In 1975, Tobyhanna was the home of the Tobyhanna Army Depot, a wood loading operation at the closed team track, a utility-pole unloading and storage yard, a closed passenger station, and one of the Lackawanna's trademark concrete interlocking towers. It was also the location where most helpers were removed from eastbound trains (some were removed at Moscow).

By 1999 the station had been restored, the tower was slated for restoration, the local industry had become a propane transload facility, and the mainline was single track. However, traces of the area's history remain and can be seen in the aerial photos of the station vicinity.

Operationally, Tobyhanna was significant in 1975. Most eastbound trains needed halpers to climb out of Scranton, and they were removed here. There were two crossovers between the eastward and wetsward tracks, and on most trains the caboose had to be moved from behind the helpers to the end of the train. The helpers used the crossovers to run around the caboose and move it onto the rear of the train before they returned to Scranton. See the Tobyhanna Helper Operations page for more.

From Microsoft's Terraserver site (http://terraserver.microsoft.com), below is a 1999 aerial photo of the Tobyhanna station and wye. Note the cleared area and structure to the west (north is to the top of the photo) of the north leg of the wye, and the cleared area to the west of the station. See the Industry in 1975 page for more on these areas.

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Thanks very much to Lou Schultheis, Dominic Keating, and David Monte Verde for help in gathering the information on these pages, and for providing historic photos.