Steam & Excursion > Steam Locomotive Repairs Must Proceed Despite The Facilities!

One of the constants in the era of steam motive power in railroading, was the need for regular maintenance of steam locomotives.  Some of these repairs could be quite involved and very labor intensive depending on the cycle of repairs that a particular engine found itself in.  Not all steam railroads were blessed with suitable facilities for such work as we see here.

In the late 1940's the Pacific Portland Cement rail operation in Grants Pass, Oregon needed to do an extensive rebuild of both the boiler and running gear on their primary piece of motive power, their 90-ton Baldwin 2-8-2 #103.  Being and industrial shortline meant that PPC had almost no servicing facility for it's steam motive power.  That, however, did not stop them from performing the needed repairs as we see in this photo.

Steam locomotives were, after all, somewhat basic machines that could be repaired even in open-air facilities like this when needed.  This attribute helped make them both popular with many railroads and aided in their longevity, even after the advent of diesel power.

Martin



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 03/13/19 02:27 by LoggerHogger.

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Thank you for a new image of this operation. See you at Winterail. - Tony

I have never heard of this rail operation.  Where did it run from / to?  When was it in operation?  Any other history that you can provide?

lynnpowell Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I have never heard of this rail operation.  Where
> did it run from / to?  When was it in
> operation?  Any other history that you can
> provide?

I'll try to keep this short and simple. The Beaver Portland Cement (BPC) Co, (later Ideal Cement) operated over the eastern portion of of the old California & Oregon Coast (C&OC) RR. The C&OC was a railroad with plans to build a railroad west from Grants Pass, Oregon to Crescent City, California. It was to connect with (if it had been built) the SP NWP from Eureka, CA. Unfortunately the C&OC reached only 14.5 miles west of Grants Pass and the dream ended. In 1924 the BPC laid a four-mile spur to Marble Mountain and took over the C&OC tracks. In 1950 floodwaters swept away sections of a bridge, blocking the the Marble Mountain quarry from Grants Pass, so BPC switched to trucks to haul rock from Marble Mountain to the Idea Cement plant at Gold hill, OR There were still several rail customers between Grants Pass and the other side of the Rogue River Bridge in Grants Pass, so BPC operated shuttle service to the SP interchange.

.The Christmas Day flood of 1955 washed away the Rogue River Bridge and that was the end of the railroad. Some of the old rail on the east side of the Rogue River Bridge remained until about 15 years ago when our NRHS chapter was granted permission to salvage rails and ties. Some of this is in use as our motorcar train inside the Medford Railroad Park. - Tony Johnson

Previous post by LoggerHogger and contributions by others on this short line:
https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?10,2970815

Ken
 

Interesting story, thanks for background and photos.

You've hit a soft spot, Martin, as I've lately been working feverishly on revising and significantly augmenting my California & Oregon Coast webpage (which currently is inexplicably missing many pictures). Curiously, it has been my experience that photos of the PPC 103 are harder to find than of earlier C&OC #301, so it is great to see this one.

As you know, C&OC planned for much of its existence to project southwest, using Hobbs, Wall & [lumber] Co.'s line for the last few miles into Crescent City , something that never happened. Lately I have discovered how little the Hobbs, Wall rail operations (DNS, earlier Crescent City & Smith River and later Hobbs, Wall & Co., proper) appear in the historical record, and how misrepresented the outfit is in railfan literature. For instance, most "rosters" that I've seen show CC&SR having two tank locos of inconsistent specifications, plus DNS rostering one loco, a Shay #6. Actually, CC&SR eventually rostered five rod locos, which were later placed on the DNS roster ahead of #6. DNS purchased one more rod loco after that. When DNS ceased as an operating entity ca. 1925, the remaining locos were run as Hobbs, Wall locos under their existing numbers and soon replaced with used Shays (2nd) #1, 3 and 4 (a fourth Shay was purchased for parts). DNS #6 became (2nd) #2. I have plenty of data for the Shays, but the rod locos, not so much. I have supposed stats for original #1, 2 and 5, but these come without attribution, let alone any corroboration

Then there's the CC&SR Fort Dix branch of the 1890's (at least), which appears on no known maps. And a supposed DNS branch up the Smith River which appears in a railfan atlas, but seems highly unlikely. AND, there's the California & Oregon Lumber Co. that operated a logging line from Brookings to the vicinity of Smith River for a couple of years in the early 20's, for which I also have been unable to locate a map.

Truly unexplored territory!

Thanks for the timely post! I tried to send you a PM, but your box is full.

Ed Gibson
Wx4.org
 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/14/19 19:58 by hogheaded.