A Trip I'll Always Remember
When I was 12, my older brother Manley took me on a weekend round trip from historic Kansas City Union Station on the Union Pacific Domeliner, "City of St. Louis" to Denver, Colo. The train was a sight to behold at the station platform, bright and inviting, lighting up the darkened track areas under the depot. The Union Pacific staff were very friendly and professional. I stayed up in the dome car across the darkness of Kansas watching the farm lights whisk by until it closed at midnight. Very early the next morning, breakfast in the dining car was a treat and I can remember it today as if it were yesterday.
Two years later, now a resident of Boy's Town in Nebraska, and after getting permission from Monsignor Schmidt to take a train ride, I convinced two of my classmates to come with me on a quick excursion from Omaha Union Station to Fremont and back on a Saturday afternoon in 1969. We rode Union Pacific train No. 5 to Fremont and arrived just in time to catch Union Pacific train No. 6 back to Omaha. It was the "Cowboy Train" as someone told me, with no diners or dome cars, just coaches. It was a great but quick ride and as I left train No. 6 at Omaha Union Station, I took a quick photo with my Polaroid "Swinger" camera of Union Pacific locomotive No. 910 before heading up the station escalator.
My thanks to all of the men and women at the Union Pacific who helped make such childhood adventures possible. Happy Anniversary to UPRR!
Hubert J. Hanrahan, Jr.
Union Pacifc Train No. 6 after arriving Omaha Union Station, summer of 1969