Indiana Northeastern Railroad 2185 leads the American History Train as it heads south at Montgomery, Michigan on September 23rd, 2022. The Nickel Plate Road steam locomotive 765 is on the end of the train around the curve and pulled the train northbound between Angola and Palmer Lake, Indiana, during the annual American History Days activities on September 24-25th of 2022
The train took guests back to the 1940s for a living history experience at Pleasant Lake from Angola. The passengers then got a 45-minute layover at Pleasant Lake where they visited with WWII reenactors, listened to live music and much more.
According to Wikipedia: The Indiana Northeastern Railroad (reporting mark IN) is a Class III short line freight railroad operating on nearly 130 miles (210 km) in southern lower Michigan, northeast Indiana and northwest Ohio.
The Indiana Northeastern Railroad Company began operations in December 1992 and is an independent privately owned company. As of 2017 the railroad hauled more than 7,000 carloads per year. Commodities moved by the railroad include corn, soybeans, wheat, and flour. It also handles plastics, fiberboard, aluminum, copper, coal, perlite, stone, lumber, glass, rendering products, as well as agricultural fertilizers and chemicals.
In the early 1990s the Hillsdale County Railway was heavily in debt. Its trackage was suffering from deferred maintenance and derailments were becoming a common occurrence. Then in 1992, a 50-car eastbound unit train from South Milford hauled by HCRC derailed near Hamilton, Indiana costing the South Milford Grain Company $30,000. The grain elevator company’s owners decided to assume HCRC’s $1 million in debt, and it acquired the railway. The grain company then created the Indiana Northeastern Railroad Company to take over the rail operations of the HCRC and its Pigeon River Railroad on December 22, 1992. It’s now owned by the grain company and farmers in the areas it serves, and major track improvements and upgrades have been done over the years creating a solid and reliable railroad.
Tech Info: DJI Mavic Air 2S Drone, RAW, 22mm, f/2.8, 1/2500, ISO 120.