The feature article in the January 1977 issue of Trains magazine was Jay Potter’s The Monsters of Mingo Junction, which highlighted Conrail’s assignment of its six-axle Alco Centuries to ore service centered around Mingo Junction, Ohio. Although Mingo Junction was well over 300 miles from my home turf, and a little out of my range at the time, it was immediately added to my bucket list. A year and a half later, a phone call from a college buddy who had already graduated ended up being a planning session for a long weekend in Mingo Junction. By August 1978, many of Conrail’s 32 C628’s, 27 C630’s, and 15 C636’s were retired and in dead lines at Collinwood or Altoona, but some still had a little life left. Here one of the largest, a C636, catches some morning sun, while an SD45 lays over two stalls away, Although the big EMD’s initially drew better assignments than the Alco’s, the fuel guzzlers didn’t last much longer than the Centuries.
