2012 in review…not bad!

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 34,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 8 Film Festivals

Click here to see the complete report.

ALCo’s on History, American Restoration S04E10

The History Channel has been the home to some hit TV shows recently. This all started with the ever-too-popular show “Pawn Stars”. Pawn Stars is based out Gold and Silver Pawn on Las Vegas Blvd, less than 2 miles from the strip. During the show, they have experts come in and appraise historacal items from the show, and once in a while, they have items restored by a guy named Rick Dale. This eventually lead to Rick Dale having his own show on the history, as a direct spinn-off of Pawn Stars. In this particualr episode, Rick sends his son, Tyler, and his soon-to-be-stepson, Brettly, to East Ely, Nevada to pick up a piece from the Nevada Northern Railway Museum. Once there, Mark, the curator of the Museum, decides to take Tyler and Brettly to the piece he wants restored, a Speeder powered by an 8-cylinder Ford Flat-Top engine. To get to the piece, they travel aboard Nevada Northern Railway ALCo RS3 #109. In the first shop to the ALCo, you also see Nevada Northern SD9 #204. We will look into BOTH of these locomotives.

Brettly and Tyler look up at the venerable ALCo that they will get a ride on.

Lets first look at the RS3. The locomotive was built by the American Locomotive Company in Schenectady, New York in November 1950. She was built for the Kennecott Copper Corperation for use on the KCC’s Nevada Northern Operation. She has spent her entire life on the NN and is used frequently on the tourist trains operated by the Museum. She was built with the serial number of 78426. She is one of several dozxen RS3’s still operating. Of all the RS series locomotive built by ALCo, the RS3 is the most recognized, and was also the most popular model, with the perfect amount of Horsepower for the railroads who were dieselizing at the time. A total of 1,370 were built for use in the United States. The Montreal Locomotive Works, also built 40 units for use in Brazil. In an interesting piece of information that I learned while working on this story is that 5 Units were also burchased by Ferrocarril de Langreo for use in Spain. 4 units came from my hometown, and favorite railroad, The Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis, while the 5th unit was purchased from the Great Northern Railroad. These 5 units served until 1986 when the railroad converted track guages.

Here is a photo of Nevada Northern 109 when she was still in full KCCX Paint in 1983
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2655565

Here is a photo of the 109 looks today.

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1795300

Now that we covered the ALCo RS3, lets concetrate on the locomotive that was sitting behind her, Nevada Northern SD9 #204.

The 204 was built by the Electro-Motive Division in La Grange, Illinois in February of 1956. With the Frame number of 5435-5 and seriel number of 21293, the locomotive emerged from the paint shop in a splending coat of Black, Red, Silver and Orange of the Southern Pacific’s Black Widow paint. She was delivered to the railroad with the road number of 5468. She carried this number for a number of years until a mid 1960’s renumbering, and repainting into the more Brad grey and Red “Bloody Nose” paint scheme that replaced the Black Widow scheme in the Early 1960’s. When she re-emerged from the shops in Sacramento, CA, she carried the road number of SP 4426. She carried this number until retired by the Southern Pacific shortly before the Merger with Union Pacific in 1995. She was sold the BHP Iron Ore for use on the Nevada Northern Railway. Kennecot Copper had sold the railroad to BHP sometime before the unit came to the property. The Locomotive was then retired again when BHP shut down the railroad and the line became part of the Nevada Northern Railway Museum in the early part of this century. Please correct me if this information is not correct!

Here is a photo of SP 4426 in 1978

Here is a photo of the unit as it looks today on the Nevada Northern Railroad.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1222609

Lets hope there wont be another long pause between updates!

INFORMATION NEEDED

Ok, so there has not been a post in well over 6 months, and thats because I have been stalled on ONE project. The ALCo S6 from Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. I have not been able to Locate ANY information on it. Can any of my readers help me out with this identity so I can proceed with other projects? Here is a photo that I have of the locomotive

The only markings on this unit is the #11 on the cab. However, none of the SP ALCo switchers were ever numbered in an 1100 series….Help is really needed!

Honer the Heros 1: The Trains in “Rescue 911”

This is a first in a series of 6 Articles about the old TV show “Rescue 911”

Who does not remember the show “Rescue 911?” The show was one of my favorites growing up in the 1990’s, usually 3 segments per 30 minute episode. Hosted by William Shatner, the show focused mainly on Emergency personal rescuing people from dangerous situations, and also normal everyday people doing the same thing. The show ran from April, 1989 to August 1996, with 7 seasons, 182 episodes and 2 specials. Currently, the only place to view the episode segments is on YouTube, since no channel is currently airing the show. The following is from 5 segments that were ran in different episodes.

Season 1, Episode 2, Segment 3 “Conrail Train”

In Ramsey, New Jersey, the Prichard family lives in a Cul-de-Sac, 300 yards away from the active Conrail/NJT mainline. 3 year old Tod, and 1.5 year old Scott had just come back from the store with their mother, and being the trustworthy parent she was, she let the older child watch his younger brother play outside. Knowing they were not allowed anywhere near the tracks, today, for some reason, the children made their way down through the woods and started to play on the right-of-way. While playing on the tracks, a train appeared. The engineer of the Conrail Freight (In this episode, portrayed by Morristown and Erie #18), noticed something moving on the tracks. The Engineer applied the brakes when he noticed it was the children. At this time, the conductor, Anthony Folsom, ran out of the cab and climbed down the step, trying to wave the children off the tracks. With the Horn blaring, the mother, inside putting away groceries, heard the commotion and had a bad feeling, and immediately ran outside. With the train slowing, the children were not noticing the train fast approaching. When the train was nearly upon hitting the children, the conductor jumped down and forced them down to avoid being hit.

Morristown and Erie C424 #18 portrayed the engine in the re-construction

When the train passed over the children, the 1.5 year old Scott was hit in the head by the pilot of the Locomotive, necessitating medical treatment. When the train finally came to a stop, the engineer jumped off the locomotive and ran back to see if everyone was ok. the conductor, told him to call the dispatcher and get an ambulance out there right away. The mother arrived shortly after, and when she saw the injury, she too ran back to her house to call 911. After 6 stitches on the head and 7 on the chin, the boys were released without a trip to the hospital. Neither of the boys sustained serious injury due to the incident….

The locomotive used in the reconstruction of these events was Morriston and Eastern ALCo C424 #18. The locomotive was built in September 1964 by the American Locomotive Works in New York. She was outshopped for the Toledo, Peoria and Western Railroad as #800. The Locomotive worked for the “Tip-Up” until the railroad was bought outright by the Santa Fe Railway in the early 1980’s. After the merger with the Santa Fe, the Locomotive was sold to the Morriston and Erie railroad, and she has been in active service with the M&E ever since.

Here is a photo of the unit when she was still working for the TP&W: http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1700635

Here is a photo of the Unit as she looks today on the M&E: http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=512207

A Groover Goodbye! Santa Fe in “Fandango”

By CineTrains Blogger: Christopher Bodkin

ATSF 3834 in Fandango

University of Texas, May 1971. Five frat brothers, part of a group known as the “Groovers” have just graduated and are facing uncertain futures. Two of the members, Gardner Barnes (Kevin Costner) and Kenneth Waggener (Sam Robards) have just received their draft cards to Vietnam, and are ordered to basic training within a week.  Knowing the group is on borrowed time, the gang decides to go on a rip-roaring trek of West Texas on what few days they have left of freedom. Gardner commandeers the 1959 Cadillac of another member, Phil Hicks (Judd Nelson) and they go on their way. A day or so later the gang stops at a roadside monument, their car having run out of gas. And it just so happens they are stopped by some railroad tracks. After what seems like an eternity, the guys hear a distant train horn. Gardner’s first idea is to leave the car where it is, hop the train to go into town and get some gas, and return later. Phil is vehemently opposed to the idea. Gardner then gets another idea. The parking area of the monument is surrounded by a short fence consisting of a cable. This idea is to tie one end of the cable to the front bumper of the Cadillac, the other end to the rear of the train, basically getting a free ride into town courtesy of the railroad. He then orders another member, Dorman (Chuck Bush) to rip the cable out and lasso it onto the last coupler of the last car. He is successful, and the gang waits for the final result. Unfortunately the laws of physics come into play and instead of taking the car with it, the train violently rips the front clip of the Cadillac pulling it up the tracks a short distance before finally leaving it in the middle of the tracks. The gang, including a very angry Phil, ponder their next mission, eventually pushing the car into the next town down the highway… Now onto the train.

The locomotive featured is Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe GP50 #3834, which emerged from the EMD plant in La Grange, Illinois in April 1981, as part of order #796317, a sixteen unit order of GP50’s (#s 3824-3839) built between March and April 1981. This was Santa Fe’s third order of the units. A fourth and final order would follow in April 1985. They were typically put in place on the ATSF’s hot intermodal freights when delivered in the early 1980’s.

3834 would eventually make it into the BNSF era, and was ultimately renumbered to 3187. It is still in its as-delivered blue and yellow, aka “Bluebonnet” paint scheme as it was seen in Fandango.

Now for a couple of minor goofs…even though the film was set in 1971, the locomotive seen wasn’t even built until ten years later, most rail fans would have believed a GP35 would have sufficed. But this being Hollywood perfection is not a top priority. And the other goof, the “bluebonnet” scheme didn’t debut until the following year in 1972. All ATSF locomotives in 1971 were in the solid blue with yellow trim “cigar band” paint scheme. Finally as to why all Santa Fe reporting marks were blanked out, especially on the freight cars, I can only assume that the ATSF didn’t want to be held liable for anything that should have went wrong during the filming of the scene. Just a guess…Anyone who actually knows please comment!

Some pictures of the 3834/3187:

3834 in Tehachapi, Ca in December 1987, two years after being in Fandango:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2124604

After being renumbered to 3187, in Turrell, Ark in 1998:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1752025

Most recent picture of the 3187. In Conroe. Tx on a work train, 1/27/12:

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2900630