Massillon, Ohio

My town here in Ohio once had both the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and the Pennsylvania Railroad pass through it with each road having its own station. This view of the Pennsylvania Railroad's station here in Massillon was postmarked in 1912 with the familiar RPO (railway post office) football-shaped cancellation. It had long wood platform extensions and a wooden track dividing fence along with its own water tank seen in the distance. From my research, including a bit of oral history from my next-door neighbor, the tracks crossed over a downtown street using a concrete bridge, hence the guard rails between the two main rails. The guard rails kept a derailed wheel moving in a straight line instead of derailing other cars and, in the case of a bridge, breaking the train apart leading to cars falling below.