706th Transportation Railway Group

Some from Rich ... 

The 706th Transportation Railway Group (Reserve) was a derivative of the 706th Railway Grand Division sponsored by the Pennsylvania Railroad both prior to, during and after the war, with a reduced title of group versus division due to a smaller scope. The 706th Transportation Group had one rail battalion under its umbrella which was the 717th Trans Bn. The 717th Bn was a rail bn located in the Philadelphia area with one operating company with their other rail units scattered to other states. I

In 1975 Army Reserve units focused on railroading were basically a holding groups for officers and senior enlisted serving out their time for their 20 years and were not being pursued by career reservists if they could help it. Active Reserves for officers require you to be very political so that you can find a new unit that can absorb you if you get promoted out of your slot, i.e. Company grade to Field grade, and a Group has a lot of senior officer slots. I had left the 706th when it was deactivated. 

 The greatest value of the 706 Group was that we had three members who were qualified to repair the steam engines being used at Fort Eustis for training, and those three sometimes were called up to active duty to make mid-year repairs, they were all Majors. However, in 1975 the Army realized that as part of the downsizing they did not need railroad reserve units that would not be mobilized until three to four years after WWIII began, so they were deactivated. Also even the poorest nations had acquired diesel engines and steam experts were no longer required. 

The unit crest for the 706th was Iron Horse with PRR logo. 

The interesting part of the history of the ACTCOTS was that it lasted 6 weeks. I went through TOCS in the 1960's and it was 23 weeks. 

Some articles from the 1970s.