Rocky recalls June 3, 1951: GN retires the named train "Oriental Limited" which in itself was bumped from exclusivity by the "Empire Builder". The new named train becomes "The Western Star". This service became the "secondary" named passenger train, albeit, there wasn't much secondary about it in many ways. Except for the smaller lunch-counter/lounge car and the smaller windows on the observation car, the two trains were, from a passenger’s perspective, nearly identical. Both had essentially the same number of revenue seats and beds, while the 1951 Empire Builder had a 24 more non-revenue seats because of its larger cafe-lounge car. The Western Star stopped more times and took a longer route (via Grand Forks and Great Falls), requiring about 56 hours for a trip that the Empire Builder did in about 45. If you wanted to get on or off at Glacier Park, you had to take the Western Star. The Great Northern’s rule about no foreign paint schemes on the Empire Builder didn’t apply to the Western Star, so that train often carried several sleeping cars from other railroads to and from Glacier National Park. The Western Star ran until 1970. (fb)

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