Steam & Excursion > AFT Confidential 11- Albuquerque NM

11 Albuquerque NM Feb 3-6, 1976

I don't remember anything special about leaving Tucson, so I guess it went smoothly enough. Smoothly would mean we pulled at the usual 2am.

At Steins, just over the AZ/NM line, we stopped to let a westbound pass and then again at a siding called Gary to set out our 2 SP helpers. Apparently SP regularly removed helpers here, about 20mi shy of Lordsburg, to return to Tucson.

I have a few photos of military aircraft making “strafing runs” at us as we crossed the desert. Guess we were a rather conspicuous (and popular) target.

We left the SP at Deming. At Rincon NM the ATSF added their diesel helper and the '49 was watered and serviced. I walked up to the head end to ride the crew car- a chance meet and get acquainted with Craig, Tom, and Bob, the “second string” firemen of the engine crew. Craig and Tom had joined the 4449 crew as volunteers in the Bay Area. Bobby had been involved wit the 4449's restoration in Portland. Their ambition eventual earned them paid spots on the crew. The Crew Car was always welcome to an extra set of hands to drag alemite gear- especially running on the SP with the 3 flats between it and the locomotive!

Our Albuquerque arrival was scheduled for late afternoon/early evening, so it was a full day of riding. The routing was SP Sunset line to Deming NM, then north up the ATSF to Albuquerque. At the time this was a bit of rare Santa Fe mileage, but today the RailRunner commuter service operates this line.

In Albuquerque the train displayed out at Kirtland AFB. The branch out to the airbase has since been largely removed making this site the most isolated of all the AFT display sites today.

The next day the Engine Crew commandeered a courtesy car (more about the car situation later) and we were off to have a look at what the Santa Fe had tucked away in their roundhouse.    I quickly learned that if the local RR had something to see, Doyle and his gang usually got themselves invited to see it. (Wise words: “I'm with Doyle”) This roundhouse collection was later transferred to Sacramento when the SPSF merger was pending, about 12yrs later. (Now that I think of it: I saw that move in AZ while working on #4. Huh, I'd forgotten about that..) The collection has since been distributed even further.

Early on the morning of the 7th we left ABQ for Odessa TX.
It would be the start of a rough couple of days..
SR Bush
Dutch Flat CA


Photo 1. In the clear at Steins to let an SP WB by.
Photo 2  Dropping down from Steins.
Photo 3. Cutting out the helpers at Gary NM. They would return to Tucson.

Photo 4. Under attack!
Photo 5. Deming NM. Here we would go onto the ATSF and the 4449 would leave “Home Rails” for nearly a year.
Photo 6. Now on the Santa Fe with one of their Bicentennial units.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/02/21 10:02 by BoilingMan.

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Photo 7. The roundhouse in Albuquerque.
Photos 8&9. ATSF's Rotary plow 199361. In Topeka KS now, still with the BNSF.

Photo 10. 0-4-0 #5 (Lil Buttercup) and F7A #347C, now in San Jose & Sacramento CA.
Photo 11. FM H-12-44 #543, now at the Illinois Railway Museum.
Photo 12. Motor Car M-190, now in Belen NM.

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Does anyone have photos of the display site they can post?

    Tom

Unfortunately, I didn't take a single photo of the site- only the running move and the Santa Fe roundhouse.  Oddly, we skipped looking for ATSF 2926 in the Albuquerque park- we certainly were chose enough.  My guess is we'd run out the clock and needed to return the car we'd borrowed from the AFT courtesy pool.
SR

Thanks for the great coverage and photos of your trip eastward with the Freedom Train. I don't seem to remember much of it's trip once it left So Cal where I lived at the time. I don't recall seeing a photo of a Santa Fe bicenennial unit with the 4449 before. 

Thanks.  We had the Santa Fe Bicentennial unit along on several of the moves.  Actually I think the ATSF had more than one (5?).  I never kept score as to which ones we saw, but we never had more than one at a time, always a single unit. And always a Bicentennial, never a locomotive in freight colors.
This series will run for a year-  So California wasn't even the half way mark of the tour!
SR


 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/03/21 08:05 by BoilingMan.

I used to, but the slides didn't like extreme heat.

towazy Wrote:
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> Does anyone have photos of the display site they
> can post?
>
>     Tom

Nice catch on image #6 with 5704's medallion being a pre- eagle, red white and blue paint job.

IC1038west Wrote:
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> Nice catch on image #6 with 5704's medallion being
> a pre- eagle, red white and blue paint job.

I’ll be darn- I never noticed that before. We’ll see the 5704 again in Houston. I looked, and it had the medallion by then- 2 weeks later.
SR

A few years after this trip (circa 1979) I spent quite a bit of time at our research lab just east of Tucson.  Of course, I spent a lot of my spare time along the SP main east of town.

Getting buzzed by planes out of (?) Davis Monthan AFB was really common.  It was explained to me that that was the delivery point for new F15s, and there was a lot of  testing of some new nape-of-the-earth navigation system going on.  It was really amazing how close one of those things could get to you without you hearing it first.