The Missouri and Illinois Railroad was in operation for 50 years and definitely left its mark on southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois. During very low river levels, remnants of the track can still be seen in Ste. Genevieve and memories of watching railcars come off the transfer boat are still very vivid in many residents’ minds.
Charlie Duckworth, author of the book, Missouri-Illinois Railroad: Missouri Pacific’s Route through the Lead Belt and Little Egypt, will be a guest speaker at the Sainte Genevieve Museum Learning Center on Saturday, March 18 at 1:00 p.m. He’ll talk about the rich history of the M and I.
He said the Missouri-Illinois Railroad was unique in several respects.
“The M and I was not that big of a railroad with only 146 miles,” he explained. “The railroad used a three-foot gauge, which was unusual for a Midwest railroad. The Missouri-Illinois Railroad ran through the largest concentration of lead deposits in the world and the southeast area of Missouri was promoted as the ‘Lead Belt.’”
Duckworth said he is a second-generation rail worker, having done stints in Texas, Kansas, and in Herculaneum, Ste. Genevieve and St. Louis before Missouri Pacific merged with Union Pacific and he got moved to Omaha. He retired as senior director of e-commerce, but over the course of his career, he worked in a variety of railroad positions.
Trains have always been a passion of Duckwork and for a lot of other people, too.
“Many people love trains because it’s a family history,” he said. “Their grandfather worked for them, their dad worked for them. It’s a big piece of equipment; they’re noisy, you had a lot of steam with steam engines; and when you get into how they move railcars from point A to point B, it’s a complex industry that’s pretty fascinating.”
Duckwork wrote his book as a fundraiser for the Missouri Pacific Historical Society.
No one had ever done anything on the M and I,” he said. “I naively thought I’d just write a small book, but it quickly grew as I found more and more resources.”
His book grew to the tune of 400 pages and 700 photos, paired down from nearly 4,000 photos.
The book sold out and Duckworth isn’t sure if it will be reprinted anytime soon. Anyone who has a copy is welcome to bring it to his presentation and he’ll be happy to autograph it.
Duckworth’s presentation on the M and I is part of the museum’s speaker series. The museum thanks Richardet Floor Covering in Perryville who is sponsoring this program. All programs in the lecture series are free to museum members. Otherwise, museum admission will apply.
For more information on the speaker series, call the Sainte Genevieve Museum Learning Center at 573-883-DINO.