Steam & Excursion > A Brand New Train Shows Off Her Colors During Her First Month!

Just before the outbreak of WW-2, the Southern Pacific showed it's optimism for the nation and it's economy when, on July 4, 1941, it inaugurated the famed "San Joaquin Daylight" to provide service between L.A. and Oakland, by way of the San Joaquin Valley in California.  To add a touch of splash to this new train, SP #2485 assigned to this new train and was given some streamline skirting and castings and was painted in the Daylight paint scheme of it's big sister 4-8-4's.

The handsomely attired 4-6-2 #2485 was captured by David J. Welch on July 24, 1941 taking water at Tracy, California during her month of service.   What a beautiful sight she was.

Martin



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 09/05/19 04:41 by LoggerHogger.

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See?

EVERY early Daylight loco wore WhireWall tires...
It’s  an important aspect of the overall paint scheme & design...

To clean them...hit them wit a mist of diesel fuel, kerosene, then use a steam lance. ( right off the boiler) ..to rinse them nice and clean...  Takes less than a minute per tire...
That’s what eager fans are for...like Tom Sawyer’s friends who wanted to paint his pickett fence.. 

(Doyle: “Oh, it’s too hard to keep them clean..”.  At times, he can be stubborn)

Wes

Oh well Doyle takes good care of his baby for us anyway.
 

Love the pics. I'm using all the pics I can find to help finish my 1" scale live steamer. I am going with whitewalls.

I already have the train, just need to finish the loco!
 

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Matt,
Will your train be out tom the LALS Spring Metr this weekend?

James R.(Jim) Baker
Whittier, CA

Matt,
Will your train be out tom the LALS Spring Meet this weekend?

James R.(Jim) Baker
Whittier, CA

It's such a momentous issue, I feel compelled to chime in.......about whitewalls, or not.

I'm fine with whitewalled builders' photos, and even for delivery.  But, in regular service, as 4449 now wears, solid steel.

Then there's diesel and passenger car trucks.....silvered please, in all cases.

AA

Stanford White
Carmel Valley, CA

Possibly the first train I ever rode. I was born in 1935 and we moved from Bakersfield to Madera in 1940.
Had relatives in Bfl and rode this train (and ATSF Golden Gate from Hanford) rather than driving.

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

I would love to have heard this engine leave Bakersfield and do the long climb up thru Edison to Sandcut---what a great stretch of railroad that is, back then, with packing houses all clustered in Edison, making for great echos and sound reverb...

JimBaker Wrote:
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> Matt,
> Will your train be out tom the LALS Spring Meet
> this weekend?

If you mean the Fall Meet, no. I usually come down for the Spring Meet in May.

coach wrote:

> I would love to have heard this engine leave Bakersfield and do the long climb up thru Edison  to Sandcut---what a great stretch of railroad that is, back then, with packing houses all clustered in Edison, making for great echos and sound reverb...

Bigger power - 4-8-2s and 4-8-4s - would have been the normal road engines used on the San Joaquin Daylight east of Bakersfield.  Howerever, Pacific-type locomotives sometimes were assigned as helpers on the train.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/06/19 13:06 by johnsweetser.