History
The original Texas Chief was inaugurated as a coach and Pullman train on April 3, 1948.
At Amtrak's inception, the Texas Chief operated Chicago-Houston. It inherited the Hi-level (bilevel) chair cars from the former San Francisco Chief, which had been discontinued at that same time. The train operated separately from the Super Chief (renamed the Southwest Limited in 1974 and now known as the Southwest Chief) along their shared route from Chicago to Newton, Kansas.
A number of colleges and universities along the route—including the University of Kansas, University of Missouri-Kansas City, Wichita State University, University of Oklahoma -- provided students looking for economical transportation.
Due to cuts ordered by the US Department of Transportation, Amtrak's Lone Star was discontinued on October 8, 1979. At the time of its discontinuance, the train was ranked as Amtrak's 7th most popular long-distance train.
Chicago-Houston service continued in the form of a section of the Chicago-Laredo Inter-American that split from the train in Temple, Texas. This left Oklahoma without passenger rail service until 1999.
Read more about this topic: Lone Star (Amtrak Train)
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