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Caption: Having grown up in Norfolk County, Ontario's tobacco heartland (what a claim!), I have a certain affinity for tobacco kilns. Nothing says "home" quite like the sight of them. Picturing the old ROWs through Norfolk, passing through the tobacco fields and by tobacco kilns, I'd always imagined how cool it would have been to have gotten a shot of that. I hadn't even seen one that anyone got until a year or so ago when I saw a shot from Brian Thompson on Facebook of some Chessie power on the CASO going through La Salette past some kilns - easily one of my favourite shots of all time.
When I was out shooting T29 the other weekend, I did some exploring, and found some old tobacco kilns in the area, and realized with some proper timing I'd be able to pull off a shot I'd long imagined. So with this 141 running around the right time, and the hourly forecast looking like it may work out, I decided to try my luck. It was pretty heavy cloud when the train departed London, but when it was about 5 or 10 minutes out from Bothwell, the sky finally cleared to my favour. As I heard it nearing, one cloud decided to cover the sun, and I knew it was going to be close. As the lights were going for the nearby crossing on Fansher Road, the cloud finally cleared, and with a few seconds to spare, I had sun on the scene. What a sigh of relief, as it's a long, depressing drive home if the clouds win out.
These old kilns are largely being replaced with a newer, far less aesthetic structures, and less and less remain with many left to fall over (like this one no doubt soon will) or are simply burned (with a permit). Some farms around Norfolk take great pride in preserving their old kilns, simply from an aesthetic and heritage perspective, and for those farms I am grateful. The new ones that are now the norm are like the GEVOs of tobacco kilns, and truly lack any charm.
If you asked me, I'd say the Windsor Sub is fairly underrated from an aesthetic point of view. It has many wide open angles, plenty of searchlights, and no shortage of interesting landmarks to incorporate into your shots. It is however a good trek for many of us, and with trains few and far between, and chasing near impossible, the return on investment for a trip to Ontario's far south can sometimes be just one shot - as it was for me on this day.
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Cool – I’m reminded of this photo from Norfolk County by James Adeney
http://www.railpictures.ca/?attachment_id=7100
A very interesting (and for a Westerner) unknown aspect of the tobacco industry. Thanks for the write up.
I so identify with the cloud roulette. Glad your number came in this time.
Thanks Steve – that was a photograph I wasn’t aware of but appreciate it being brought to my attention. Very cool to see that. A couple of those kilns remain (likely someone putting some effort to keep them), but that scene is largely changed. The irrigation pond is about the only constant haha. I have fond memories doing a quick glance left and a quick glance right at this location as a child each time my family went over that overpass.
@Larry – they’re pretty neat structures, and truly unmistakable. Like I said, they bring about a feeling of nostalgia. And yeah, I feel like I have been playing cloud roulette all week.
Very nice, James. Well done.
Thanks Earl.
Interesting, I would have had no idea what that structure was without your caption.
They’re neat structures, Matt. In the Canadian context they’re limited to a few regions within southwestern Ontario, and largely concentrated on what’s known geologically as the Norfolk Sand Plan (Norfolk County, southern Brant County, southeast Oxford County, and east Elgin County) though you will find some rare spots in some places like Chatham-Kent (and probably Middlesex and maybe Lambton too) as this shot shows. From some agricultural census data I can find, about 2/3 of Ontario’s tobacco (and thus Canada’s) is grown in Norfolk County so a rather niche crop largely concentrated in one locale.
Norfolk Sand Plain*