Tourist Railroad & Museum Conference To Be Held In Golden Mid-April

The Association of Tourist Railroads and Railway Museums has announced its spring 2016 national conference will be at our state's own Colorado Railroad Museum. The conference will run Thursday, April 14 to Saturday, April 16, 2016 and, while the fall conference is seems to be the main annual conference, the ATRRM says "interesting train rides and tours, a full educational program, and many social events for networking and getting to know colleagues and friends." Non-members should be alert for specials and activities in the Denver area held in advance of and during the conference dates.◊

For Unto Us...

For unto us a child is born,
Unto us a Son is given;
And the government will be upon His shoulder.
And His name will be called
Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the increase of His government and peace
There will be no end,
Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom,
To order it and establish it with judgment and justice
From that time forward, even forever.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.
Isaiah 9:6-7 (NKJV)

My father passed away this month. A time that is reserved for joy and peace between everyone, has for me become a time of grief and turmoil. Yet my father's love for me is a great comfort for me. Even as I mourn his passing, I know that his faith, and mine, tells me he has not really died. His spirit lives on and is right now in the presence of the Holy God of Israel. The promise of his faith, and mine, tells me that I will see him again because in a little town of Bethlehem, a little baby was born, who was the savior of mankind. The child brought us peace between God and man by completing his mission, sent to die on a desolate hilltop outside Jerusalem. His death brought an end to the enmity of God with man, whose sin had separated us from Him. God wanted everyone to come back to him, and so He sent his one and only Child. That child would be blameless, sinless until the moment on the cross when He became sin's horrible separation and died there for us, dying in our place, so that we could know Him again.



It was this substitution, this Great Exchange,* that completely amazed my father. He could not "get over" this wonderful turn of events that now allowed him to know God again. It's this relationship that is continued, even now, this first Christmas since I've seen him with these eyes for the last time. He is alive, more alive than I could ever be in this earthly body, because of a tiny baby's birth in some podunk byway in a barn among smelly animals and sheep whose shepherds had just been scared nearly to death by a heavenly burst of praise out in the fields nearby. This birth fulfilled by time and location the many seemingly impossible prophecies that had been set forth by prophets hundreds of years before.

These prophecies were read by my dad to supplement the Christmas story on Christmas morning. His voice is today silent, but his heart and mine echo the words like never before. This peace is possible for you to have just like my dad and I have. All that's necessary is for you to accept it in you heart and choose Him as your savior and lord. You can know God personally and meet me and my dad, Jesus and His Dad, and many more people all waiting to join you in heaven. That's the destination of the train I'm on. I don't know when the train will arrive, but I know that I'm making great time!

My dad and I on board the 2005 iteration of Rio Grande Scenic Railroad's La Veta Pass train, where we met Ed Ellis and enjoyed a great day together. He's a Grande fan, like me.

* This song was put together and performed by my dad's good friend, Bruce Carroll.

If you have questions about me, my dad, or our faith, I welcome all three at editor@corailroads.com!◊

POTD - Amtrak's California Zephyr Descends Ruby Canyon Along the Colorado River

Photo of the Day: Peter Lewis

Ruby Canyon is one of those hidden Colorado jewels that few people get the chance to see, unless you're riding Amtrak's California Zephyr between Grand Junction and Green River, Utah. The 25 mile long canyon is aptly named; even without the "golden hour" the walls fit the description in every season. No wonder the train leaves Denver so early! Nonetheless, the trip is often too long to be reached in daylight on those short winter days.

Peter Lewis makes his second appearance on Photo of the Day with this entry that has already garnered some attention. Gaining RailPictures.net's trifecta of awards (Screeners Choice, Photo of the Week and People's Choice) is no easy task! I especially enjoy the mirage-like effect of the sky blue reflected off the roofs of the Silverliners! But what seals this choice for Photo of the Day, however, is Mr. Lewis' own notes on the photograph. He says:

Amtrak's westbound California Zephyr negotiates the confines of Ruby Canyon as it nears the Utah border on a captivating August afternoon in the breathtaking American west. When I walked up to the edge and took in the scene for the first time, I was simply in awe. This experience and those like it are one of the biggest reasons I enjoy this hobby. The remoteness and natural beauty of this area is simply incredible, especially for an easterner like me. ^{[emphasis added]}

Keep up the great work, Mr. Lewis, and I get the feeling that you'll be making plenty of trips like this one!◊

POTD - Amtrak's California Zephyr Descends From the Divide To Downtown Denver

Photo of the Day: Peter Lewis

Peter Lewis' recent trip along the Moffat line in August yielded several good photos. Each worked well with the light, but I selected this particular shot because it's not the typical shot taken in this specific area. Usually shots are lower with the attempt to bracket the city next to the train. By raising the angle of attack (to borrow an Air Force term), the city and the train are in different quadrants and because one of them is moving, it was likely easier to capture the train at the right moment without forcing the focus or zoom to do the work in a tighter shot. Great work, Mr. Lewis and welcome to the ranks of POTD photographers!◊

Grand Junction To Host Amtrak Train Day This Saturday

Amtrak is going to visit Grand Junction this Saturday, October 10th from 10 AM to 4 PM MDT. Actually, Amtrak visits there every day in the form of Amtrak's California Zephyr, the popular Chicago-to-San Francisco train, making stops at Fort Morgan, Denver, Fraser, Granby, Glenwood Springs, and Grand Junction. But this Saturday will be a bit different.



They call it the Amtrak Exhibit Train Tour and its already made a stop in Denver last weekend. Sharp-eyed photographers might still get a chance to catch it in transit along the former Rio Grande railroad's Moffat Tunnel Route between Denver and Grand Junction sometime this week, assuming they need a couple of days to set up. Keep your eyes peeled and your lens caps in your pockets! Comment with a link to photos of your experience or send them to me, if you'd like.

Looks like a fun day this Saturday October 10, 2015, in Grand Junction!◊

Denver & Rio Grande Steam Engine 168 Moves To New LIfe In Antonito

Shaking off over 75 years of sitting cold and drained in a park, Denver & Rio Grande steam engine 168 left Colorado Springs this week on a flatbed trailer for Antonito to be refurbished by the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic for use on the 63 mile narrow gauge, heritage railroad. As announced back in April, the C&TS will lease the class T-12 locomotive for 45 years from the City of Colorado Springs, the owner, after receiving the locomotive from the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad in 1929. This was twenty years after the passing of Gen. William J. Palmer, founder of both the D&RG in 1870 and Colorado Springs in 1871. No official word yet on when work will commence in Antonito.

More Regarding the Move

• Pictures of the move - Nathan Holmes' DRGW.net
• Hundreds Turn Out... Colorado Springs Gazette
• Engine 168 Making Way Back... Pueblo Chieftain
• Iconic Locomotive To Get New Life... KRDO
• Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Plans For 168

Special Request: Please take time to visit one or more of the links above, comment there, and share your interest with others on Twitter, Facebook, & Pintrest and other social media. Supporting this effort--even just "generating buzz" about it--is important for this and future projects to succeed!◊

Special POTD: Sadness On a Sunday Morning

As a finishing touch to the featured article on the 3600s, Dave Straight placed his photo "Sadness on a Sunday Morning." I can't look at it without an emotional reaction and I don't trust myself to be reliable in those moments. Yet, to not say anything would seem criminal.

Special Photo of the Day: Dave Straight

At the end of our summer, it's the end of the era of steam, specifically March 25, 1956. My father is not yet 16 years old and his days of driving an ice truck are still ahead of him (let alone parenting me and my three older siblings). Someone older, who would be in his 80s or 90s today, probably looks at the line of used steam engines as dirty, pre-war relics and thinks they look pitiful next to the modern first-generation diesels, all shiny and pristine. Oh, how different a perspective 60 years later!

Today, I still find it incredible that no one gave serious effort to save one of the largest locomotive classes in the world--and certainly in Colorado--off in a corner of a park somewhere in Denver, Pueblo, Grand Junction or Salt Lake City, someplace indebted to the Rio Grande's years of faithful service where such space would have easily been had for the asking. If they had, future generations could have possessed something tangible and real, not a paint scheme or a model, but a life-size representation of the Denver & Rio Grande Western's Main Line Thru the Rockies in an era that is gone forever.◊

EPA Explores Gold King Mine Leak With Predictable But Unplanned Result

"The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help." - Ronald Reagan

In what could be described as an official Federal agency doing what it does best, the Orwellian-named Environmental Protection Agency in the course of its duties made a well-intentioned but badly planned exploratory excavation at the site of the Gold King Mine. This excavation triggered a release of one million three million gallons of severely contaminated water that had seeped into the mine since it ceased operations nearly a century ago.

The moment that the EPA folks might have said, "Uh... Oh, no." A small leak begins to seep a new flow after their exploratory excavation. Photo: EPA - Your government in action

The Gold King Mine was connected by bucket tramway to the Gold King Mill, which was served by the 7-mile long Silverton, Gladstone & Northerly Railroad--the last of the four fabled Silverton Railroads--from 1899 until 1917 when it was foreclosed on by Mears, who merged it with the Silverton Northern for operations until 1938 when the closure of the mines spelled the demise of the SN. In reality, Mears only had 7 years to get what he could because the SG&N line only saw traffic until 1924. Only 25 years of operation, and then the mine sat for 90 years like a ticking time bomb, the mining companies, miners, machines and precious metals all vanished like ghosts.

The spill itself points to a larger problem that Colorado and the western states have ignored for some time and will not simply "go away." Some estimates put the number of potential problems near 55,000 sites. While not all of these sites are going to turn loose a toxic brew of lead and arsenic compounds, they are going to continue to challenge Colorado and the nation with potential spills in the foreseeable future. At this point, reactionary plans at the EPA are just going to anger more and more of the population around the Four Corners with poisoned taps, poisoned livestock, and poisoned crops. One can only assume that tourism is the next thing to go.

The bitter irony is that the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad's original reason for construction by the Rio Grande, to capture revenue by servicing the mines of Silverton, is now threatening its present stock-in-trade, the scenery of the Animas River, for which tourists pay top dollar. Until residents of the San Juan district, the state, and the nation make the decision to fix the problems of the past, they will continue to lose their future. If mines were stabilized and the stained rocks of the Animas were cleaned up and restored, I would wonder if we have enough engines to haul yellow narrow gauge trains filled with tourists up & down the Animas each day. So, San Juan residents, Coloradoans, and Americans, what do you choose: yellow rivers of poisoned water or rivers of yellow revenue trains of tourism?◊

POTD - Full Moon Lights An Empty Main Line

Photo of the Day: Kevin the Krazy 1

On the night of a full moon in early April, near Salida but far from the city lights of Denver and Pueblo, photographer Kevin A. Sadowski opened the shutter on his Canon for a full 30 seconds, allowing as much starlight as possible to reach the sensor at the back. Waiting in the stillness, the quiet of the Royal Gorge Route over Tennessee Pass has not been broken by a revenue freight for 18 years. At the end of the half-minute, Mr. Sadowski was probably a bit colder, and in possession of the Photo of the Day.◊

POTD - Bowie Black Diamonds

Photo of the Day: Kevin the Krazy 1

A Union Pacific coal drag leaves Somerset towards Paonia, allowing a worker of a private orchard to cool his heels while it clears his crossing. While coal from eastern states has all but played out or otherwise dropped from domestic use, "high-BTU, low-sulfur, compliance thermal coal" from Bowie on the former Rio Grande is still in demand. On the other hand, recent layoffs at the same mine have threatened to destabilize the western slope's economy and make scenes like this one vanish forever. The first of two POTDs this week by Kevin A. Sadowski.◊

D&RGW 3600 Locomotives

D&RGW 3600 LOCOMOTIVES

by Dave Straight and John Hill

3600’s. Mention that number series and those who follow the Denver and Rio Grande’s steam locomotive fleet will smile and fondly remember the 2-8-8-2 articulated giants, the world’s largest at their construction in 1927. Built by the American Locomotive Company, the first ten were class L131 numbered 3600 through 3609 and followed by class L132 numbered 3610 through 3619 built in 1930. 131,800 pounds of tractive effort, 63" diameter drive wheels, 26" x 32" cylinders and weighing in at 649,000 pounds. I remember being told that for every four scoops of coal into the firebox, one went straight up the smokestack.

Sadly all met with the scrapper's torch in 1955 and 1956, five in 1955, engines 3600, 3603, 3614, 3617 and 3618, the remainder in 1956 with none saved for posterity. Unfortunately, this was the same for all but one locomotive of the D&RG standard gauge steam fleet. 

Author Dave Straight met several engineers, hostlers and the like while out photographing the final days and hours of the great beasts. Here are a couple of anecdotes from the fellows he met as well as himself; 

“A hoghead named Alvie Powell, brought the first 3600 into Phippsburg, Colorado approximately in  1947. Alvie was an engineer who worked over the hill in the D&SL Days. He was quite a character, and he liked the 3600’s.”

“The last two 3600's under steam were: the 3609 and the 3619. Ironically the last 2 numbered engines in each class. Sadly enough, the last day they operated, was Oct. 27th,1956. They left Tabernash that afternoon. Joe Preiss and Flory Iacovetto, engineer and fireman respectively. Both were D&SL employees. Joe was a veteran from the days on the line over Corona/Rollins Pass." 

“About a week before their leaving Tabernash, A hostler let me up in the cab of the 3609."Just don't touch anything!" they told me. But I got to blow the whistle. I can't tell you how much of a charge I got out of that. Later on, we went over to a little diner across the highway. The cook had a little, black & white TV set on. It looked like a blizzard on Corona Pass! His rabbit ears antenna weren't much good. He started lamenting about those (censored) steam engines and how their steam generator "jacked up the reception." Plus the fact, some (censored) was blowing the whistle! Of course, needless to say I kept my mouth shut for a change. What a sight to see the 3609 pound out of Tabernash, tied to the tail of a Moffat Tunnel freight. ‘Twas quite a day.” 

“Another character said he had a 3600 running at 75MPH, that’s right, 75MPH between Flat and Troublesome. If you’re not familiar with those names they are between Kremmling and Parshall along the Colorado River. I leave this one for you the reader to decide but…”

Dave’s friend, retired D&RGW employee Gerry Decker, relates in a letter to Dave about his father Dean who was a D&RGW conductor. Gerry says,

I don’t have too many 3600 stories. Dean was on the first one west with tonnage. He said the road foreman got off after a few tunnels and rode the caboose to Bond. He told Dean at Bond that he wouldn’t have ridden through another tunnel if they gave him what it cost new at the factory! He referred to it as ‘a miserable S.O.B!’ ... Frank Woodruff was on one west and they stopped someplace east of Bond. Don’t remember where. Frank went to the headend and the Hogger was passed out drunk. Frank told the fireman, who was promoted, to run the engine and he refused so Frank sent the head brakeman to the rear end and Frank ran the engine into Bond. He said, ‘That S.O.B., never thanked me for saving his job or even bought me a cup of coffee!’ 

Dean always remarked how bad they smoked. The company issued the crews some old WW1 gas masks and he said they were useless! The best they could do was keep a box of packing waste and a bucket of water in the cab. They would grab a wad of waste, dip it in the water, and cover their faces in it while going thru the tunnel. Dean also carried a small mirror with him to help pick cinders out of his eyes. He said he could get a cinder in his eye by just looking at a picture of a 3600. ... Dean said that there was a practice in helper service for other engines to be ahead of a 3600 because they put out too much smoke and heat that would about kill the crews on the smaller engine. He said they tried that at first but that didn’t last too long.” 

Author Dave Straight’s attached photo of the 3600’s and a 3700 being towed to their demise brought forth his comment, “The sound of hissing air being sucked into and blown out of the cylinder cocks was a sad moment as I stood and watched them fade away.”

3607 at the Pueblo Coaling Tower on Feb 12, 1956 Dave Straight Photo

3619 near Fraser 10-20 1956 Dave Straight

3619 at Tabernash CO 10-20-1956 Dave Straight

 L 131 3609 at Tabernash Colorado  Sept 30, 1956 Dave Straight

3612 at Winter Park CO Sept 30, 1956 Dave Straight Photo

3609 at Winter Park CO Robert LeMessena Sept 1956 DPL-WHD Photo

3619 South of Tabernash CO  10-20-1956 Dave Straight Photo

3600 at Mitchell Curves with Train 35 on May 31 1941 R.H. Kindig, DL Straight Collection

3609 West of Malta CO with Train 33 with 71 Cars 3-24-1940 R.H. Kindig, DL Straight Collection

3606 and 1510 South of Littleton CO with 107 Cars 12-1-1940 R.H. Kindig, Dave Straight Collection

3612 at Tabernash Colorado Ready for Helper Service Sept 30, 1956, Dave Straight Photo

3602 at the West Portal of Tennessee Pass  3-24-1940 R.H.  Kindig  Photo Dave Straight Collection

Sadness On a Sunday Morning
L-131/2 class locomotives 3611, 3615, 3610, and L-105 class leader 3700 are pushed to their doom at the hands of a scrapper's torch. The culprit at the back is FT 5431 and 2 B-units on March 25, 1956 in Pueblo,CO. This is, to my knowledge, the last photograph of these steam engines, forever lost. Dave Straight Photo

"The sound of hissing air being sucked into and blown out of the cylinder cocks was a sad moment as I stood and watched them fade away."

---

Editor's note: Dave and John both have my deep personal gratitude for their patience in letting me put this article together. Having to work with my errors and delays is something that few can work with and it speaks to their great fortitude and generosity. I look forward to writing about the 3600s and hopefully, I will be able to use their incredible photographs and collections in the future! - SRW, ed.◊

OT: Walking In My Shoes

I don't go off-topic very often on this blog. You should get what you came here for. However, today is my birthday, and my wish is for you to take a few minutes and watch this video. I live this video every day, every week, every year since 2002. Please take a moment to walk in my shoes.



Video
Companion article in Palo Alto Online

Please feel free to contact me at editor@corailroads.com for my story.◊