What is an Interurban? If you were not around during Depression Days, you would not know. Oh, you might notice the raised track bed out towards Parma or Grass Lake in the other direction. Probably a discontinued railroad line, you say. Nope. It was the remains of the Interurban line that ran between Chicago and Detroit.

If you were not around during those days or before, you wouldn't appreciate the cheap transportation that old line offered. I think the minimum charge was a dime. That would get you from Jackson to Ann Arbor or Jackson to Battle Creek. Of course, there was other stops in between those cities. How about a short hop to Grass Lake going east or Albion going west?

Times were hard. Ten cents seems like a pittance now, and back then an extra dime was hard to come by. BUT ... it was cheaper to ride the Interurban than to drive a car. Sure, gas was cheap, but not a dime. What if you couldn't afford an automobile. We had one, an old Essex, a real gas guzzler. Didn't matter. We didn't know anyone in Ann Arbor or Battle Creek anyway. Our live revolved around the Horton area where we lived on Vroman Road.

Back to the Interurban Line. My husband told of hazing newly married couples. We all know about short sheeting the bed. They took it a leap forward. First, they would separate the newlywed couple with some sort of pretext. Driven to an Interurban station, such as Albion, the bride would be sent to Ann Arbor and the groom to Battle Creek in the opposite direction ... with no money. He thought it was really funny. I didn't. Thank goodness the Interurban had faded into history by the time we were married.

I came across an old picture of the Line. Those mounds of track bed live on in my memory. Those so called "good old days" are long gone.