1963 slide image of the MOPac station (Jose Cazares collection)
The End of an Era.
This photograph of the Missouri Pacific passenger station during its last days before it was to be demolished, was taken on September 20, 1963. A year later on October 1964, the old Levee Street station, which served rail patrons in Brownsville for more than half a century, closed. The Missouri Pacific railroad moved its passenger facilities to its 6th Street freight depot, combining its freight, passenger and warehouse facilities at this single site.
This photograph of the Missouri Pacific passenger station during its last days before it was to be demolished, was taken on September 20, 1963. A year later on October 1964, the old Levee Street station, which served rail patrons in Brownsville for more than half a century, closed. The Missouri Pacific railroad moved its passenger facilities to its 6th Street freight depot, combining its freight, passenger and warehouse facilities at this single site.
The depot was demolished in 1965 at the request of the Brownsville chamber of commerce and the city. It was a terrible loss, not only did Brownsville lose this beautiful building, it also lost all passenger train service in 1966. The trains which once brought Brownsville out of its isolation and helped the city prosper and grow in 1904, was gone.
The city of Brownsville has remained without passenger train service since 1966, maybe one day passenger train service will once again return......?
......Wm. Norman Hall
El Jardin Hotel, May 19, 1965.
