Western Railroad Discussion > Paul Gordenev from Western Pacific Railroad RIP

Paul Gordenev was born in San Francisco in 1939 and grew up riding and became a fan or the San Francisco Municipal Railway. He was an early rider of excursions and became involved with the Northern California Railroad Club in San Francisco where he was President in the 1960's.  He set up excursions on the McCloud River Railroad using 2-6-2 #25.  Excursions that he also ran included one such as going to the Franzia Winery on the Tidewater Southern RR where everyone came home quite happy after much tasting. Another notable excursion in the early '60's was the joint railfan club Suntan Special Excursion riding on the Southern Pacific RR from San Francisco to Santa Cruz and Big Trees.  He recounted that the last such trip was so popular that the Southern Pacific office that sold the tickets begged him to stop  advertising as they could not put on any more cars for the train to handle the crowds. The most famous ride that he took as a teenager was riding behind the last cab forward #4294 over Donner in 1957. He snuck out and rode a good portion of it on top of the tender.  As the late Western Pacific and Amtrak veteran Arthur Lloyd who ran the trip for the R&HS said, "Some of us had a better ride than others."

Paul also worked for the Western Pacific Railroad in many positions. He worked at the headquarters at 526 Mission Street in San Francisco. At times he also worked for them in the Traffic Department in Pittsburgh, PA, was a brakeman in Oakland and San Jose, and worked as Public Relations Manager writing and editing the Western Pacific magazine, Mileposts. He staged the famous photo of the 2 Bicentennial diesels on the Keddie wye bridge in 1976 that did not bode him well with the higher ups at the WP as they said that 2 locomotives could never be on the bridge. He made it happen anyway. He stayed with Western Pacific through the merger and retired from Union Pacific in Customer Service in St. Louis.

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Paul was a regular rider and an ardent supporter of the Southern Pacific commuter trains from San Francisco to San Jose.  He started the Peninsula Commuters Action Committee (which later became the spark for the Caltrain Citizens Advisory Committee) which was instrumental in drumming up support for the trains when the Southern Pacific wanted to abandon them.  He set up petitions, needled railroad officials, and cajoled countless politicians pointing out the value of these Peninsula trains.  Ultimately thanks to his and others continued support the trains were taken over by Caltrans, renamed Caltrain, and then taken over by the 3 local counties.  He was an early supporter and advocate of electrification of the line and lived to see and ride the electric trains on the line. 

Paul also liked tourist trains and used to volunteer at tourist logging railroads in the Sierra's in the 1970's. He also used to work on the Sierra Railroad Supper trains run by Great Western Tours out of Jamestown. Paul was also an early member of the Bay Area Electric Railroad Association which runs the Western Railway Museum at Rio Vista Junction. Any donations may be made to this organization or to the Western Pacific Railroad Museum in Portola in his memory.  Paul was an ardent passenger train rider and supporter and was always there to remind anyone who would listen about railroads and the joy of riding trains. RIP.


 

We lost lost another good one. Sorry to hear the sad  news. RIP. Bill Webb