2015 Archive
Community 12232015
Railroader Debuts at Carnegie Hall
The crowd inside New York City’s famous Carnegie Hall sits in hushed anticipation. Inside the jewel box of a performance space, two dozen musicians wait their turn to step onto the stage, sit at a gleaming black grand piano, and dazzle the audience with a piece of original music. Among the performers is someone you may not expect to see: Attila Gibson, a Union Pacific foreman general in the West Colton, California, locomotive shop.
Community 12182015
Houston Literacy Program Strives to Break Cycle of Poverty
Standing out like Easter eggs in a nest of the boarded-up buildings and abandoned homes that crowd Houston's Lombardy Street are three pastel-purple houses that provide hope for homeless families struggling to get by.
Community 12092015
Hooves and Paws Strike at the Heart of UP Employee
More than a dozen horses, donkeys and dogs live at the end of a winding dirt and gravel driveway in Glenwood, Iowa. They are well cared for now, but all have at some point been severely neglected or abused. Once nursed back to health some will be adopted. Others, too traumatized from years of abuse and in need of round-the-clock care, will live out the rest of their lives on a peaceful 10-acre animal sanctuary called Hooves & Paws Rescue of the Heartland.
Community 12042015
When the Railroad Comes to Town
When large teams of Union Pacific track improvement employees enter a small community, the impact is hard to miss.
Community 11232015
UP Delivers Huge Holiday Tradition
With a police escort, a large Union Pacific truck rolled slowly through downtown Omaha, Nebraska, hauling a 40-foot Colorado blue spruce Nov. 16. Delivering Omaha’s Official Christmas Tree to the Durham Museum, formerly known as Omaha’s Union Station, is a special tradition that began more than 75 years ago.
Safety 11132015
Steel Giants Promise Safe Passage
They say if a referee in a basketball game is doing his job well, you won't even know he's there.
The same can be said of a bridge. We cross them every day on our way to work or school or home. We will cross literally dozens, maybe even hundreds of bridges when trekking cross country on that annual family vacation. If those bridges are doing their jobs right, we'll never think twice about them, except to stare in awe at the big ones we admire from afar, and while we cross them, looking down at the water below.
Heritage 11122015
UP Steam Update: Making Parts for a Living Legend
When it comes to working on a Living Legend, it’s the details that matter.
Community 10302015
The Feel-Good Story that Keeps Giving
When Josh Cyganik, a track inspector out of Pendleton, Oregon, decided to paint an elderly man’s house, he didn’t expect to receive an avalanche of media inquiries, hundreds of new Facebook friends or an adjusted outlook on life.
Innovation 10072015
Union Pacific Launches Port Laredo Expansion Project
Business is booming in Texas.
Default 10012015
Overcoming Natural Disasters to Keep America Moving
Few natural disasters are more devastating than a flood.
Community 09242015
Machinist Uses Basketball to Teach Children Financial Literacy
On a warm and sunny Saturday in late July, the Next Level Sports Complex in Garden Grove, California, is humming with the sound of basketballs – dozens and dozens of them – bouncing off the polished hardwood floors. There’s a tournament here today, and teams of young boys and girls from all over the state have come to compete in this weekend’s event.
Heritage 09182015
No. 844 Boiler Work Entering Final Stages
At the heart of every steam locomotive is the boiler.
Community 09042015
Camp Provides Picture of Railroad for Visually Impaired Children
With the help of his aide, six-year-old Rocco inches closer to the edge of the tracks at the Nevada State Railroad Museum in Boulder City.
Community 08122015
Hundreds Re-Enact Westernmost Civil War Battle
Despite its name, the Battle of Picacho Pass was more like a skirmish. Still, more than 4,000 visitors and 200 Civil War re-enactors travel to the site in Arizona each year to learn about and re-live its history. It is said to be the site of the westernmost battle of the Civil War.
Community 08052015
Track Inspector's Good Deed Goes Viral
Josh Cyganik has waved to 75-year-old Leonard Bullock every morning for the past four years.
Safety 07282015
Mission Completely Possible: South St. Paul Task Force Takes On Crossing Safety
Mayor Beth Bauman started the South St. Paul Mayor's Youth Task Force with a specific mission: reduce underage drinking and smoking. Just seven years later, that mission has been accomplished.
Safety 07102015
Chicagoland Rail Safety Is High-Tech
Local elected officials, community representatives and first responders learned about and discussed emergency response, training programs for first responders and technology at the railroad during recent Hazardous Materials Safety Days at two Union Pacific yards.
Community 07022015
Paz De Cristo Community Center Empowers People in Need
Often the working poor and elderly living in Mesa, Arizona, are forced to choose between buying groceries and paying their utility bills. By June, it's already a blistering 111 degrees in Mesa.
Community 06242015
Girls Inc. Honors Tradition of Tenacity
Katherine Fletcher is an inspiration to Nebraska women. Despite being orphaned at the age of 11, she became a nurturing teacher and community leader who ushered generations of students into adulthood.
Community 06122015
UP Team Helps 'Clean Sweep' Council Bluffs
It was a dirty job, but someone had to do it, and a small but mighty team of eight from the Union Pacific Railroad Museum and Union Pacific answered the call May 12 as part of Clean Sweep Council Bluffs, Iowa. The clock was ticking; the team had 90 minutes to scour their assigned stretch of highway in search of litter and roadside trash as part of the annual clean-up that kicked off a weeklong "Celebrate CB" calendar of events. Council Bluffs is the site of milepost 0.0, the starting point of the transcontinental railroad and Union Pacific.
Heritage 06022015
Railroad Roots Connect Generations of Chinese
Some believe the contributions of Chinese workers to the Transcontinental Railroad – one of our nation's most ambitious endeavors – have been forgotten.
Default 05122015
Forget Disneyland: I'm Going to Santa Teresa
Like an oasis among the warehouses that crowd the dusty streets of Santa Teresa, New Mexico, sits Penny's Diner. The tiny restaurant, right next door to the Oak Tree Inn, was designed to look like a relic out of the '50s, though it opened just over a year ago.
Community 04242015
Bee Whiz! Sacramento Garden Sprouts Hope
Nestled below cobalt blue skies on the southernmost tip of Sacramento’s California State University campus lies half an acre of freshly tilled hope.
Community 04062015
UP and the University of Nebraska at Omaha Help Girls Develop a Crush on IT
Like many teenagers, Hauwa Muibi didn't know what she might eventually do for a living, or even what she'd major in when she went to college. She loved math, and after reading some course catalogs, decided Computer Engineering sounded interesting. With her parents' blessing, 15-year-old Hauwa traveled more than 5,800 miles from Lagos, Nigeria, to Wilberforce University in Ohio to study.
Innovation 03272015
Long Rail Is a Game Changer
A dream more than a decade in the making is now reality. Union Pacific is the rail industry's first to import long rail from Japan to its custom facility at the Port of Stockton, California, setting a new standard for rail reliability.
Safety 02252015
California Agencies Get an Inside View of Rail Safety
"Come on and walk with me," Union Pacific Hazardous Materials Manager Michael Villa-Real said to the crowd of news media gathered next to a small fleet of high-tech equipment assembled outside the California State Railroad Museum. "This equipment is all part of our recovery mission."
Community 02202015
Pullman History Honored with National Monument
A piece of railroad history – the Pullman Historic District located on Chicago's south side – was officially designated a National Monument Feb. 19 by President Barack Obama.
Safety 02132015
I Am My Brother's Keeper
Union Pacific Locomotive Engineer Harry Stewart was pulling himself off the cab floor when he heard a knock on the locomotive door. "I saw it all," said the man standing outside the cab. "That truck pulled right in front of you."
Default 02032015
Lessons from CHIberia Help Ease Storm's Impact
Ski goggles? Check. Full-face ski mask? Check. Thermal insulated gloves, cleats and coat over coat over coat? Check, check, check.
Safety 01262015
Following His Calling to Train and Protect
To celebrate a 21st birthday, some people head to Las Vegas. Ben Salo marked the occasion by doing something very different. As a volunteer firefighter in Central Sacramento Valley, he ended up battling the hottest house fire he’d ever encountered.
Community 01212015
Illinois Seasonal Drive Benefits Victims of Domestic Violence
For Union Pacific's intermodal team at Yard Center in Dolton, Illinois, helping local charities is about supporting a community.
Community 01052015
D-Day Memorial Honors Nebraska Inventor
Andrew Jackson Higgins was a small-town Nebraska boy credited by Gen. Dwight Eisenhower after WW II with being "the man who won the war for us."