Steam & Excursion > This "Biggest Little City" Knew How To Attract Train Passengers!

"Location, location, location" as the saying goes is the secret to a retail business.  Clearly the shop owners in Reno, Nevada in 1939 knew that meant be near the Southern Pacific train station and you will do well. One look at this image of SP Cab-Forward #4175 stopped with her passenger train and all the nearby gambling clubs, eateries, bars and hotels tells us that these Reno shopkeepers knew where the customers would be arriving first in town.

Given how busy the scene appears to be, I would say their plan has worked.

Martin



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/19 03:12 by LoggerHogger.

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Today, is there anything left in this photo?  Even the railroad has been dug into a ditch.

Wow, so much to see in this scene.  Thanks for posting it Martin.

Neat tower there in the background. Looks like the railroad goes under it.

Regards, Jim Evans

What a wonderful photograph that is, with so much going on in the scene.  It illustrates how central the passenger train was to American life.  Thanks for posting!

Is that the infamous "Two Trains" light on the Magnetic Flagman wigwag?

Stan Praisewater

And the in later years Reno was the one place you could acquire a "Quiki Divorce", ah the sweet sentiment!
Oh, and after that, it was the one town that had four rail oriented hobby shops!

Out

Wonderful photo!
ALLEN

Very NICE shot!

Larry

Cab forwards always gave a sense of majesty.

Are Virginia & Truckee tracks to the left of the locomotive in this photo?

The Virginia & Truckee came in on the south side of the station on the right.

Nothing left of that scene today except the train station.
 

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After looking closer, I realized the orginal photo looks like it was taken from the crossing at Virginia St. looking east.  This was the best perspective I could get on google earth.

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Wow that area sure looks different now. But Martin sure found an interesting photo with tons to look at. Wig-wag, classic cars, classic locomotive, and on and on.

Nathan

Posted from iPhone

Sister engine 4155 was my old hoghead Jim Abraham’s fav engine back in the day and he said she was “easy to fire”— great view of the 4175, here.
Now, the railroad is “out of sight, and out of mind”... People really have no connection w/ it since the trench was completed— a huge debacle with plenty of bias on the UPRR’s part citing a major increase in traffic ( still waiting for that) along with editorial support from the pro-trench forces at the Reno Gazette-Journal which “boiler-plated” the need for the trench due to safety and response issues for police/EMS/fire.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/08/19 02:03 by IC_2024.

It's really amazing how smart people were back in 1939--all they needed was a simple "wig wag" signal to let them know a train was coming.  They actually looked around and paid attention to their surroundings.  Very intelligent, indeed.

Not to mention that the V&T was in the middle of the street approaching the station!

Out

FiveChime Wrote:

> Neat tower there in the background. Looks like the
> railroad goes under it.

The perspective is misleading - the crossing tower was off to the right (south) side of the tracks.  I haven't seen many good photos of it, but masterphots posted another view in this old thread that shows that the tower didn't straddle the tracks:

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3552458

coach Wrote:

> It's really amazing how smart people were back in
> 1939--all they needed was a simple "wig wag"
> signal to let them know a train was coming.  They
> actually looked around and paid attention to their
> surroundings.  Very intelligent, indeed.

Considering wigwags were outlawed for new installation just ten years later, you may be giving "people" too much credit.  Looking through old newspapers is also good for shattering those sorts of illusions - they tend to contain all kinds of stories about people dying by their own stupidity.