Line Locations

n this June 30, 1996 scene (above), AD&N GP28 #1812 is picking up a cut of empty woodracks at Valley Junction, Arkansas, as the road clears all cars of the line on its last day of operation. Valley Junction was AD&N’s crossing with the Wilmar & Saline Valley Railroad, a sister logging railroad during the early days of the AD&N. On the same day, same run, #1812 stops at Whitlow Junction, Arkansas (below) former crossing and interchange junction with the Rock Island, to pick up the last here.

Russell Tedder

ach 24-hour operating cycle on the AD&N typically saw six regular switch engine assignments, three on the day shift, two on the evening shift, and one on the graveyard shift. The first switcher on the day shift was named the “paper route,” which gathered up empty boxcars for the three major paper mills to replace loaded cars pulled as the engine and crew made their appointed rounds. Extra switching shifts were called in peak periods.

The track layout at Crossett consisted of an outer loop around the entire complex. On the east side, the mainline was part of the loop which connected to the eight-track Pond Pass yard. On the west side, where the track curved east to complete the loop in that area, the main track continued straight south as the Venice Line. The Venice line was a Crossett Lumber Company line that extended to Venice, Louisiana, on the Missouri Pacific over which the lumber company ran log trains to its logging camps between El Dorado, Arkansas and Bastrop, Louisiana. After cessation of railroad logging in the early 1950s, the line was cut back to the industrial area on the south side of Crossett although the remaining line was still called the Venice line. Besides a Georgia-Pacific plant, two other industrial plants were served in this industrial area. Including line haul shipments between Crossett, Whitlow Junction and Monticello, interplant and intraplant switching cars, the AD&N handled an average of 50,000 carloads of freight per year.

Russell Tedder