Steam & Excursion > The Rear Of A Freight Drag May Never Look This Good Ever Again!

In the bygone days of steam on mainline railroads it was worth the railfan's time to simply wait as the steam powered train passed him by to get a view of the smoke disappearing into the distance the the caboose on the end of the train acting as an exclamation point to the whole event.

Here we see just such an event near to town of Mount Shasta, California in August 1948 as SP #4133 is at the head end of her freight train with #4219 on the rear helping just ahead of the ever present SP caboose.  Guy L. Dunscomb was patient enough to wait for this view before proceeding on to the next stop. 

I for one, am glad he waited.

Martin



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/24/17 03:03 by LoggerHogger.

---

The crossing at Mott Road.

Steve

Excellent!   One question; are there three cab forwards handling that train? One on the headend, why out of sight, then another cut-in about 20 cars from the rear(where all that black smoke is coming from), then the third "pusher" on the rearend?

Jack,

That is a good question.  Al lI know is that Guy recorded just 2 engine numbers on the negative sleeve.

Martin

It appears to be a 3 engine train.  Note the box and tank car in the distance to the left of the man standing.

That is one dandy photograph.  Thanks Guy and thanks Martin.

Lee Hower - Sacramento

Looks like it may be a meet to me. Eastbound up the main, Westbound coming down the siding.

Steve

I enlarged the shot and the siding is to the Right ( note the switch stand.) to the Left it looks like a single main at that point.

Didn't 4219's tender eventually become 4449's aux tender?

Posted from Android

That switch controls access to Mott spur which held about ten cars.

Steve

A-1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Didn't 4219's tender eventually become 4449's aux
> tender?

Yes.

Great photo. It sure looks like Mott but it's not what I thought it looked like at that time, this view is a little wider than most available photos. The location is well known for having a small MoW shed behind the photographer.

The was a small town of Mott and folks say it was in the area of the grade crossing and then wiped out by the freeway, but there doesn't seem to be much here except for a lot of power poles and power lines. I'm figuring that there was another grade crossing at the opposite side of what we call sawmill curve, just before the drop into the canyon, with the road on the left side continuing to that crossing and then working it's way over to the present County road.

The spur track is now a few hundred feet further down grade. Also of note is that the major grade was climbing up from Cantara Loop, it's much more level north of the road crossing, although still at a grade. That may explain why the rear helper has backed off a bit but the mid-train is working. Or, the head end would be looking at the signals at the Mott-Azealea crossover, if they were indeed in place at this time. The fill across Big Canyon would have been there for quite a while but I don't know about Azealea siding. For that matter the SP west switch at Mott may not be in the same place as today. Have to dig out Signor's book again.

>That switch controls access to Mott spur which held about ten cars.

Yes, and the caboose wheels aren't on the nearest rail, which would be the case if there was only one track at this spot. Not only that, where are all the chairs and riser plates which are normally associated with a switch?

HotWater Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> A-1 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Didn't 4219's tender eventually become 4449's
> aux
> > tender?
>
> Yes.


Keep in mind that tenders on the SP were frequent swapped with engines of the same class. It's highly unlikely that 4219's tender shown in this 1948 photograph was the same tender when 4219 was retired.

A great photo  . . and taken in Photobob's backyard pre-Photobob !! . .  a rarity for sure!

Craig
http://www.mcmrailvideos.com/