Time was when you could look out the front window, or the back window, of the train you were riding on, and could often get a fantastic view such as we see here. But times changed. The fabled Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Electroliners were gone from these tracks less than five years after this photo was taken. They then ran for another dozen years or so on Philadelphia’s “Red Arrow” line to Norristown, but are now relegated to museums.

Railfan seats are also a distant memory on CTA rapid transit cars, victims of full-width cabs and one-man operation. But we can still dream, thanks to yesterday’s railfans, who so faithfully and lovingly documented fleeting scenes like this one.

-David Sadowski

A train of CTA 6000s, as seen from a CNS&M Electroliner, looking north at Howard St., in a photograph by Lawrence H. Boehning, taken on May 8, 1958 (Author’s collection).