Shortline Action

Sometimes you're just in the right place at the right time. In the fall of 1991, we made one more of many family trips along Interstate 10 from our home in Louisiana across the Panhandle to visit my sister in Jacksonville, Florida. Dad decided to get off the interstate at Cottondale to check on the Bay Line, just in case. No sooner had we parked the family sedan and I walked over to a field near the tracks than I heard the unmistakable blast of a Nathan 3-chime. Out of nowhere appeared Bay Line #510, hauling the mail with a southbound local in tow -- white "extra" flags flapping in the wind. We could not have planned it better if we tried.