Steam & Excursion > Retired SP Steam At Bayshore Yard, Around 1958

My father took these in 1958.

Regards, Jim Evans

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Neat photos.  Being a Midwesterner, I am guessing that this area looks absolutely nothing like this now.

Thanks for posting them.

Agree, interesting to see what the hills looked like.

Thank you for posting those great shots of Bayshore. I recall staying overnight with my folks at a motel in Brisbane and walking up the hill behind it to see the long lines of steam in the yard below. I was 12 and had no camera but can still see them in my mind's eye.

Tom

Here is what Bayshore Yard looked like in 1973. Then it was the end resting place for SP passenger cars with a lot of economy baggage cars visible
on the tracks nearest my camera.

Soil was cantaminated by years of rail use so yard site remained dormant for years after track was removed.

There are plans for huge housing and office development on the site.

Regards, Jim Evans



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/26/20 10:57 by FiveChime.

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Is that last image reversed?

That was my first thought as well.

Greg Stadter
Phoenix, AZ

Yes the 1973 image is reversed as this is taken from the south end of the yard and the main should be on the right.  I wandered through Bayshore several times myself between 1958 and 1961 and well remember the long lines of dead steamers that lined the tracks adjacent to the main.  As in these photos most of the cab forwards did not have lettering on the cab as several trips through the tunnels and snow sheds of Donner made the lettering unreadable, so SP in the latter years just no longer painted their name on the tender flanks.    TomE

Jim:

Great pictures...I have a question was a cab forward ever used in passenger service.
Was a cab forward ever put into service on a commute run?

Thanks for posting these,
Charles n

Very sad.  I remember lines of steam around St. Louis and at the scrapyard over in IL.   Heartbreaking for a 15 year old steam fanatic to see this.

Here is the image flipped.  I wish there was this amount of rail traffic in SF these days.

Thanks for the pictures, Jim! 

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Just to chime in... I have had the pleasure of seeing a cab forward in charge of Train #91,
the coast mail. I guess it qualifies as a passenger train since it usually carried a rider
coach or two on its tail. I lived in Santa Clara, CA at the time and there didn't seem to really
be a need for that much power since we were some distance away from any significant
grades. Never did see one on a commute.

charlesn wrote:

> I have a question was a cab forward ever used in passenger service.

Cab-aheads were routinely used on the "Owl" and on the "West Coast" between Bakersfield and Los Angeles.

Posted from iPhone

And the Cow Palace is visible in Pic #2.  Great trio of pictures!

Rich


TCnR Wrote:
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> Agree, interesting to see what the hills looked
> like.

I remember those steam dead lines too.  I never did roam the yard in that era, but did have a good view of the dead lines from the train on trips into the City.   First it was from the Starlight, later after the demise of the Starlight, from the Lark.  
Over the years I saw them grow, then shrink, then, finally, disappear.  I thought it sad to see the dead lines, but also felt gratification those wonderful machines were still in existance.  I think my teen age brain hoped from some impossible resurection of steam which, of course, never happened........Ross Rowand's steam trials of the '80s excepted!!
Anyway, what was really depressing was to see that final disposition of them, and the disappearance of the hallowed dead lines.
Thanks for the poignant memories.

AA

Stanford White
Carmel Valley, CA



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/26/20 17:49 by agentatascadero.

The only passenger trains Cab Forwards were not used on over Tehachapi were the Daylights. They were also used in passenger service over Donner.

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

Thanks Jim for the photos. I wandered around the steam deadline in 1959-1961 (got kicked out once) and took photos.

Kodachrome?
 

Somewhere I saw a photo of No. 98, the Coast Daylight, at San Luis Obispo powered by a Cab Forward, obviously a relief engine grabbed from some freight.  It would make for quite a running time penalty compared to the GS classes.
My first trip past Bayshore in '59 or 60 I tried to see the steam deadlines but it seemed that long lines of green pullmans blocked the view.
But I'd see them in ones and twos come from Burbank to Los Angeles on their moves to scrap yards down at the harbor.