The Empire Builder: A Man, a Train, a Legend

"Most men who have really lived have had, in some share, their great adventure. This railway is mine." - James J. Hill

Words by Gary Dolzall

James Jerome Hill was born in Canada, came to age in the United States, and took a proud claim to his Scottish ancestry. But first and foremost, James J. Hill was a railroad builder and entrepreneur, so much so that he earned the name “The Empire Builder.”

Hill (1838-1916) will forever be best remembered as the man who through a will of steel and financial savvy created the Great Northern Railway, which by January 1893 stretched from St. Paul, Minnesota to Seattle, Washington. But there was more to come: As the 20th century dawned, Hill – in alliance with a friend and another titan of the Gilded Age, J. P. Morgan – wrestled control of first the competing Northern Pacific, then the Burlington Route (CB&Q) to form, along with the Great Northern, what was referred to as the “Hill Lines.” The Spokane, Portland & Seattle soon also joined the family. Anti-trust concerns stymied Hill’s own dream of a full merger of these properties, but over the next seven decades the GN, NP, CB&Q, and SP&S would remain financially intertwined, and in 1970 – more than half-a-century after Hill’s passing – the four roads would indeed combine into the giant 27,000-mile Burlington Northern Railroad.

In 1905, Hill’s Great Northern debuted a lavish heavyweight passenger train – the Oriental Limited – between St. Paul and Seattle (soon to be extended on to Chicago via the Burlington Route). Then, in June 1929, the Oriental Limited would be displaced as flagship of the GN by a new train named for its founder – the Empire Builder.

In original form, the Empire Builder was a study in traditional railroad style and luxury – plush, Pullman green heavyweight equipment with a Great Northern P-2 class 4-8-2 or later an S-2 class 4-8-4 on the point (many of which would wear Glacier green on their boiler jackets) and an observation-solarium-lounge with an enclosed sun room bringing up the markers. Six sets of equipment covered the train’s operations, which called for a 63-hour westbound and 61-hour eastbound run between Chicago and Seattle.

Not long after the debut of the Empire Builder, the era of the diesel-powered streamliner was born (with Burlington Route and its famous Zephyrs at the forefront in the mid-1930s). But GN’s flagship would remain traditional and steam-powered until after World War II, when, in 1947, a stunning new streamlined, orange and green, diesel-powered Empire Builder debuted. Headed by a pair of Electro-Motive E7A diesels, the new 12-car Empire Builder, built by Pullman-Standard, featured coaches, sleepers (including a new design, the “duplex roomette”), a dining car (in which proudly hung a portrait of James J. Hill), a coffee shop/lounge, and a “River” series sleeper-observation car. Five train sets covered what was now an accelerated 45-hour schedule between Chicago and Seattle.

In what was a highly competitive market for passengers between Chicago and the Pacific Northwest – with direct competition from Northern Pacific’s North Coast Limited and Milwaukee Road’s Olympian Hiawatha – Great Northern aggressively protected its market position, soon ordering new equipment again for the Empire Builder, this time from Pullman-Standard and American Car & Foundry. This latest equipment – five sets of 15 cars – arrived in 1951 and, most prominently, featured new “Mountain” series observation and ranch lounge cars. Concurrently, much of the original 1947 Empire Builder streamlined equipment was “handed down” to a new GN sister train, the Western Star. By this time, there was also a change in motive power. The pairs of A1A-AIA trucked E7s originally assigned to the Empire Builder proved too slippery for use in GN’s mountain territories such as Stevens Pass and Marias Pass, and were replaced by sure-footed four-axle EMD F7s which operated in either three-unit A-B-A or, increasingly often, four-unit A-B-B-A lash-ups on both the Empire Builder and Western Star.

With dome cars the new rage in the mid-1950s and with both the North Coast Limited and Olympian Hiawatha slated to be so equipped, GN once again – in 1955 – brought new splendor to the Empire Builder, this time in the form of Budd-built “short” dome coaches (three to a consist) and a full-length “great dome” lounge for first-class passengers. Interestingly, the sleeper-observation cars from the 1947 Empire Builder were remodeled into a “Coulee” series and again brought up the markers of the train.

The 1955 edition of the Empire Builder was, without question, one of the finest examples of passenger travel to be experienced in American railroad history. Alas, the mid-1950s would witness both American passenger railroading taken to a fine art and the beginnings of its dark days. Construction of America’s Interstate Highway System made long-distance travel by auto ever more popular, and the airlines drew ever more passengers away from long-distance trains such as the Empire Builder. The 1960s became a decade of endless train service reductions and discontinuances as passenger operations slipped deeper and deeper into the red. When the U.S. Post Office Department discontinued “rail by mail” service in 1967, taking away a major revenue source that the remaining passenger trains relied upon, it was the death knell for privately operated passenger service in the U.S. In May 1971, the National Railroad Passenger Corp. (Amtrak) assumed responsibility for the vast majority of U.S. intercity rail services, including the Empire Builder.

To Great Northern’s credit, the railroad maintained its flagship in fine form through the darkest years of the 1960s. While not as finely treated as in the past, the Empire Builder carried on in style. With the F-units that had long powered the train getting older and less reliable, GN purchased Electro-Motive SDP40 and SDP45 diesels in 1966-67 to power the Empire Builder and Western Star. In 1967, Great Northern introduced a new corporate image – “Big Sky Blue” – and the Empire Builder, like all GN equipment, began to appear in a new and indeed quite striking blue and white livery. As had long been the case for its Chicago-Twin Cities leg, the Empire Builder was powered by CB&Q’s classy silver-and-red EMD E-units. CB&Q often combined the consists of the Empire Builder and North Coast Limited for the journeys in and out of Chicago.

For the short 15 months between the creation of the Burlington Northern in March 1970 and the takeover by Amtrak of operations of the Empire Builder in May 1971, the train was operated by Burlington Northern and some passenger equipment was repainted yet again, this time in a BN green-and-white scheme. Today, the Superliner-equipped Empire Builder remains one of the stars of Amtrak’s long-distance stable, and while today’s Amtrak routing of the train varies as compared to its traditional GN routing (most notably in using the ex-Milwaukee Road main line between Chicago and the Twin Cities), the Empire Builder still travels over much of the absolute best of James Hill’s remarkable railroad, including the scenic crossing of Marias Pass.

That the Empire Builder remains, in both steel and name, vibrant today is a fitting honor to James Jerome Hill and to his love for “his” railroad, or as Hill himself fondly recalled, “Most men who have really lived have had, in some share, their great adventure. This railway is mine.”

James Jerome Hill was born in Canada, came to age in the United States, and took a proud claim to his Scottish ancestry. But first and foremost, James J. Hill was a railroad builder extraordinaire, so much so that he earned the name “The Empire Builder.”

In original form, the Great Northern’s Empire Builder was a study in traditional railroad style and luxury – plush, Pullman-green heavyweight equipment and classic steam power. With a magnificent Great Northern P-2 class 4-8-2 on the point, the heavyweight edition of the Empire Builder crosses the famed stone arch bridge over the Mississippi River at Minneapolis, Minnesota. Although no longer used by the railroads, the bridge remains a popular landmark in the Twin Cities and is used for festivals and civic events. Great Northern photograph.

The Empire Builder was, naturally, a favorite subject of Great Northern company photographers. The original streamlined Empire Builder of 1951 posed with its original motive power of Electro-Motive E7 diesels (above). Surely the ultimate edition of the Empire Builder was the train of the mid-1950s with its classic Budd-build dome cars and EMD F7 power. Posed against the great Montana Rockies, a set of F-units lead the beautiful train wearing GN’s green-and-orange livery (below). Great Northern photographs.

Between Chicago and the Twin Cities, the Great Northern’s Empire Builder utilized the route of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy. The clock is ticking toward the advent of Amtrak, but on a gray winter day at Eola, Illinois, the Chicago-bound Empire Builder – its consist a mix of GN green-and-orange and “Big Sky Blue” equipment – hustles east behind a duo of Burlington Route silver-and-red EMD E8s. Photograph by Gary Dolzall.

The legendary Empire Builder lives on as a jewel of the Amtrak long-distance network. In October 1979, the Empire Builder became the first Amtrak train to be equipped with Superliners. On a spring day in 1990, fishermen take notice and extend a friendly wave as Amtrak Train 8 – the eastbound Empire Builder – rushes past Pewaukee Lake, Wisconsin. In the Amtrak era, the Empire Builder has utilized this ex-Milwaukee Road line between Chicago and the Twin Cities. Photograph by Gary Dolzall.

Aboard the Builder: On its long and captivating journey from Chicago to the Pacific Northwest in May 1983, the Empire Builder meets an eastbound Burlington Northern freight amid the rolling plains of North Dakota. Photograph by Gary Dolzall.

Railroading was the great love of James Jerome Hill (left), and in particular his legendary Great Northern. Hill famously remarked, “Most men who have really lived have had, in some share, their great adventure. This railway is mine.” And indeed, both in the Amtrak Empire Builder and the monumental BNSF Railway, Hill’s grand legacy endures.