Issue Number 89 – Fall 2024 San Luis Obispo, California www.slorrm.com!
Coast Mail
News from the San Luis Obispo
Railroad Museum
Open Saturdays from 10:00 to 4:00. Other times for
groups by arrangement. 1940 Santa Barbara Avenue.
Central Coast
Railroad Festival
Join us October 4 – 6 for new exhibits,
presentations, food, and entertainment.
See our website for days, times, and loca-
tions of events at the Freighthouse and
elsewhere:
ccrrf.com/schedule.html
According to Rule 301, “...absence of light ... where a colored light
should be in a block signal, must be regarded as the most restrictive
indication...” That would be Stop. But at this dark signal we want
you to proceed along the Walk of History that’s long been recognized
in the city’s Railroad Historic District Plan. This newly installed
searchlight type signal with its classic relay-cabinet base has been
carefully positioned to avoid any confusion for Union Pacific and
Amtrak operations on the far side of the Museum’s display track.
The Rule 301 quote above and the diagrams below are from Southern
Pacific Transportation Company “Rules and Regulations of the
Transportation Department,” effective October 31, 1976.
Have you had to renew your driver’s license lately? Conductors
and locomotive engineers were required to take periodic rules ex-
aminations. One not only had to get the general idea right, but the
rule number and the exact wording. There were (and are) absolute
and permissive signals, diverging routes, protective signals, excep-
tions for signals on certain grades, signals with timers...
1890
1880
Pacific Coast Rwy
predecessors form
SP Coast Route open
to Los Angeles
SP completes
line SF to SLO
SP reaches north-
ern SLO County
New exhibit at the Freighthouse
!
CCRRF photo contest
Again this year there will be recog-
nition and prizes for winning entrants. The
subject must involve railroads on the Cen-
tral Coast (San Luis Obispo County and
northern Santa Barbara County).
Entrants may submit up to three of
their own photos, by Septempber 15 at
5:00 pm. Submission is by one email for
each photo to Photo@slorrm.com
. This year
there will be a separate category for photos
of model railroads, which may be located
anywhere but must have a Central Coast
subject. Prize amounts and all rules are at:
slorrm.com/2024-Photo-Contest.html.
Below, Nathan Campbell’s first-place entry
in the 2023 CCRRF photo contest.
Coast Mail is published quarterly by
the San Luis Obispo Railroad Museum.
© 2024. All rights reserved.
Just passing through
In June Amtrak’s Coast Star-
light trailed six unoccupied, single-
level cars and two locomotive bod-
ies without engines that had been
converted to control cars (below).
Christian Schultz recorded the move
north of San Luis Obispo.
Documents Available
Anyone may access the Museum’s
Bylaws, Collections Policy, Develop-
ment & Operations Plan, Code of
Conduct, and other documents at
slorrm.com. Or request a paper copy
via the contact information above.
SLORRM Coast Mail Number 89 Fall 2024 Page 2
!
Our Mission
Promote California Central Coast
railroad heritage through commun-
ity participation, education, and his-
toric preservation.
Contact
Telephone (message) 805 548-1894
email: info@slorrm.com
Website: www.slorrm.com
Mail: 1940 Santa Barbara Avenue
San Luis Obispo, CA 93401
In this publication product or corp-
orate names may be registered
trademarks. They are used only for
identification or explanation with-
out intent to infringe.
Admission, membership
dues are increasing
Our admission prices and member
dues are increasing to help cover op-
erating costs such as electricity,
water, telecommunications, and insur-
ance. The increases are needed des-
pite measures to improve efficiency.
Starting October 1, adult admission
will be $6; ages 4 – 15 will be $4.
Children age 3 and under remain
free, as do museum members. Start-
ing January 1, 2025, annual mem-
bership dues will be $40 for indiv-
iduals and $65 for families.
Museum Store
To raise funds, the Museum offers
several items for sale on-site and
online: T-shirts, hats, belt buckles,
mugs, enameled pins, embroidered
patches, and engineer hats. On the
website click on About, then Gift
Shop. We also have an eBay site for
a wider range of items.
Board of Directors
Peter Brazil Mike Burrell
Stephen Cake Jim Chernoff
Alan Estes Ken Green
Greg Jackson Brad LaRose
Ted Van Klaveren
Crew List
President ...................... Peter Brazil
Vice President...............Mike Burrell
Museum Manager.. Diane Marchetti
Curator, Restoration .. Brad LaRose
Treasurer/Insurance ...... Dave Rohr
Exhibits ............................. Gary See
Operations ................... Mike Burrell
Events .....................................vacant
Model Railroad .... Andrew Merriam
Membership ....................... Gary See
Fundraising ...........................vacant
Digital Media Coordinator Gary See
Webmaster ................ Jamie Foster
Secretary, Archivist/Librarian, News-
letter Editor ............... Glen Matteson
(newsletter@slorrm.com)
The museum is a 501(c)(3) non-
profit, educational organization,
staffed entirely by volunteers.
1950
1910
1940
Current SLO
SP depot built
Santa Maria
Valley RR starts
Pac Coast
Rwy ends
Pacific Coast Rwy
maximum extent
Streamlined
Daylight debuts
Become a member
Membership provides opportune-
ities for anyone interested in today’s
railroads, railroad history, train tra-
vel, artifact restoration, or model
railroading. Membership benefits
include free Museum admission and
a 10% Museum Store discount.
Annual dues: Individual $36;
Family $60; Sustaining $100. Life
member single payment: under 62
$1,000, 62 and over $600. Junior
memberships (ages 12-18) for model
railroaders are available; contact
our Model Railroad Superintend-
ent for details.
Application forms can be down-
loaded from the Museum’s website
and mailed with payment. Or you
can join online: click Membership
and use PayPal.
Timetable
Board of Directors meetings
are scheduled for Sept. 10, Oct. 8,
and Nov. 12, at 6:00 p.m. They are
held at the Museum. Online partic-
ipation can be arranged. Contact
info@slorrm.com for help with on-
line participation.
Museum supporters
The Museum would not exist and
could not improve without the sup-
port of many. All forms of support,
from membership dues to grants and
donations of expertise, materials,
and funds are greatly appreciated. In
this edition we recognize the follow-
ing for their support.
Overlooked for our Summer ed-
ition: Specialty Construction, Inc.,
of San Luis Obispo, which provided
equipment used to prepare exhibit
sites.
Impressive tool collection and a
moon shot, on page 5.
More Coast Mail Online
SLORRM Coast Mail Number 89 Fall 2024 Page 3
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Busy volunteers and contractors
During spring and summer Museum volunteers and contractors
prepared, relocated, and installed several large items from Emily
Street Yard. Above left, Dennis with Louie’s Crane Service (note
his helper seated in the cab); above center, Ken Bennett (blue
shirt) and Mike Burrell paint a signal mast; right, the concrete
phone booth is craned into position. Left and right photos by Mike
Burrell, center photo by Brad LaRose.
Last SP steam
power on Coast
Last Lark
train
SP, ATSF
attempt merger
Last Coast
Mail train
Amtrak takes over
passenger service
by Andrew Merriam, Model Railroad Superintendent
One of the most interesting workplaces in San Luis Obispo in
the 1950s contained the roundhouse and service facilities of the
Southern Pacific Railroad: huge steam engines, rumbling diesels,
big machinery, movement, noise, hot steam and oil smells, hazards,
oversize tools, stacks of strange metal parts and supplies. At the
time, many school kids had a parent working there. In a town of
about 14,200 population and maybe 3,000
employed adults, about
600 had jobs related to the railroad. They included division
management, train crews, station personnel, freight handlers,
ticket agents, watch inspectors, and even medical staff and police.
Among these were 44 employed in maintaining the locomotive
fleet and making repairs to the rolling stock, making sure that
freight and passengers were moved up Cuesta pass to San Fran-
cisco and south along the coast to Los Angeles.
Modeling SP’s Engine Facilities at SLO
The average person didn’t have access to
this area. It is the happy task of the Central
Coast Model Railroad (CCMR) to bring this
scene to life for those viewing the area today
in 1/87th proportion (referred to as HO scale).
At top left is a map of the engine service
area including the turntable. On it, locomo-
tives could be reversed, to face in the proper
direction of travel designated for the train.
The cab-forward locomotives were too long to
fit on the turntable and had to be turned on a
“Y” track a quarter mile to the east [Coast
Mail Summer 2022]. The area was first
developed in the 1890s. Longer and heavier
locomotives required the service area to be
changed and extended several times. The
map shows part of the area about 1953, and
was drawn by railroad author John Signor
based on Southern Pacific documents.
Continues on page 4
Below, the oil column as photographed by
Alden Armstrong about 1953.
!
SLORRM Coast Mail Number 89 Fall 2024 Page 4
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The company that built the Museum’s Plymouth switcher,
former Quartermaster Corps No. 2038 (also known as Danny
the Diesel Locomotive), specialized in small locomotives for
industrial and mining operations. Above we see Danny’s little
cousin, apparently doing tourist duty, on the “B G Railroad”
at Ryan, California in 1948. The “Baby Gauge” was a two-foot
gauge operation hauling borax from a nearby mine to the
town of Ryan in Death Valley. From there, the Death Valley
Railroad hauled it to a connection with the Tonopah &
Tidewater RR. The 6-ton, gasoline-powered locomotive was
built in 1919. It had a 50 hp, four-cylinder engine, friction-
wheel transmission, and chain drive
The photo above is from the collection of Fred Hust, and
was probably taken by him. It came to the Museum as a
donation with many other photos, some of which were relevant
to the Museum’s mission. Photos that didn’t fit our mission
were forwarded to other nonprofit rail heritage organizations.
For the Museum’s weed control efforts, target number one
is puncture vine (T. terestris), bane of pets, walkers, and
cyclists. It’s followed closely by tumbleweed (S. tragus), yellow
star thistle (C. solstitialis), burr clover (M. polymorpha), and
foxtails (Setaria sp.). In May, some passersby agreed that this
lupine (L. arboreus?) in our display track, having no sharp bits,
should be allowed to remain until it was about to shed seeds.
Let it be?
Danny’s little cousin
2030
2010
2000
1990
San Diegans renamed
Pacific Surfliners
UP
absorbs
SP
SLO RR
Museum opens
UP thru freight
diverted from coast
A simple timeline
The timeline at the bottom of pages 1 through 4
shows some of the major events that have shaped
railroad heritage on the Central Coast. The blue
marker at 1991 represents founding of the organ-
ization that became the San Luis Obispo Railroad
Museum. Join us as we see what comes next.
San Diegan
trains extend
to SLO
Proposed
new layover
facility
Modeling SP’s SLO Engine Facilities
Continued from page 3
The device dispensing fuel oil shown on page 3
was supplied by huge tanks on high ground on the
opposite side of the tracks.
Locomotives carried sand to improve traction
on slippery rails. Sand was originally dried and
stored in a wood structure, the sand house, and
handed up in buckets. In 1943 that process was
replaced by a tough, flexible pipe that allowed
sand to be air-driven up into a tank, from which it
flowed down a tube to the locomotives. The Winter
Coast Mail will include more on the sand house
and its model representation, as well as the
roundhouse itself.
Above, a GS-4 type locomotive moves from the sand
tower toward the turntable in this 1954 view by
Rod Crossley. Below, Andrew Merriam’s photo
shows a model of the facility as built from re-
purposed rails due to wartime steel shortages.
!
SLORRM Coast Mail Number 89 Fall 2024 Page 5
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Not on the Central Coast
“A drill bit as big as your wrist? Right here.” Thanks to the
November 1941 edition of Railroads Magazine we have this view of
some of the roughly 2,000 tools neatly stored in Southern Pacific’s
tool room in Ogden, Utah. According to the original caption, mach-
inist Sam Whetton (pictured) could find exactly what he needed
thanks to the regular attendant Mr. Peterson.
Next time you’re at the Museum have a look at our more modest
collection of tools from the San Luis Obispo roundhouse and other
sources (below). We have a pipe wrench that’s taller and heavier than
many of our young visitors. With tools on this scale, simply moving
them around was a safety concern. And no thank you to the
apprentice who over-tightened that connection and set up the next
worker for frustration.
Terrestrial railways help reach space.
Below, rocket booster segments on Norfolk
Southern Railway being moved from Utah
to Florida in 2020.
In June Matthew Robinson caught former
Santa Fe No. 33 at SLO on the end of the
Coast Starlight. The 1923-built private car,
now named Redwood Empire, sports
Northern Pacific two-tone green, while
lettered for Southern Pacific subsidiary
Northwestern Pacific –no relation to the
Northern Pacific. Beautiful but confusing.!
Above, a full moon appears trough a tower
of Stenner Canyon trestle in Fall 2015.
Imagine the bridge’s mid-1890s builders
hearing of plans to build a moon railway.
In March Railway Gazette Intern-
ational reported that the US Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency com-
missioned Northrup-Grumman to develop
conceptual plans for a rail system to move
resources, supplies, and people on the moon.
The work will explore how to build, oper-
ate, and maintain the railway using robots.
The rail transportation effort is part
of a broader scheme to eventually est-
ablish lunar infrastructure usable by gov-
ernment and commercial entities.
Phil Maton photo
So far from the Central Coast!
Classy visitor to San Luis Obispo!