| A CN local pulls 12 cars west through The Flats via former C&NW rails at Appleton, WI on 12 May '18. Train was headed back to the yard at Appleton Junction after working Kimberly and Combined Locks. The bridge crosses the last remaining scrap of what was once the South Channel of the Fox River through the Flats. South Island St. (which I was standing on) used to run parallel to the north bank of the South Channel. Old maps reveal that the west end of the South Channel was filled in at some point between 1916 and ‘57. Most of the remainder of the South Channel was filled in the following years. This remaining portion forms the confluence with a mill race which connects West’s Power Canal (a.k.a. West’s Canal, a.k.a. Grand Chute Island Canal) to the Fox River. Edward West bought Grand Chute Island and excavated the canal in 1870 to provide water power for the industries which were built soon after. Up until about 2010, everything beyond the train would have been obscured by the paper mill which stood there for over 100 years. The Kerwin Paper Co., a subsidiary of Riverside Paper Corp., closed in ‘05 or ’06. It was demolished in order to erect the hideous, modern apartment buildings, known as the Landing at Eagle Flats and Riverwalk Place, in ‘11-‘12 (both are just out-of-frame to the right). The white, concrete wall beyond the train is a remnant of the paper mill’s foundation. The bridge tender’s tower for the Lawe St. bridge over the Fox River Navigation Canal can be seen near the center of the photograph. The recently restored lock tender’s house can be seen background right. |