Steam & Excursion > Quite A Steam Facility - WP's Portola Roundhouse!

This is the latest in my series on famous steam facilities here in the West.

Today we look at the Western Pacific's mountain roundhouse facility at Portola, CA on the Feather River line.

I have selected a series of photos taken by Guy L. Dunscomb in 1938 during one of his earlies visits to the Portola roundhouse. The steam facility is in full swing and it will be several more years before it is invaded by diesels.

Martin



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/12 05:50 by LoggerHogger.

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The first 2 shots taken by Guy in 1938 are from the hill behind the roundhouse. You really can get the feeling of the activity that surounded this steam plant day and night in the cool mountain air.


The last shot is from the edge of the turntable showing the oil, water and sand facilities so necessary in the days of steam.


Martin



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/12 05:54 by LoggerHogger.

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M-762 in the second shot is nice, a woody being used as an inspection car.

Sharon Evans
Glen Allen, VA

Martin,

THANK YOU for sharing these wonderful photos. Thanks to Mr. Dunscomb for this (to say nothing of his thousands of others).

I really need to research your earlier postings and am anxious for others to come.

John Bush
Omaba

These are great Martin. I could look at vintage roundhouse and engine terminal photos all day. I wish more people had taken shots like that.

Frisco1522 Wrote:
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> These are great Martin. I could look at vintage
> roundhouse and engine terminal photos all day. I
> wish more people had taken shots like that.


My feelings EXACTLY!

John

Picture 1 looks like engine 335 is either getting a plow added or removed. Sure is a lot easier in HO scale than 1:1 scale.

Ditto, love engine terminal shots.

Just wondering if you have permission of the owner of the Dumscomb negative collection to post these as you might be in copyright violation. As far as I know, they still sell prints as a business and you might be taking money out of their pockets. Just a question that needs to be asked with all internet posts as the copyright belongs to the original negative/slide owner, not the current owner of the print/slide.

Peter Arnold

Pete,

Next time I look in the mirror, I will ask the owner of the collection your question. I'll let you know what he says.

Martin

Thanks for the clarification; I wasn't aware of who owned it. There are many out there who don't abide by copyright laws. Are you continuing to sell prints from the collections you bought? Website?

Peter

These are wonderful images of a busy place. Thanks for sharing.

Steve Mitchell
http://www.yardgoatimages.com

Awesome awesome stuff. Never seen that shot with the 762 before. Wasn't even aware it existed until I was helping sort the Virgil Staff collection for the FRRS. Found several nice shots of WP inspection cars I didn't even know had existed.

In the background of a few of those photos can be seen WP combine 402, which was a regular "caboose" on the mixed trains out of Portola. She survives today painted as Rio Grande 550 at CSRM. And the control doghouse on the turntable survives at the WP museum (along with the turntable pit, a section of which we temporarily uncovered many years ago when laying new sidewalks). One day, it will be united with the doghouse-less Oroville turntable and will sit in front of a reconstructed roundhouse.

Thanks, Martin.

Z

Whats interesting about these types of shots...is that you never see any people....interesting...

Costanza Wrote:
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> Whats interesting about these types of shots...is
> that you never see any people....interesting...

They were taken by Google Earth.