This postcard from the 1920s shows a southbound train departing the Chicago & Alton's Bloomington depot, as disembarking passengers stroll toward Washington Street and whatever local transportation awaits them. During the early decades of the twentieth century the local railway depot was one of the "hot spots" of a thriving town. Postcards of this type were common, and may be found today in many antique shops — whence I acquired this one in 2003. This depot, constructed in 1913, was considered a "union depot," although the other railroads providing passenger service to Bloomington also maintained their own depots until the 1950s.