Station: Larch (Spur), MI

Larch, in Delta County, is a location where the Soo Line railroad (now CN) crosses under the former Chicago & Northwestern (also now CN) line from Escanaba to Ishpeming. The CN has an interchange here which also serves local industry.

Photo info: Soo Line 1003, pulling a Soo Line Historical and Technical Society special passenger excursion, goes under the railroad overpass at Larch. August 7, 1999. [Mark Andersen]

Notes

Time Line

1911. The Escanaba & Lake Superior railroad is now engaged in constructing a railroad bridge over the river leading to the pulp plant, offering a means of delivering pulpwood to the mill and an outlet for the product of the company. Work on the bridge has been in progress for some time and it is expected that it will be completed this week. [EMP-1911-1102]

1918. The C&NW had an operator here on the 1st and 2nd shifts. [TRT]

1980. A Soo Line railroad worker was killed between Gladstone and Larch when a machine tamping down railroad ties ran into the back of a small rail section car he was riding on with two other workers. The victim and his companions were setting up construction markers on the Wells Township tracks. The other vehicle, a tamper, was following behind. The tamper driver's attention was diverted and when he looked up the small rail car had stopped. He was unable to avoid hitting the car. The two other workers were able to leap from the car before the collision. [PNR-1980-1007]