Big Four Shops
Big Four Shops - 1938
Big Four Shops - 1998
In 1869, the City of Mattoon donated thirty acres to the
Indianapolis and St. Louis Railroad to move their maintenance shops from
Litchfield. They were one of the top employers in Mattoon until the
1950's when they were phased out due to the diesel engine.
In 1978, the abandoned shops burned to the
ground. They had been slated for demolition by the railroad, so the
fire department let then burn to the ground.
From
“History of Coles County, 1879”. Concerning the Big Four Shops.
The machine shops are 110x204 feet, with eight repair pits. The power-room,
40x50 feet, adjoins this building. The store room is also adjoining, and is
40x60 feet in size. The car shops are 85x204 feet in size, with six repair
tracks, and, with the machine shop, get their power from an 80-horse power
engine. The blacksmith shop is 50x150 feet, has sixteen fires and is
furnished with one 1,500-pound steam hammer. The boiler shop is 50x80 feet,
and has three repair tracks. The paint shop is 44x228 feet, and has two
repair tracks. There are 21 stalls in the roundhouse. It is furnished with
one of Greenleaf’s Machine Works turntables. The transfer table is 27x180
feet, and connects with the tracks leading into the different shops. The
tank and oil room is 40x60 feet, has four water-tubs, with the capacity of
60,000 gallons each, filled from a reservoir one-half mile south of the
works. The buildings are all of brick, with slate roofs, save the paint
shop, which is frame.
All are heated by steam save the paint and blacksmith shops. The shops in
their arrangement ar unsurpassed in the West, and turn out nothing but the
best work. Over two-hundred men are employed here, in addition to nearly
one-half that number employed in the repair shops in Terre Haute and East
St. Louis. The monthly payroll at Mattoon is about $23,000, the material
used each month costing about one-half that sum. The money distributed at
these shops is in measure nearly all spent in the city.
The last structure to from the
Big Four shops was the skeleton of an old coaling tower that was razed in
the 1980's prior to the construction of the baseball complex.
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