Railroad Trains for the Soul: Chessie & Seaboard Hall of Fame
Earlier this year, Trains Magazine announced that it will release a special issue commemorating the 40th anniversary of the huge CSX system. In the meantime, let's have a lookback at all the notable predecessor railroads that merged into this large eastern network. This is a Charles Smiley video covering the Chessie and Seaboard systems and their predecessors.
Starting on the Chessie side, the Chesapeake & Ohio and the old Baltimore & Ohio were married by the early 1960's, which resulted in the common blue and gold paint scheme. You can also see some of the Western Maryland trains that wore their own schemes until the railroad merged with the C&O and B&O to form the Chessie System about a decade later. The Chessie System had a sleeping kitten as its legendary mascot, which originated in the C&O's passenger trains until 1971.
Next, we'll go to the Seaboard side where it started as the Seaboard Coast Line, the 1960's merger of the Atlantic Coast Line and the Seaboard Air Line railroads. Then, the Louisville & Nashville, the Clinchfield, the Georgia Railroad, and the West Point Route (to name a few) consolidated with the SCL to form the Family Lines System in the next decade. In 1982, Family Lines was rebranded as the Seaboard System, combining both the SCL and the L&N. However, the CSX Corporation actually came into existence two years earlier to hold the Chessie System and the two major Seaboard predecessors. Finally, the Chessie System and the Seaboard System continued to represent their somewhat independent paint schemes until they merged into what became CSX Transportation by 1986.
Don’t forget the small, 113-mile Richmond Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad, which was sort of a connection point between the Chessie and Seaboard networks. CSX acquired the RF&P by the early 1990’s. In addition, you will even see some trains from the predecessors of Conrail and Norfolk Southern. Of course, Conrail was split and taken over by CSX and NS in 1999. Overall, this video features all-vintage film of freight and passenger trains from the two major pre-CSX railroads. Whether you’re a CSX fan or not, you can enjoy seeing the Chessie and Seaboard rails in action without being rudely interrupted by a single CSX lettering. This is a fantastic video in honor of the whole CSX Corporation that started as a holding company and grew up to a giant railroad occupying much of the trackage in the eastern United States.
Chessie & Seaboard Hall of Fame