Good morning to you! Welcome once again to Midweek Photos. Time again for you to share any images of railroading in the real world with the rest of us. Whatever you can find is appreciated by us. Even if your pictures are not brand new. We like a bit of history, too. 
Today I will start out with a flashback to January, 2009. Steamtown in Scranton used to run a Winter excursion to Tobyhanna, PA where there was an ice harvesting demonstration at a local lake. Ice was a big business in the late 1800s and early decades of the 1900s. Ice blocks were delivered daily to homes for their iceboxes to keep milk, eggs and other items from spoiling in the home. Larger amounts were delivered to stores to keep foods from spoiling in the coolers. Anyway, from 2005 through 2011 (excepting 2010) Canadian National 2-8-2 no. 3254 led these trains. Many years there was no snow on the ground in Scranton, but we had it on this day.
3254 runs through the yard on Friday, January 16. She was getting a load of coal for the 52 mile round trip the following day.
I was in charge of videotaping the activities on the day of the Ice Harvest train, and that video is at work. I did snap this shot of the horse which drew the rope through the pulley to bring the ice blocks into the ice house. The Ice Harvest Train ended when CN 3254 was taken out of service. She was down for half the year in 2012, which was her last year under steam.
Steamtown, being part of the Department of the Interior and the National Park Service, is still closed due to lack of a federal budget. When Boston & Maine no. 3713 comes back to life in few years, we hope to have a return to some sort of winter excursion. The steam locomotive shown here is Berlin Mills no. 7.
That is my contribution for this week. How has your rail-fanning been lately? If you caught a recent train, freight or passenger that we might like to see, please post it here. We have another holiday coming up this weekend, so some of you get an extra day to take your camera to where the trains are. Enjoy!
