Robert John Davis wrote:

"Hi friends,

Can anyone shed some light or update the photo at the link below? It says it
is in Meredith, NH in 1988."

http://www.railpixs.com/misc/B&M-milkcar-atMeredithNHSept88.jpg

Rob and list:

This car appears to be on a spur at the Meredith station of what is now the
Winnepesaukee Railroad, the tourist line between Lakeport and Meredith. I
think this tourist operation was using that track in 1988, though perhaps
under different ownership (now operated by Hobo RR in Lincoln, not sure who
it was in '88).

Don't know if the car is still there, the green buggy in the background is,
along with several others. I'll be up in that area next week, I'll probably
get over to Meredith to see if that milk car is still there. Don't remember
seeing it there on previous visits, though...

Also, many thanks to Tim Gilbert for the Herculean effort of transferring
all those listings to an easily-downloaded computer-friendly format.
Speaking solely for myself, this is going to be a godsend in developing
consignor or consignee/routing info slips for car cards on my model pike. If
the B&MRR modelers group has another get-together at W.Springfield next
February, many of us owe Tim a drink, soft- or otherwise.

Listers, what do you think of this idea:
those who live in the larger towns on the list with libraries still having
"city directories" go and see what they can dig up for the industries listed
on Tim's document. For some local industries listed, I can do them off the
top of my head. I'll be at the Greenfield library tonight looking up the
other listings, maybe I'll post what I find, tonight. What process should we
employ, here? Just post to this list and the user can save/discard according
to his/her interests? Here's a start:

Conn. River South Deerfield, Mass.:

-- Hubbard-Hall Chemical Co. (ex Old deerfield Fertilizer Co.)
This was a large plant that received dry chemicals in covered hoppers, and
mixed the chemicals and bagged them for distribution to farmers. Also
shipped out to local farmers in bulk by truck. I rather doubt that they
shipped anything out by rail by 1955, but it's possible. Assume before the
covered hopper era, Hubbard-Hall received chemicals bagged in box cars,
though I never saw this. This plant was taken over by Kerr-McGee, then
another agri-chemical firm whose name escapes me at the moment.

-- Pyrofax Gas. Co.
Received LP gas in pressurized tank cars, offloaded into one of those large
above-ground 'white sausage' LP tanks. "Repackaged" the gas in bottles for
home use. The sausage tank is gone, the bottle-storage building is now a
vegetable store on routes 5&10, with two B&M buggies in back parked on what
was the tank car spur.

-- Wirthmore Grain
Received bagged feed and grain in box cars, probably other things such as
farm implements, milking equipment, etc. I believe this building is now
owned by a home-construction firm.

Odd, there were a couple of large onion/potato warehouses served by rail in
South Deerfield, too (that are still standing, but repurposed), I guess by
1955 this outbound agricultural traffic had gone to trucking, though I could
swear I saw refrigerator cars spotted at those buildings well after 1955.
There was also what I believe is the former South Deerfield freight house on
the east side of the tracks that I thought was used by the adjacent South
Deerfield lumber dealer back then, that isn't listed. Maybe it was still
used by the railroad in '55... I think it's in a picture in Jones' Forest,
Mountain and River book, with the Sacred Cow grinding to a station stop.

By the way, the Turners Falls branch is listed in the "Conn. River" group.
The branch goes OVER the actual Connecticut River, but it joins the rest of
the railroad on the Fitchburg division (the 'old' branch at Turners Fall
Jct. in East Greenfield, the "new" former New Haven branch via the
switchback at East Deerfield)... is the TF branch considered part of the
Conn. River division in employee timetables? Don't have any ETTs here at
work ;-)

Hope this is a start,
Doug Drew