Big Blow 23 leads an extra east from North Platte, Nebraska, on October 22, 1966. The 8,500-hp turbine is typical of UP railroading in the mid-sixties, but for a moment take a closer look at the seemingly endless string of freight cars – a pair of stock cars, rare even then; scattered grain hoppers, a harbinger of the future; a wide load of some kind; and dozens of standard 40-foot boxcars all painted boxcar red. This in the days before unit trains and containers was the look of classic American railroading.
