Nostalgia & History > The Coast Daylight arriving at Third & Townsend Station 1959

†his probably one of the first photos I ever took. Here's one of the 4Th Street crossing guards protecting the arrival of the Black Widow E unit leading Train 99 into San Francisco in 1959.

Robert Morris Photography
http://www.snowcrest.net/photobob/index.html

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Wow, I'm not sure I realized SP had "E" units in black widow colors... Great shot!

James Nelson
Thornton, CO
www.flickr.com/mojaveflyer

Well done for one of your early slides.
Bob

SP 6048 and SP 6050 both wore those colors for a brief amount of time. Bob caught the firefly in the jar here!

~ BZ



mojaveflyer Wrote:
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> Wow, I'm not sure I realized SP had "E" units in
> black widow colors... Great shot!

Notice the flagman at the crossing. I always wondered about their tales.
Some, I think, had on the job injuries and held these positions as a light duty until retirement or full recovery but that is a guess.
Also, they had to have seen the amazing parade of trains plus switching moves through the decades, and should have had interesting observations if they cared about railroading.

Would this train block the crossing when berthed at the station?

Posted from iPhone

Note that the second unit is sans the red sill stripe with paint on the nose. this is indicative of the Halloween scheme. The 6051 wore it for a shorter time then the E's in black widow!
Rare photo indeed!
Thanks for another gem Mr. Morris!
Rob

EDIT: I do remember in one of Strapacs, SP Historic Diesels, that PA 6039? was in Halloween Scheme till at least late '59. The grills are more ALCO the more i look at it vs. EMD.

Edit #2: Love the REA truck to the left. My grandfather worked for them until they folded.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/20/17 21:30 by GoldenState.

EXCELLENT!
ALLEN

Superb Bob! Didn't shoot my first photo at 3rd and Townsend until 66!

I was thinking the same thing. Looks close to retirement and probably had some interesting stories.

Such an interesting photo for many reasons.


railstiesballast Wrote:
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> Notice the flagman at the crossing. I always
> wondered about their tales.

Second unit is an Alco PA and it looks black, which would make it the pumpkin 6039. Great catch of two rare units, paint-wise.

Yes, Mike, my understanding of flagman were from folks who had been injured etc. Thats the story that I got back in the 50's.

Ed

Was a two unit Daylight unusual at that time? Seems like every other photo I’ve seen of 98/99 in the late fifties/early sixties shows three E units, PAs or a combination of the two.

Dave

I remember talking to a flagman at his little shanty on the 7th Street curve. He said he was a pensioner and SP would help supplement their pension with small jobs like this. Of course a few years later automatic crossing gates eliminated that option.

Classic paint scheme!

I would be ecstatic if one of my earliest images turned out this well! Great image, thanks for sharing Bob.

Jan Austin
Chico, CA
J.G. Austin Photography

Historic photo from the experimental paint era Bob. Looks Like the Black widow 6050 and Halloween painted 6051 ran as a pair for a bit.
Note photo 2 here:
https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?3,4410559,4410829#4410829
Looks like the same pair 50 and 51 on the southbound (East) Daylight

Notch16 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> SP 6048 and SP 6050 both wore those colors for a
> brief amount of time. Bob caught the firefly in
> the jar here!
>
> ~ BZ
>
>
>
> mojaveflyer Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Wow, I'm not sure I realized SP had "E" units
> in
> > black widow colors... Great shot!


Yup. And as one story I heard goes, SP realized that the cost to paint passenger units in this scheme was nearly equal to the Daylight scheme. One must wonder "what were they thinking?"

Looks to me like only two cars ahead of the triple nit diner....wonder how often that happened. It was in the fall of '59 that I saw my first short Daylight consist...combine, two coaches (articulated?), dining car, coach, tavern, parlor-obs, pulled by two units. Before that, I think 14 cars was the shortest I'd seen.

AA

Stanford White
Carmel Valley, CA