The Freehold Secondary Mystery

I had a couple of questions for this thread:

1. Who owns the Out Of Service section between Freehold and Farmingdale, Conrail, or NJT?
2. With all the passenger traffic on this line in the early 1900's, how was train traffic managed, timetable and train order with passing sidings?
3. Was there ever a tower located anywhere along this line back then?

There was a signal here and there was one down, just west of the RT-35 Bridge on the left side facing west, like the one in the picture.

Great shot! btw, 4666 just returned to passenger service at BR&W.

Until the line between Whitings and Bay Head opened in 1881 or so, all Philadelphia - Long Branch trains ran via the F&JARR. Plus Trenton - Long branch trains.

To give you an idea of the traffic in bygone years, Pennsy investigated double-tracking the Freehold & Jamesburg all the way to Sea Girt. I'm assuming things ran by timetable authority. There were a few passing sidings I remember. Freehold had two (?), there was one at Allaire, one at Allenwood, and one at Sea Girt. Sea Girt also had two yards and a two-track interchange yard. Except for SG Tower in Sea Girt, I don't recall any other towers. Farmingdale was busy enough to have a passing siding for Pennsy, part of the leg of the wye was double-tracked, and had a two-track interchange yard.

The last major freight moves were in the early 60s when Pennsy ran jetty rock unit trains from Kingston to Lewis Lumber Company's yard in Spring Lake. Soon after that, the Doodlebug made its last run and the line closed between Sea Girt and Farmingdale. Last customer on that portion of the line was Monmouth Box in Allenwood, that got all of one boxcar a week at that point. The diamond crossing at Farmingdale remained in service for a coal trestle on Frequency Engineering's property for a few years.

Farmingdale station was a "union" station, located right at the CNJ/PRR diamond crossing, with platforms for each track.

Absolutely beautiful picture !!! BTW , the 4666 is alive and well in Kutztown, Pa, running on the Allentown and Auburn RR. The owner lives there and is more able to restore her there. She was running solo last Sunday and had no problems ! Never knew there were signals on the Freehold line. I've seen the concrete phone booths along with the wooden phone boxes It must've been wild after the Matawan trestle burned and the NY & LB trains were diverted through Freehold.
Jim H

Just figured out why they ran to Prestone last Friday, Conrail is replacing the crossing at. Hudson St.
Jim H

Speaking of Farmingdale being a station for both Pennsy and the CNJ at the diamond, there seems to be a lack of photographs of that facility, I've only seen a few and they didn't show much detail. I guess there was no freight house at Farmindale along with the station, unless I'm just not aware of one.

My late father in law spent some of his youth in Farmingdale and when the subject of trains would come up he would always comment on the daily Blue Comet passages stating that they were " very fast and shook the buildings next to the tracks when they passed". The Pennsy had the " Sea Breeze" a named train that was in a near miss at that diamond according to Don Ball's book. I wonder where the Sea Breeze originated to be a name train on that line. Does anyone have any old timetables that show the number of daily passenger trains on the old F&J/Freehold Secondary?

BTW, Jim one of your grandfathers old photographs of Freehold shows the street side, facing Broad street of the stub platform Freehold Pennsy freight station that is on one of the maps I uploaded. I can't find any roundhouse pictures.

CNW,
My avatar is Farmingdale. Station was located northeast of diamond.

Wow, cool picture, any chance of a post to see a larger view of it? Thanks for the comment. Based on that picture, it looks like to stop at the platforms, both CNJ and Pennsy had to block the diamond?

This is in the late 50s,at least looking at the age of the cars in the back ground.

I did some research about the PRR engine house in Freehold. I've seen it on maps from the late 1800's but on a 1928 map it's gone , so I'm guessing that's why my Grandfather never got any pictures.I've actually never seen a picture of it. I remember the station in Farmingdale a little. My Grandparents lived on Academy St in town and he worked at the canning factory inside the 3/4 diamond. The PRR crews would leave their RS 11 behind his boiler room and would come in and chat with him.
Jim H

Farmingdale 1931 map

Freehold:
1895 map has no enginehouse in Freehould
1901-1916 has a CNJ enginehouse, on the south end of the CNJ (the left leg of a wye coming from the north). The right leg went to the PRR westbound, the left leg went to a siding parallel to the PRR that tied back into the right leg to make the wye.
By 1923 the enginehouse is gone, and there is a full wye with the PRR (so the CNJ could go east or west on PRR).
No PRR enginehouse in any maps that I saw (but it could be on others).

This map shows the engine house & the turn table off of Throckmorton street.