A Milwaukee Road 4-6-4 will welcome you in Kalmbach

If you’re reading this, you no doubt know what’s going on with Kalmbach Media and how it sold most of its magazine titles, including trains and Classic trains, to Firecrown Media in Chattanooga. At the same time, Kalmbach decided to liquidate within the next two months, ending approximately 90 years of continuous publication in and around Milwaukee.

For me, a 31-year veteran of the company, the whole process was a rollercoaster of emotions. I am of course satisfied that the railway company’s titles — inclusive trains, Classic trains, Model railways and Classic toy trains — found a new owner, one that promises big improvements. But I’m also wistful, knowing that this proud old company goes the way of Penn Station, Ophir Trestles, Panama Limitedand a million other lost causes.

I will miss our building, which for nearly 40 years has housed a group of extraordinarily creative people. As I write this, Kalmbach employees—sorry, Firecrown—are cleaning the building for the new owners, a beverage container company called Silgan. Moving soon.

The building at 21027 Crossroads Circle—located in the town of Brookfield, the address of the Waukesha post office—is a typical suburban office building: sleek, efficient, a little bland, but far more comfortable than the digs most magazine publishers endure. By now, it also had one heck of a lobby, thanks to a huge mural at the end of the front corridor. If you’ve ever visited, you’ve left impressed.

I’m talking, of course, about the full-size, 1-to-1 scale photo of the 80-inch driving wheel on Milwaukee Road 4-6-4 no. 6414, occupying what would otherwise be a blank wall. measuring about 11 by 10 feet. It was so large that a visitor might have concluded that the great engine was parked in the rear under steam, ready to go to Watertown with Hello at a certain time.

The mural was the creation of George A. Gloff, Kalmbach’s longtime director of corporate art. Like many Kalmbachers of his era, George was multitalented—company executive, graphic designer, fine art painter, cartographer—and when the company decided in 1988 to move to Waukesha from its creaky, beloved downtown offices of Milwaukee, put George in charge of interior design. Once he spotted that blank wall facing the main doors, he knew what to do.

To fill the space, George made a wise choice. He understood 6414’s place in Milwaukee Road history, as well as the railroad’s status as a favorite of founder Al Kalmbach. Gloff could recite chapter and verse about how these Super Power-style machines lifted the railroad from its 4-6-2 and 4-8-2 roots and set the stage for the creation Hiawatha fleet of passenger trains. Baldwin built 22 of these beauties between 1930-1931, in the F6 and F6a classes, with minor differences between the two; Milwaukee Road called them “Baltics,” never “Hudsons.”

6414 could carry. Sister engine no. 6402 proved it on July 20, 1934, during a test run between Chicago and Milwaukee, during which the engine covered 135 miles in 67 minutes and 37 seconds, including a sustained speed of 89.89 mph between the junction Chicago’s Mayfair and the South. – Location in Milwaukee known as the Lake. At times, the engineer got 103.5 mph out of the engine.

The performance proved the effectiveness of the railway plan for Hiawathasunveiled just a year later in 1935. As noted Milwaukee author Jim Scribbins concluded, “The eventual Hiawatha the time was 75 minutes for this trip again Hiawatha timing was probably the fastest scheduled train in the world in the 1930s.” Clearly, Gloff wanted that legacy to be reflected in Kalmbach’s new lobby.

George had other criteria for the mural: He needed a clear photo for such a large blow-up, and the library had several official portraits, probably taken with an 8×10 view camera. It needed a lot of detail in the main driver and valve gear. He needed an absence of shadows. And he wanted the photo taken in Milwaukee.

He found it in the print shown here, a nice side-on, rods-down photo taken in October 1931 near the roundhouses on Milwaukee’s Road under the 35th Street Viaduct, part of the railroad’s Menomonee Valley Shops Complex. In the accompanying photo, you can see how Gloff found a second view of the 6414—an 8×10 close-up of the front—and used white masking tape to crop the image for the production house he hired for to print the mural.

A personal note: During the production of the painting, Gloff requested a somewhat green still trains associate editor—me—to write the caption that will be framed and placed next to the mural. I’m proud to say that this short piece of framed text lasted until the end.

An interesting side note: why didn’t Gloff choose one of Milwaukee’s most famous 4-6-4s, the 1938 F7 class, known for their bold Otto Kuhler streamlining, their orange and brown note, and other improvements such as roller bearings , 84-inch disc drivers and an all-weather cab? I suspect George was simply a traditionalist, more in love with the older, classic lines of the 6414.

Perhaps it’s a good thing George Gloff isn’t around to witness the fate of the painting, let alone the entire building. George died in 2012 aged 80, still a true believer in the company’s mission, especially when it came to rail transport. Over the years, he embraced Kalmbach’s expansion into magazines devoted to astronomy, jewelry making, model making, bird watching, and other pursuits. But deep down, I think he wanted to remind anyone who came through those doors that this place was, first and foremost, a place for trains.