Steam & Excursion > An Engine Is Seen Pushing Her Train Past This Most Unique Depot!

Depot buildings in the West came in a variety of designs and styles.  Most of the mainline depots tended to follow standard designs for the particular railroad that built them.  However there were exceptions to these rules.

One such railroad that utilized a unique design for many of it's depot buildings was the Sierra Railway of Jamestown, California.  This Mother Lode Shortline decided earl on to adopt a Chinese flair for the design of it's depots to emulate the Chinese culture that had helped build the transcontinental railroad.  This should not be too surprising given that fact that the same Crocker family of the famed Central Pacific also was the founding family of the Sierra Ry.

In the first photo we see Sierra Railroad 2-8-2 #34 shoving a string of loaded ballast cars past the Sonora depot building in the early 1940's.  The next photo by Ralph Demoro better shows the details of the building as it was in September, 1938.  The wainscotting on the lower portion of the building is marble that came from the near-by town of Columbia, California.  Marble was for a time one of the main commodities hauled by the railroad.

You will note that even the speeder shed next to the depot emulated the Chinese architecture of the main building.

Unfortunately, this building came to an end in 1946 when it burned to the ground.  She was then replaced by a wooden fright shed of standard design.

Martin



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/16 03:25 by LoggerHogger.

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The garage and tool shed at Sonora remained standing until August 2, 1979, when it was demolished to make way for the new Sonora Post Office.

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Those might not be ballst cars, the train is just North of the siding into the limestone facility.

Out

callum_out Wrote:
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> Those might not be ballst cars, the train is just
> North of the siding into the limestone facility.
>
> Out
They look like the hoppers that are sitting a short distance from the Jamestown depot (as of 2 saturdays ago)
Regards,DK

These are the former Great Northern hoppers that the Sierra bought decades ago.  Similar ones also ended up on the Yosemite Valley RR.

Martin

DKay Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> callum_out Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Those might not be ballst cars, the train is
> just
> > North of the siding into the limestone
> facility.
> >
> > Out
> They look like the hoppers that are sitting a
> short distance from the Jamestown depot (as of 2
> saturdays ago)
> Regards,DK 
These are Ballast hoppers and this is in fact a Work Train. All lime products were shipped out in covered hopper cars or boxcars.

Cool, thanks for the heads up.

Out

Great shots, Martin! BTW the Nevills Hotel in Jamestown had a similar look to it, but it also burned down in 1915? I don't have my books with me now to fact check it.

Tom