60 Minutes
The Chicago Surface Lines was one of the largest traction
properties in the Midwest. Formed by the consolidation of the Chicago City
Railway and the Chicago Railways Company, by the early 1920s the system
encompassed almost 3500 streetcars operating over more than 1070 miles of
track. More than 1-1/2 billion passengers were carried every year. With an
order in 1936 for 83 of the new streamlined Presidents' Conference Committee
(PCC) cars, Chicago became one of the first cities to operated these modern
trolleys.
CHICAGO SURFACE LINES, filmed by Walter Druck and others,
presents scenes of both the PCCs and the older standard cars in action, with
some views dating back as far as the late 1930s. Routes covered include 4, 21,
22, 38, 43, 45, 63, 67, and the Cottage Grove private right-of-way. The program
also includes scenes of PCCs operating in Kansas City, Missouri.
THE CHICAGO "L"s, filmed by traction expert and
modeler Walter Druck, surveys the vast Chicago elevated railway system, second
only to New York City's in size. The development of Chicago's elevated railways
was spurred by a need to transport large crowds of people from the downtown
"loop" area to the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Jackson Park. To that
end, the South Side Elevated Railroad Company constructed a 3-1/2 mile line
from Congress Street to 39th Street. On June 6th, 1892,a fleet of 46 small
Forney steam locomotives began pulling trains of wooden coaches over the route.
The line reached Jackson Park in May 1893. Chicago's "L" system
continued to expand, with new lines being constructed by the Lake Street,
Metropolitan West Side, Northwestern, and Union Loop Elevated Railroads. In
1924, all of the "L"s were consolidated as the Chicago Rapid Transit
Company, which in 1947 became the publicly-owned Chicago Transit Authority.
Consisting of high-quality archive film, the program features
an interesting variety of locations. Lines covered include Kenwood, Stock
Yards, Lake Street, Ravenswood, Garfield Park, Westchester Shuttle, Evanston,
and Mt. Carmel Funeral line. The bulk of the material was filmed in 1948 and
features a variety of "L" rolling stock, plus North Shore Line and
CA&E trains which also operated on portions of the system
