Nostalgia & History > Al Rose: Depot Friday – Escalon, CA

1, 2) The Santa Fe depot in Escalon, CA was built by “predecessor” San Francisco & San Joaquin Valley in 1896.  It was an SF&SJV standard No.1, which differed from the more common No.2 most notably in the shape of the open-air waiting room.  The depot’s days were numbered when Al Rose photographed it on March 23, 1969.  Santa Fe had filed to close the agency in June 1968, and the California Public Utilities Commission finally approved the application a month after Rose’s photo session.  The railroad made good on the closure in late May 1969 and offered to sell the depot on the condition that the buyer had to move it off the property.  The city had voiced an interest in preserving the depot in situ, but no buyers willing to swallow the expense of moving it came forward, and it was torn down in 1970.
 

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3) The other railroad in Escalon was Western Pacific subsidiary and former interurban Tidewater Southern.  The TS and Santa Fe very briefly paralleled each other on the north end of town but they didn’t share depot facilities.  Instead, the TS had its own depot on the north side of First St. west of the tracks. 
 
4) Passenger service was long gone from TS rails by the 1950’s, but the Escalon depot did get visits from an occasional railfan excursion during that decade.  Stan Snook caught TS 2-6-2 #132 pulling a Northern California Railroad Club excursion past the depot on April 27, 1952.  This train originated at the SP Oakland Pier and ran to Turlock and back.  More photos of this trip can be found in these old threads:
 
https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3578720
https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3580167
https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?10,2368309
 
5) NorCal ran another Tidewater excursion on May 8, 1955, this time coming out of Oakland behind diesels and switching to WP 4-6-0 #94 at Stockton.  The train ran down the Manteca Branch and also the TS “main line” at least as far as McHenry.  Dudley Thickens caught the train passing the Escalon depot eastbound.  More photos of this trip are in this old thread:

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,3594127

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6, 7) Tidewater Southern’s Escalon depot was destroyed by fire on the afternoon of December 19, 1959.  The blaze also consumed a nearby packing shed and six boxcars, one of which was loaded with oil drums that started exploding.  The fire and mayhem also damaged nearby high-voltage lines and knocked out power to the entire town for a while.  The Modesto Bee editions from 12/20 and 12/21 speculated that the fire may have started in a railroad maintenance of way outfit car “that contained a gasoline driven generator.”  Somewhat ironically, a maintenance of way outfit car was brought in to replace the destroyed depot.  Al Rose found TS MW 0565 semi-permanently connected to power and communications (but apparently not water or sewer) opposite the Escalon station sign on March 23, 1969, the same day he shot the Santa Fe depot.   TS had applied to discontinue their Escalon agency in October 1968, and none of the three ranchers who attended the closure hearing in July 1969 objected (only the Chamber of Commerce spoke in protest at the Santa Fe depot’s closure hearing, and that was only to voice concern that the railroad might terminate the city’s lease of the adjacent parking lot used by patrons of the downtown business district).  I don't know when this final TS "depot" was...scrapped?
 
Photos courtesy the Western Railway Museum Archives.
 

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Excellent series of photos! I have never seen photos of the Escalon area before and failed to take any myself. ATSF trains through Escalon were high speed - at least those that I saw on occasion from 1963 - 1975. I was too late to see TS steam so never bothered with diesel (my mistake). Appreciate your taking the time to write up and post all these.

The last picture reminds me of the old boxcar that was used on the SP at Waterford, CA. It was placed there as a residence for the company agent, Clarence Sales & wife. Lasted until sometime in the 1950s.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/24/22 09:50 by Westbound.