10 Railyard Releated Photographs By Jack Delano

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Worker inspecting a locomotive on a pit in the roundhouse at the C & NW Rail Road's Proviso yard, Chicago. December 1942.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Locomotive lubrication chart in the laboratory of the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad seen above a laboratory assistant who is working at a precision balance. Chicago, December 1942.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

March 1943. Santa Fe Rail Road. Retiring a locomotive driver wheel, Shopton, Iowa. The tire is heated by means of gas until it can be slipped over the wheel. Contraction on cooling will hold it firmly in place.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Photograph of the Pabst Blue Ribbon neon sign, from the Central Railroad freight terminal, Chicago. April 1943.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Working on a locomotive at the 40th Street railroad shops, Chicago. December 1942.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Locomotives over the ash pit at the roundhouse and coaling station in the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad yards, Chicago. December 1942.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

General view of one of the classification yards of the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad yards, Chicago. December 1942.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Servicing engines at coal and sand chutes at Argentine yard, Santa Fe Rail Road, Kansas City, Kansas. March 1943.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

General view of a classification yard at Chicago and Northwestern Railroad Rail Road's Proviso yard, Chicago. December 1942.

Image Credit: Jack Delano, Library of Congress, Office For War Information Collection.

Tank cars going over the hump at Proviso yard, Chicago and Northwestern Railroad Road, Chicago. April 1943.


More Information.

A classification yard.

The Chicago and Northwestern Railroad

The Santa Fe Rail Road

A Collection Of Old Magician's Promotional Posters

A collection of old magician's promotional posters, produced mainly between 1880 and 1925, the posters are mainly lithographic prints produced by promotional companies to advertise tours or stage shows that were being performed.

Alexander The Crystal seer (Claude Alexander Conlin)

Herrmann The Great (Alexander Herrmann)

Kar-mi poster circa 1914.

Newman The Great poster circa 1898.

The Mysterious Mahendra poster circa 1923.

Harry Kellar poster 1894.

Frederick Bancroft Prince Of Magicians

Laurant poster 1913

Von Arx ( Charles Albert Nicol)

Thurston The great Magician poster 1915

Forrest And Company

The Flints

The Baldwins

Hartz, premier conjurateur poster 1900.

P-51 Mustang under construction, 1942.

Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, Office Of War Information, The Library Of Congress.

P-51 "Mustang" fighter plane under at North American Aviation, Inc., Los Angeles, California, 1942.

Tank Driver

Image Credit: Office of War Information, 1944.

Tank driver by Alfred T Palmer: Fort Knox, Kentucky

Don't be Rescued from Outer Space - Fly Back in Style, the M2-F1 programme.

M2-F1 in flight 1964 Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection.

Flown from 1963 until 1966 the M2-F1(M referring to manned and F referring to flight version), dubbed the "flying bathtub" by the media, was the first design concept for a safe return vehicle that could be steered during atmospheric re entry. The wingless aircraft design was conceived as a means of landing an aircraft horizontally after atmospheric reentry. The absence of wings making the extreme heat of re-entry less damaging to the vehicle.

August 1963, Milt Thompson, test pilot and early champion of the project, on Rogers dry lakebed with m2-f1, Image Credit: NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection.

Based on 1950's design concept of Alfred J. Eggers at the Ames Research Center, California. The M2-F1 was a precursor to the M2-F2, M2-F3, HL-10, X-24A, and X-24B lifting bodies. Their unpowered approaches and landings showed that re entry vehicles, like the Space Shuttles, did not need to carry the fuel and engines required for conventional powered landings. This enabled increased payload capacity and hence more cost effective launches.

In February 1962 R. Dale Reed, an engineer at Dryden, built a model based upon the Ames M2 design and air-launched it from a radio controlled "mothership." Film taken from the models flight persuaded Dryden facilities director, Paul Bickle, to green light the construction of a full-scale version, to be used as a wind tunnel model and possibly flown as a glider.

1963 photo shows Pontiac tow vehicle in a hanger with the m2-f1 lifting body.Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection

The M2-F1 was built over a four-month period in 1962-63. The design stuck to the NASA concept of better, faster, cheaper, being built for about $30,000, with an additional $10,000 for the all important ejection seat. The design costs were kept low with NASA engineers building the tubular steel interior frame in house, reusing the landing gear from a Cessna 150, and outsourcing the plywood shell construction to Gus Briegleb and co, a local sailplane builder.

Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection. 1963 low speed car tow.

For the initial use of a ground-tow vehicle NASA engineers used a souped up Pontiac convertible. On April 5 1963, Using a 1000 foot rope fastened to the NASA Pontiac, at Rogers Dry Lake, Milt Thompson piloted the M2-F1 for the first time on-tow. The speed was 86 miles per hour, allowing the craft to just about become airborne. Speeds on-tow later reached 110 miles per hour, enabling the M2-F1 to rise about 20 feet in the air before gliding for about 20 seconds.

M2- F1 mounted in Ames Research Centre wind tunnel Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection.

In the spring of 1963 the M2-F1 was shipped to the Ames Research Center wind tunnel For two weeks of tests. After this testing phase it was decided to use a C-47 tow plane to undertake aero tows, the first of which was on August 16 1963. Rockets were also installed in the tail to extend the landing flare for about 5 seconds.

1964 picture of M2-F1 towed behind C-47 Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection

The initial tow from the C-47 was released at 12,000 feet. The lifting body descended at approximately 3600 feet per minute. When the descent had reached 1000 feet, the nose of the M2-F1 was lowered to increase speed to nearly 150 miles per hour, the flare was at 200 feet from a 20-degree dive. The landing was reported as smooth.

Ground test of rocket Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection.

Overall, more than 400 ground tows and 77 aircraft tow flights were carried out with the M2-F1. The success of Dryden's M2-F1 program led to NASA's development and construct the M2-F2 and the HL-10 programmes, and the U.S. Air Force's X-24 program.

1965 photograph of the M2-F1 in flight Image Credit : NASA Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection

The M2-F1 programme had demonstrated the feasibility of the lifting-body concept for horizontal landings of atmospheric entry vehicles, and that projects could be done cheaply and quickly. The entire project had cost approximately $50,000, excluding salaries of government employees assigned to the project.

More Information.

Milt Thompson article in Wikipedia

NASA M2F1 on Wikipedia

Dryden Flight Research Centre photographic collection

Dryden Flight Research Centre in wikipedia

A quick walk through the Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyards Inc.1941

I have selected a small sample from the acclaimed 1941"Liberty Ship" photo essay by Alfred T Palmer. I selected the photographs he took between the ships berths, I feel this creates a more focused view of life around the liberty ships as opposed to the construction and loading addressed more fully in the entire essay collection. I hope that the presentation gives an impression of walking the docks, while the ships were being fabricated. The full collection can be accessed through the Library Of Congress.

Here are two members of the Liberty Fleet lying at anchor in the basin of a large Eastern shipyard of the Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyards Inc., Baltimore, Maryland. Of the two ships visible, the john Randolf was mined in the Denmark Strait 1942, later salvaged and hulked,before finally being scrapped 1952. The Richard Henry Lee survived the war before being Scrapped in 1965.

At ground level, between the ways of this large Eastern shipyard run tracks for flat cars carrying materials or sections to be hoisted onto the deck of ships under construction.

A flat car carrying materials to be hoisted onto the decks of ships under construction

Ships of the Liberty Fleet lying at anchor in the eastern basin of Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyards Inc., awaiting final fitting and rigging. Identified here is the Roger B Tanney which was torpedoed and lost in the South Atlantic 1943.

Two members of the Liberty Fleet, one the Francis Scott Key which survived the war and was finally scrapped in 1967, lying at anchor in the basin of an Eastern shipyard, awaiting final fitting and rigging. Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyards Inc., Baltimore, Maryland.

Lying at anchor in the basin of the Bethlehem Fairfield shipyard, awaiting final fitting and rigging, is the Charles Carrol, the ship survived the war and was not scrapped until 1971.

These flat cars loaded with prefabricated and assembled sections for ships under construction at a large Eastern yard are leaving nearby plant formerly used for the manufacture of Pullman cars.

Images Of Women At Work During War Time.

The following photographs were all produced by the office of war information in the early 1940's. The pictures were to be used in the production of posters by the Office Of War Information, primarily to encourage women to join the war effort by enrolling in training programmes to take on industrial jobs. In their unaltered form they show how the photographers strived to show interesting yet candid images of working women.

Girl In A Glass House Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

This "girl in a glass house" is putting finishing touches on the bombardier nose section of a B-17F navy bomber

The more women at work the sooner we win!

A Finished poster, note how the poster emphasises that young married women are the targeted group. The following photographs are all part of the same collection, but have no associated posters. It may be that they were not used, or that the images were used for other purposes, or that the posters were not saved.

Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

working on a "Vengeance" dive bomber, Tennessee.

Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

Woman working on an airplane motor at North American Aviation, Inc.,

Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

Drilling horizontal stabilizers: operating a hand drill, this woman worker at Vultee-Nashville is shown working on the horizontal stabilizer for a Vultee "Vengeance" dive bomber, Tennessee.

Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

Switch boxes on the firewalls of B-25 bombers are assembled by women workers at North American Aviation, Inc.'s Inglewood plant.

Image Credit: David Bransby, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

Woman aircraft worker, Vega Aircraft Corporation, Burbank, Calif. Shown checking electrical assemblies.

Image Credit: Alfred T Palmer, The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

Woman machinist, Douglas Aircraft Company, Long Beach, California. 1942

Image Credit: Howard Hollam , The Library Of Congress Office Of War Information Collection.

Lathe operator machining parts for transport planes at the Consolidated Aircraft Corporation plant, Fort Worth, Texas.