Not often does one get a clear rear view of GN's Big Sky Blue scheme on an SD45. BN 6451 shows off the simple wrap around striping and the fancy flared radiator rear nose. Built as GN 421 in July ... (more)

Not often does one get a clear rear view of GN's Big Sky Blue scheme on an SDP45. BN 9863 shows off the simple wrap around striping and the rather plain rear nose that housed the steam generator w... (more)

Burlington Northern SD7 6017 is seen at Belknap St in Superior May 1975. the 6017 was built as GN 567 in March 1953 and retired in September 1983. This unit won't get BN green until September 1976... (more)

Burlington Northern SD7 6011 resting at Minneapolis Junction October 1972. The 6011 was built as GN 561 in July 1952 and retired in September 1983. It's strange to see this unit retain its GN sign... (more)

Burlington Northern SD24 6242 is spotted by the sand tower at Grand Forks ND April 1970. The 6242 was built in May 1959 as CB&Q 502 and retired in June 1982 and traded in to General Electric. This... (more)

BN 9726 shows some wear and tear as the one time passenger F7A mates with a former NP unit at Auburn, WA. Auburn was the last stronghold for F units on the BN in the Pacific Northwest (although so... (more)

BN 654, a former GN F7A, mates up with a former NP passenger B unit spending the night in Superior, WI. Even into the BN era, the head of the lakes area was slow to switch to second generation pow... (more)

Burlington Northern SD45 6464 leads an EX GN F45 at Minneapolis MN August 1970. The 6464 was built in January 1969 as CB&Q 523 and is wearing the "Proposed" Burlington Northern merger sc... (more)

Burlington Northern SD9 6103 still wearing battered Big Sky Blue at Superior WI September 1973. The 6103 was built in February 1954 as Great Northern 576 and repainted to Big Sky Blue in October 1... (more)

It was not uncommon to find interesting mixes of BN predecessor F units around Minneapolis in the early 1970s. Here a group weather a lousy March 1973 day at the diesel facilities at Harrison St.,... (more)

One damp evening in February 1975 a colorful group of F units gathered at the turntable at BN's Seattle Interbay roundhouse. Former GN F45s, BN 6006 and 6000 mate up, flanked by Amtrak SDP40F (ear... (more)

Burlington Northern EMD F9A-2 No. BN-1 leads a passenger special from Galesburg to Yates City during the city’s annual Galesburg Railroad Days on June 24, 1995. Both BN-1 and F9B-2 No. BN-2 were... (more)

BN 9732, former GN 366A, built in Oct. 1947 shares space with other vintage power at Auburn, WA in Mary 1975. Sort of a "skies are blue, seas of green" feeling as Cascade Green intrudes ... (more)

BN 6901 is ready to depart Shelby, MT with an eastbound freight in May of 1990. The scene looks much the same today except that all the buildings to the left of the engines are gone.

By late 1970 things were pretty quite around the Minneapolis BN station. Only a handful of passenger trains made it to BN from its predecessors. I was wandering around the platform when all of a s... (more)