikoff, Leonard; Schwartz, Peter (1989). The Voice of Reason: Essays in Objectivist Thought. New American Library. ISBN 9780453006347.
  • Sherman, T. Gary (2004). Conquest and Catastrophe: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Great Northern Railway Through Stevens Pass. Bloomington, Indiana: AuthorHouse. ISBN 978-1-4184-9575-6.
  • Sobel, Robert (1974). "Chapter 4: James J. Hill". The Entrepreneurs: Explorations within the American business tradition. Weybright & Talley. ISBN 978-0-679-40064-6.
  • Starr, Timothy (2024). The Back Shop Illustrated, Volume 3: Southeast and Western Regions. Privately printed.
  • Strauss, John F. (Jr.) (1993). Great Northern Pictorial – Volume 3. La Mirada, California: Four Ways West Publications. ISBN 0-9616874-8.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ignored ISBN errors (link)
  • Strauss, John F. (Jr.) (1994). Great Northern Pictorial – Volume 4. La Mirada, California: Four Ways West Publications. ISBN 1-885614-01-2.
  • Whitney, F.I. (1894). "Valley, Plain and Peak. Scenes on the line of the Great northern railway". St. Paul, Minnesota: Great Northern Railway Office of the general passenger and ticket agent. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  • Wilson, Jeff (2000). Great Northern Railway in the Pacific Northwest (Golden Years of Railroading). Waukesha, Wisconsin: Kalmbach Publishing. ISBN 978-0-89024-420-3.
  • Wood, Charles (1989). Great Northern Railway. Edmonds, Washington: Pacific Fast Mail. ISBN 978-0-915713-19-6.
  • Yenne, Bill (2005). Great Northern Empire Builder. St. Paul, Minnesota: MBI. ISBN 978-0-7603-1847-8.
  • Zeidel, Robert F (1993). "Peopling the Empire: The Great Northern Railroad and the Recruitment of Immigrant Settlers to North Dakota". North Dakota History. 60 (2): 14–23.

Further reading edit

Further information: James J. Hill § Further reading
  • Pyle, Joseph G. "James J. Hill." Minnesota History Bulletin 2#5 1918, pp. 295–323. online
  • Rae, John B. "The Great Northern's land grant." Journal of Economic History 12.2 (1952): 140-145.

External links edit

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Great Northern Railway (US).
  • Lively World of Great Northern (Around 1960)
  • Fort Langley
  • Great Northern Railway Company Records, Minnesota Historical Society.
  • Great Northern Railway Historical Society
  • The Great Northern Empire — Then and Now
  • The Great Northern Railway
  • Great Northern Railway Page
  • — photographs and short history of one of six streamlined baggage-mail cars built for the Great Northern by the American Car and Foundry Company in 1950.
  • Great Northern Railway route map (1920) September 11, 2006, at the Wayback Machine
  • , Book about Louis W. Hill Sr., son and successor of empire builder James J. Hill at Ramsey County Historical Society.
  • "The Egotistigraphy", by John Sanford Barnes. An autobiography, including his role in the early financing of the Great Northern Railway and the career of James J. Hill, privately printed 1910. Internet edition edited by Susan Bainbridge Hay 2012
  • Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) No. MT-52, "Great Northern Depot, 100-110 Neill Avenue, Helena, Lewis and Clark County, MT", 7 photos, 11 data pages, 1 photo caption page
  • HAER No. MT-53, "Great Northern Railroad Bed, From Big Sandy to Verona, Fort Benton, Chouteau County, MT", 8 photos, 13 data pages, 1 photo caption page

January 01, 1970
great, northern, railway, this, article, about, railway, other, railways, with, same, name, great, northern, railway, great, northern, railway, reporting, mark, american, class, railroad, running, from, saint, paul, minnesota, seattle, washington, creation, 19. This article is about the US railway For other railways with the same name see Great Northern Railway The Great Northern Railway reporting mark GN was an American Class I railroad Running from Saint Paul Minnesota to Seattle Washington it was the creation of 19th century railroad entrepreneur James J Hill and was developed from the Saint Paul amp Pacific Railroad The Great Northern s route was the northernmost transcontinental railroad route in the U S Great Northern RailwayGN system map c 1918 dotted lines represent nearby railroads The Empire Builder traveling through Glacier Park Montana 1947 OverviewHeadquartersRailroad and Bank BuildingSaint Paul MinnesotaFoundersJames J HillJohn S KennedyNorman KittsonDonald SmithGeorge StephenReporting markGNLocaleBritish ColumbiaCaliforniaIdahoIowaManitobaMinnesotaMontanaNorth DakotaOregonSouth DakotaWashingtonWisconsinDates of operation1889 1970SuccessorBurlington Northern RailroadTechnicalTrack gauge4 ft 8 1 2 in 1 435 mm Length8 368 miles 13 467 km GN s 4 8 4 S 2 Northern class locomotive 2584 and nearby sculpture U S Canada Friendship in Havre Montana In 1970 the Great Northern Railway merged with three other railroads to form the Burlington Northern Railroad which merged in 1996 with the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to form the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Contents 1 History 1 1 Mainline 1 2 Branch lines in Fraser Valley British Columbia Canada 1 3 Settlements 1 4 Later history 2 Passenger service 2 1 Named trains 3 Rolling stock 4 Paint schemes 5 Preservation 5 1 Preserved steam locomotives 5 2 Preserved diesel locomotives 5 3 Rails to Trails 6 In popular culture 7 See also 8 Footnotes 9 References 10 Further reading 11 External linksHistory edit nbsp William Crooks in 1939 with the Great Northern logo above the driversRevenue freight traffic in millions of net ton miles incl FG amp S not incl PC or MA amp CR Year Traffic 1925 8 521 1933 5 434 1944 19 583 1960 15 831 1967 17 938 Source ICC annual reportsThe Great Northern was built in stages slowly creating profitable lines before extending the road further into undeveloped Western territories In a series of the earliest public relations campaigns contests were held to promote interest in the railroad and the ranchlands along its route Fred J Adams used promotional incentives such as feed and seed donations to farmers getting started along the line Contests were all inclusive from the largest farm animals to the largest freight carload capacity and were promoted heavily to immigrants and newcomers from the East 1 The very first predecessor railroad to the company was the St Paul and Pacific Railroad owned by William Crooks He had gone bankrupt running a small line between St Paul and Minneapolis He named the locomotive he ran for himself and the William Crooks would be the first locomotive of the Great Northern Railway J J Hill convinced New York banker John S Kennedy Norman Kittson a wealthy fur trader friend Donald Smith a Hudson s Bay Company executive George Stephen Smith s cousin and president of the Bank of Montreal and others to invest 5 5 million in purchasing the railroad 2 On March 13 1878 the road s creditors formally signed an agreement transferring their bonds and control of the railroad to J J Hill s investment group 3 On September 18 1889 Hill changed the name of the Minneapolis and St Cloud Railway a railroad which existed primarily on paper but which held very extensive land grants throughout the Midwest and Pacific Northwest to the Great Northern Railway On February 1 1890 he consolidated his ownership of the StPM amp M Montana Central Railway and other rail lines to the Great Northern 4 The Great Northern had branches that ran north to the Canada US border in Minnesota North Dakota and Montana It also had branches that ran to Superior Wisconsin and Butte Montana connecting with the iron range of Minnesota and copper mines of Montana In 1898 Hill purchased control of large parts of the Mesabi Iron Range in Minnesota and its rail lines The Great Northern began large scale shipment of ore to the steel mills of the Midwest 5 The railroad s best known engineer was John Frank Stevens who served from 1889 to 1903 Stevens was acclaimed for his 1889 exploration of Marias Pass in Montana and determined its practicability for a railroad Stevens was an efficient administrator with remarkable technical skills and imagination He discovered Stevens Pass through the Cascade Mountains set railroad construction standards in the Mesabi Range and supervised the construction of the Oregon Trunk Line He then became the chief engineer of the Panama Canal 6 The logo of the railroad a Rocky Mountain goat was based on a goat William Kenney one of the railroad s presidents had used to haul newspapers as a boy 7 8 9 Locomotives and passenger cars were repaired and overhauled at the shops in St Paul Minnesota while the shops at nearby St Cloud were dedicated to freight cars beginning in 1890 In 1892 a new shop site was established five miles west of Spokane Washington in Hillyard named after James Hill to serve the western half of the GN system Mainline edit This section does not cite any sources Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed April 2017 Learn how and when to remove this message nbsp A Great Northern H class pacific with a Belpaire firebox Belpaire fireboxes were rare in the US but the Pennsylvania and Great Northern both had locomotives featuring them in significant numbers They were mostly manufactured by or to Baldwin specifications 1914 nbsp Great Northern boxcabs exiting the Cascade Tunnel nbsp Great Northern brakeman checks train from caboose The mainline began at Saint Paul Minnesota heading west along the Mississippi River bluffs crossing the river to Minneapolis on a massive multi piered stone arch bridge just below the Saint Anthony Falls The bridge ceased to be used as a railroad bridge in 1978 becoming a pedestrian river crossing with excellent views of the falls and of the lock system The mainline headed northwest from the Twin Cities across North Dakota and eastern Montana The line then crossed the Rocky Mountains at Marias Pass It then followed the Flathead River and then Kootenai River to Bonners Ferry Idaho south to Sandpoint Idaho west to Newport Washington and then to Spokane Washington The company town and extensive railroad facility of Hillyard Washington was named after James J Hill and briefly manufactured the R Class 2 8 8 2 around 1927 which was the largest steam locomotive in the world at the time 10 From there the mainline crossed the Cascade Mountains through the Cascade Tunnel under Stevens Pass reaching Seattle Washington in 1893 with the driving of the last spike at Scenic Washington on January 6 1893 The Great Northern electrified Steven s Pass and briefly owned the electric Spokane and Inland Empire Railway The deadliest avalanche in US history swept two Great Northern trains off the tracks at Wellington Washington by the Cascade Tunnel killing 96 people The mainline west of Marias Pass has been relocated twice The original route over Haskell Pass via Kalispell and Marion Montana was replaced in 1904 by a more circuitous but flatter route via Whitefish and Eureka joining the Kootenai River at Rexford Montana A further reroute was necessitated by the construction of the Libby Dam on the Kootenai River in the late 1960s The United States Army Corps of Engineers built a new route through the Salish Mountains including the 7 mile long 11 km Flathead Tunnel second longest in the United States to relocate the tracks away from the Kootenai River This route opened in 1970 The surviving portions of the older routes from Columbia Falls to Kalispell and Stryker to Eureka were operated by Watco as the Mission Mountain Railroad until April 1 2020 when BNSF GN s modern successor took back control of the Kalispell to Columbia Falls section The Great Northern mainline crossed the continental divide through Marias Pass the lowest crossing of the Rockies south of the Canada US border Here the mainline forms the southern border of Glacier National Park which the GN promoted heavily as a tourist attraction GN constructed stations at East Glacier and West Glacier entries to the park stone and timber lodges at the entries and other inns and lodges throughout the Park Many of the structures have been listed on the National Register of Historic Places due to unique construction location and the beauty of the surrounding regions In 1931 the GN also developed the Inside Gateway a route to California that rivaled the Southern Pacific Railroad s route between Oregon and California The GN route was further inland than the SP route and ran south from the Columbia River in Oregon The GN connected with the Western Pacific at Bieber California the Western Pacific connected with the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe in Stockton California and together the three railroads GN WP and ATSF competed with Southern Pacific for traffic between California and the Pacific Northwest With a terminus at Superior Wisconsin the Great Northern was able to provide transportation from the Pacific to the Atlantic by taking advantage of the shorter distance to Duluth from the ocean as compared to Chicago nbsp A 1909 ad aimed at settlers from a St Paul newspaper Branch lines in Fraser Valley British Columbia Canada edit Between 1891 and 1917 GNR built a number of railway branch lines across the border with Canada These lines were built to provide service to the city of New Westminster Victoria via ferry connection and the new city of Vancouver The first line was built between 1891 and 1893 providing a connection between Seattle and New Westminster This line crossed at Blaine passed through Cloverdale and terminated in Brownsville In 1903 GNR constructed a line running from Cloverdale to Port Guichon Present day Ladner BC A ferry service from the port provided service to Victoria and Vancouver Island In 1909 this line was extended from Cloverdale to Huntingdon Service from Blaine to New Westminster was redirected in 1909 over a new line past White Rock across Mud Bay through Annieville and on to Brownsville After a new railway bridge was completed across the Fraser River from Brownsville to New Westminster the GNR extended its railway line to Vancouver Between 1910 and 1913 GNR excavated the Grandview Cut to give it access to False Creek and used the resulting dirt to fill in the east end of False Creek In 1915 on this infill the GNR opened Union Station the terminus of its rail line in Vancouver Its service to Vancouver and Victoria experienced competition from a partnership between Northern Pacific and Canadian Pacific This competing service terminated at Pacific Station in Downtown Vancouver and from there offered direct steamship service to Victoria thus offering a superior alternative to both services offered by GNR Settlements edit The Great Northern energetically promoted settlement along its lines in North Dakota and Montana especially by Germans and Scandinavians from Europe The Great Northern bought its lands from the federal government it received no land grants and resold them to farmers one by one It operated agencies in Germany and Scandinavia that promoted its lands and brought families over at low cost building special colonist cars to transport immigrant families The rapidly increasing settlement in North Dakota s Red River Valley along the Minnesota border between 1871 and 1890 was a major example of large scale bonanza farming 11 12 13 Later history edit nbsp The Big Sky Blue Empire Builder with an SDP45 in the lead 1970 14 During World War II the Army moved its Military Railway Service MRS headquarters to Fort Snelling Minnesota The MRS worked collaboratively with commercial railroading in the U S The Great Northern sponsored the 704th Grand Railroad Division It was the second Grand Division that the Army stood up The Great Northern also sponsored the 732nd Railroad Operating Battalion ROB They were one of two spearhead ROBs The 732nd operated in support of the Patton s 3rd Armored Division crossing into Germany with them The Officers of the 732nd were all previous employees of the Great Northern On March 2 1970 the Great Northern together with the Northern Pacific Railway the Chicago Burlington and Quincy Railroad and the Spokane Portland and Seattle Railway merged to form the Burlington Northern Railroad 15 The BN operated until 1996 when it merged with the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to form the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway Passenger service editGN operated various passenger trains but the Empire Builder was their premier passenger train It was named in honor of James J Hill known as the Empire Builder Amtrak still operates the Empire Builder today running it over the old Great Northern s Northern Transcon north of St Paul Named trains edit Alexandrian St Paul Fargo Badger Express St Paul Superior Duluth later renamed Badger Cascadian Seattle Spokane 1909 1959 Dakotan St Paul Minot Eastern Express Seattle St Paul 1903 1906 replaced by Fast Mail in 1906 16 Empire Builder Chicago Seattle Portland 1929 present Fast Mail No 27 St Paul Seattle 1906 1910 renamed The Oregonian in 1910 16 Glacier Park Limited St Paul Seattle 1915 1929 replaced by Empire Builder in 1929 16 Gopher St Paul Superior Duluth Great Northern Express 1909 1918 Kansas City Seattle 17 18 International Seattle Vancouver B C Oregonian St Paul Seattle 1910 1915 replaced by Glacier Park Limited in 1915 16 Oriental Limited Chicago St Paul Seattle replaced by Western Star in 1951 Puget Sound Express St Paul Seattle 1903 1906 replaced by Fast Mail in 1906 16 Red River Limited Grand Forks St Paul later renamed Red River Seattle Express 19 Southeast Express 1909 1918 Seattle Kansas City 17 20 Western Star Chicago St Paul Seattle Portland Winnipeg Limited St Paul WinnipegRolling stock editIn 1951 the company owned 844 locomotives including 568 steam 261 diesel electric and 15 all electric as well 822 passenger train cars and 43 897 freight train cars 21 Paint schemes editThe Great Northern had numerous paint scheme variations and color changes over the years but Rocky the goat was consistently featured 14 Preservation editPreserved steam locomotives edit Locomotive no Class Type Built Retired City Location Extra information 1 William Crooks 1 4 4 0 1861 9 1897 Duluth Minnesota Lake Superior Railroad Museum In June 1962 the Great Northern transferred ownership to the Minnesota Historical SocietyWas at Saint Paul Union Depot from June 1954 to 1975 1147 F 8 2 8 0 8 1902 6 1956 Wenatchee Washington Lions Locomotive Park1100 South Wenatchee Avenue Location also called Mission Street Park 22 1246 F 8 2 8 0 11 1907 7 1953 Snoqualmie Washington Northwest Railway Museum Purchased from Fred Kepner Collection upon his death in 2021 23 Was stored by Kepner in Merrill Oregon Acquired by Northwest Railway Museum in April 2023 1355 H 5 4 6 2 Rebuilt from E 14 1020 5 1924 7 1955 Sioux City Iowa Milwaukee Shops Completed cosmetic restoration 2507 P 2 4 8 2 10 1923 12 1957 Wishram Washington Wishram Depot Hidden under shelter 2523 P 2 4 8 2 10 1923 4 1958 Willmar Minnesota Kandiyohi County Historical Society 2584 S 2 4 8 4 3 1930 12 1957 Havre Montana Havre Depot Largest surviving GN steam locomotive 3059 O 1 2 8 2 2 1913 12 1957 Williston North Dakota Williston Depot Preserved diesel locomotives edit EMD SD45 400 Hustle Muscle Rails to Trails edit In addition to the Stone Arch Bridge parts of the railway have been turned into pedestrian and bicycle trails In Minnesota the Cedar Lake Trail is built in areas that were formerly railroad yards for the Great Northern Railway and the Minneapolis and St Louis Railway Also in Minnesota the Dakota Rail Trail is built on 26 5 miles of the railroad right of way In Kalispell Montana the original Great Northern grade from 1892 has been converted into a trail The trail starts in Kila MT and goes to Kalispell Montana travelling through downtown right past the Kalispell Depot The section of rails from Kila to West Kalispell was taken out in the early 1900s while the section from downtown to where the current end of rail is was taken out in 2021 Further west the Iron Goat Trail in Washington follows the late 19th century route of the Great Northern Railway through the Cascades and gets its name from the railway s logo 24 25 The Spokane and Inland Empire Railroad that James J Hill purchased in 1929 became a bicycle path between Spokane Wa and Coeur d Alene Id and Spokane Wa and Pullman Wa In popular culture edit nbsp A Great Northern Railway train pauses for the photographer four miles west of Minot in 1914 Appearances in popular culture The Great Northern Railway is considered to have inspired in broad outline not in specific details the Taggart Transcontinental railroad in Ayn Rand s Atlas Shrugged 26 The song Great Northern by the Western band Riders In The Sky featured on their 2002 album Ridin The Tweetsie Railroad describes a journey along the Great Northern Railway 27 See also edit nbsp Trains portal Great Northern Roster Great Northern Railway Mansfield Branch 1909 1985 W 1 GN s largest electric locomotive Spokane and Inland Empire Railroad interurban electric railway purchased by G N in 1929 Western Fruit Express Snow Dozer A snowplow design unique to the Great Northern Footnotes edit Martin 1991 chapter 12 Malone 1996 p 38 41 Malone 1996 p 49 Yenne 2005 p 23 Hofsommer 1996 Hidy amp Hidy 1969 The Great Northern Goat Vol 10 15 1939 p 11 Downs Winfield Scott 1940 Encyclopedia of American Biography American Historical Company Kenney s Goat Story Recalled Spokane Daily Chronicle November 12 1931 p 1 GN Steam Locos www gngoat org Retrieved March 12 2022 Murray 1957 p 57 66 Hickcox 1983 p 58 67 Zeidel 1993 p 14 23 a b GNRHS GN Paint Schemes www gnrhs org Retrieved March 12 2022 Lennon J Establishing Trails on Rights of Way Washington D C United States Department of the Interior p 50 a b c d e Glacier Park Limited Ted s Great Northern Homepage Archived from the original on March 26 2012 Retrieved March 6 2012 a b Transcontinental Trains Ted s Great Northern Homepage Archived from the original on March 26 2012 Retrieved March 6 2012 Great Northern Express Ted s Great Northern Homepage Archived from the original on March 26 2012 Retrieved March 6 2012 Archives West Great Northern Railway Company Wellington Disaster records 1907 1911 nwda db wsulibs wsu edu Archived from the original on August 23 2011 Retrieved May 4 2018 Three Daily Trains Great Northern Railway c 1912 Archived from the original on May 4 2018 Retrieved March 6 2012 Great Northern History Retrieved September 17 2022 rgusrail com Wrinn Jim Major private collection of steam locomotives is sold to Oregon Coast Scenic Railroad Trains com Retrieved December 30 2021 Andrew Weber Bryce Stevens February 1 2010 60 Hikes Within 60 Miles Seattle Including Bellevue Everett and Tacoma Menasha Ridge Press p 232 ISBN 978 0 89732 812 8 Archived from the original on May 4 2018 Mike McQuaide 2005 Day Hike Central Cascades The Best Trails You Can Hike in a Day Sasquatch Books p 30 ISBN 978 1 57061 412 5 Archived from the original on May 4 2018 Rand Peikoff amp Schwartz 1989 p 92 Cusic Don 2003 It s The Cowboy Way The Amazing True Adventures of Riders in the Sky University Press of Kentucky p 227 ISBN 0813122848 References editDoyle Ted Great Northern Flyer Teds Great Northern Homepage Hickcox David H 1983 The Impact of the Great Northern Railway on Settlement in Northern Montana 1880 1920 Railroad History 148 Spring 1983 58 67 JSTOR 43523868 Hidy Ralph Hidy Muriel E 1969 John Frank Stevens Great Northern Engineer PDF Minnesota History 41 8 345 361 Hidy Ralph W Hidy Muriel E Scott Roy V Hofsummer Don L 2004 1988 The Great Northern Railway A History Minneapolis Minnesota University Press ISBN 978 0 816 64429 2 OCLC 54885353 Hofsommer Don L 1996 Ore Docks and Trains The Great Northern Railway and the Mesabi Range Railroad History 174 Spring 1996 5 25 JSTOR 43521883 Hofsommer Don L Rivals for California The Great Northern and the Southern Pacific 1905 1931 Montana The Magazine of Western History 38 2 1988 58 67 Malone James P 1996 James J Hill Empire Builder of the Northwest Norman OK USA University of Oklahoma Press ISBN 978 0806128603 Martin Albro 1991 James J Hill and the Opening of the Northwest Minnesota Historical Society Press ISBN 978 0873512619 Murray Stanley N 1957 Railroads and the Agricultural Development of the Red River Valley of the North 1870 1890 Agricultural History 31 4 57 66 JSTOR 3740486 Rand Ayn Peikoff Leonard Schwartz Peter 1989 The Voice of Reason Essays in Objectivist Thought New American Library ISBN 9780453006347 Sherman T Gary 2004 Conquest and Catastrophe The Triumph and Tragedy of the Great Northern Railway Through Stevens Pass Bloomington Indiana AuthorHouse ISBN 978 1 4184 9575 6 Sobel Robert 1974 Chapter 4 James J Hill The Entrepreneurs Explorations within the American business tradition Weybright amp Talley ISBN 978 0 679 40064 6 Starr Timothy 2024 The Back Shop Illustrated Volume 3 Southeast and Western Regions Privately printed Strauss John F Jr 1993 Great Northern Pictorial Volume 3 La Mirada California Four Ways West Publications ISBN 0 9616874 8 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint ignored ISBN errors link Strauss John F Jr 1994 Great Northern Pictorial Volume 4 La Mirada California Four Ways West Publications ISBN 1 885614 01 2 Whitney F I 1894 Valley Plain and Peak Scenes on the line of the Great northern railway St Paul Minnesota Great Northern Railway Office of the general passenger and ticket agent a href Template Cite journal html title Template Cite journal cite journal a Cite journal requires journal help Wilson Jeff 2000 Great Northern Railway in the Pacific Northwest Golden Years of Railroading Waukesha Wisconsin Kalmbach Publishing ISBN 978 0 89024 420 3 Wood Charles 1989 Great Northern Railway Edmonds Washington Pacific Fast Mail ISBN 978 0 915713 19 6 Yenne Bill 2005 Great Northern Empire Builder St Paul Minnesota MBI ISBN 978 0 7603 1847 8 Zeidel Robert F 1993 Peopling the Empire The Great Northern Railroad and the Recruitment of Immigrant Settlers to North Dakota North Dakota History 60 2 14 23 Further reading editFurther information James J Hill Further reading Pyle Joseph G James J Hill Minnesota History Bulletin 2 5 1918 pp 295 323 online Rae John B The Great Northern s land grant Journal of Economic History 12 2 1952 140 145 External links edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to Great Northern Railway US Lively World of Great Northern Around 1960 Fort Langley Great Northern Railway Company Records Minnesota Historical Society Great Northern Railway Historical Society The Great Northern Empire Then and Now The Great Northern Railway Great Northern Railway Page Great Northern Railway Post Office Car No 42 photographs and short history of one of six streamlined baggage mail cars built for the Great Northern by the American Car and Foundry Company in 1950 Great Northern Railway route map 1920 Archived September 11 2006 at the Wayback Machine Dutiful Son Louis W Hill Sr Book Book about Louis W Hill Sr son and successor of empire builder James J Hill at Ramsey County Historical Society The Egotistigraphy by John Sanford Barnes An autobiography including his role in the early financing of the Great Northern Railway and the career of James J Hill privately printed 1910 Internet edition edited by Susan Bainbridge Hay 2012 Historic American Engineering Record HAER No MT 52 Great Northern Depot 100 110 Neill Avenue Helena Lewis and Clark County MT 7 photos 11 data pages 1 photo caption page HAER No MT 53 Great Northern Railroad Bed From Big Sandy to Verona Fort Benton Chouteau County MT 8 photos 13 data pages 1 photo caption page Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Great Northern Railway U S amp oldid 1224089430, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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