The stuffing had been blasted from the seats by the wind, and mice and rats had nibbled through the leather. The squatters left as soon as the demo crews sauntered railside with drill and torch to begin cutting. They began at the rear and moved forward, sawing through the grooved steel and lifting the sections off the tracks to be torched by the permit workers and loaded into dump trucks. What was once proud is to be mungoed and sold as scrap. Used to motion, to making the run between Chicago and Minneapolis, the train seemed surprised by the men hammering at it and carting away its body. It was too big to move, and if it could it would have bent back and snapped at the men sparking and burning its tail. It was unused to such disrespect.

The crews didn’t mind, though. They would rather have been building, but it was a job. They were committed but casual about the destruction. What was supposed to be a three-week job turned into five and then six and still they weren’t done. The union office was packed with books and permits, sipping coffee there and drinking on credit at the CC Club. There wasn’t much real work to be had, and with winter coming on they knew the big jobs wouldn’t be starting for a while. Work on the IDS wasn’t due to begin until September. They held back, trying to make the job last. What began with indifference, just another cutting job, turned into reluctance. Ripping down buildings was tough work but the need was clear. The city must grow and the older buildings were in the way or unsafe, unwanted, not turning enough profit. The Hiawatha, however, was the best, the fastest streamliner there was. Half the men who signed on to destroy her suspected they had arrived in Minneapolis on that train. They took boats from Ireland, Germany, Sweden, Norway and Italy, and docked in Chicago, bound for the interior of a vast land. Back then the cars were pulled by steam engines, not with the diesels that replaced them in the 1940s. The cars had evolved and the lounges and smoking cars improved, but it felt like the same train nonetheless. As they cut, they figured they rode the train to Minneapolis, carried into the dark folds of the Midwest. Minnesota. Even the names of places felt thick on their tongues.