Once upon a time, the HIgh Line connecting the Golden State Route at McFarland and the Omaha-Denver line at Belleville, Kansas, saw four passenger trains (including a Rocket) and a half dozen freights daily. But by October 10, 1965, lucky is the photographer who catches anything moving in daylight on this much overlooked line. This is train 73 out of Kansas City with piggybacks and auto parts for Denver, behind F7A 118, making the curve around Wildcat Bluff in Manhattan, Kansas. The line, officially Subdivision 37, is unsignaled, track speed is 40 mph, and the rails will be taken up four years after Rock Island’s 1980 bankruptcy. Today, the view here is all suburban sprawl.
