Steam & Excursion > While Her Days Are Numbered, This Locomotive Is Well Lettered!

With her line-shafts, bell and other parts missing, there is no doubt but that Yosemite Sugar Pine Lumber Co. Shay #3 will never see service again.  However, how is it that she is sporting such fresh lettering?

The YSPLC shut down for good in 1942 when they ran out of available timber and the USFS would not sell them anymore as Yosemite National Park became the focus of early environmentalists.  Shay #5 was quickly sold to the Northern Redwood Company out of Korbel, California by the scrap company that bought the YSPLC assets.  The other 4 Shays were left in the woods up above the big incline that connected with the Yosemite Valley Railroad.

By 1947, when Stan Snook took this photo of YSPLC #3 at Sunset Camp, her days were numbered.  However, that did not stop Stan from giving the 3-truck Shay some new lettering for this photo.  Sadly, the lettering would not last long as #3 would be scraped on the spot in just a few short weeks.

Martin



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 10/07/21 02:23 by LoggerHogger.

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Hey boss.....what do I do with this gallon of white paint?

LoggerHogger Wrote:

> The YSPLC shut down for good in 1942 when they ran out of available timber and the USFS would not sell them anymore as Yosemite National Park became the focus of early environmentalists. 

I'm not sure I understand this.  The U.S. Forest Service is a different agency than the National Park Service, which runs Yosemite National Park (in addition, the two agencies are in different federal departments).


 

johnsweetser Wrote:

> I'm not sure I understand this.  The U.S. Forest
> Service is a different agency than the National
> Park Service, which runs Yosemite National Park
> (in addition, the two agencies are in different
> federal departments).

The answer is easy and clear.  Both the NPS and USFS are federal agencies.  They often work together on conservation issues like this one.  Begining in the 1930's the USFS was tasked to help creat buffers around certain vital national parks suce as Yosemite.  That is what these 2 agencies were doing in 1942 when the NPS asked the USFS to halt logging in the USFS lands imediately abutting Yosemite National Park.

Martin

LoggerHogger Wrote:

> Begining in the 1930's the USFS was tasked to help creat buffers around certain vital national parks suce as Yosemite.  That is what these 2 agencies were doing in 1942 when the NPS asked the USFS to halt logging in the USFS lands imediately abutting Yosemite National Park.

I figured buffer zones were a possibilty but it would only have been a guess on my part.