THE PAST AND THE FUTURE. I detrained from the Coast Starlight at Sacramento to visit the California State Railroad Museum. The group from the O Scale Convention was arriving around 10 am on one of the Capitol Corridor trains. That provided some time to check luggage, find a coffee shop, stroll over to Old Sacramento, and link up with the tour there. The convention organizers arranged a visit to the museum's backshops, which use two Southern Pacific shop buildings that have only recently been sold by Union Pacific to the museum. Some historic pieces of Southern Pacific rolling stock will stay with the museum. Behold the prototype double stack container car.

A short turntable remains. The complex had a longer turntable for cab-forwards but that's long gone. I hope there will be some way to incorporate this turntable into the public part of the museum, as there is no more railroady ritual than moving a steam locomotive onto the table, turning it, and moving it to its next assignment. It's even more impressive as the opening or closing act of the day at the museum, if the museum has a roundhouse. On the other side of the turntable is the prototype of the stack-pack automobile car. It didn't offer enough advantages over the circus-loading triple deck cars to catch on.


Most of the museum's repair work takes place in the building to the right; the stock requiring work is in the building on the left. The transfer table was the last piece of electrified railroad on Southern Pacific after Pacific Electric dieselized.

The heavy repair shop is guarded by this 0-2-2-0 Mouser.

The storage building, where some work does go on, is an expansion of Central Pacific's 1868 shop building. The brick wall with arched windows here thus antedates the Golden Spike.

The repair buildings are not open to the public. Hard hats, signed releases, closed-toe shoes please. In the background is a Santa Fe locomotive that participated in Death Valley Scotty's 1905 cross-country dash.

The curator explained that, like grandfather's axe, the 1010 underwent numerous rebuildings, and only the number plate might have been present on that 1905 run.

There are other steam locomotive projects in the shop, including this Southern Pacific 2-6-0, with Vanderbilt tender, and a lot of work to do.

This Prairie Tank dates to the middle 1870s. It might have been the first commute locomotive (to use the Southern Pacific locution) in the Bay Area. It has a very small boiler, which the water tanks almost completely hide.

The most famous face in dieseldom, and a good look at the framing of a cab unit.


The museum, on occasion, offers train rides along the Old Sacramento riverfront in these coaches that pay tribute to a Southern Pacific paint job and a local interurban.

At the entrance to the museum building are several working signals, including this Griswold model. The stop sign no longer rotates, but the bell rings and the lights flash. (The Illinois Railway Museum has restored an interurban Griswold with the smaller lights, it will protect toddlers from streetcars on the upcoming Thomas open day.)

There are a number of steam locomotives inside. Indoor photography of large black objects is difficult. One of the rotating displays is a collection of toy trains, and other early twentieth-century toys to give some context. Check out those zeppelins and Meccano sets. (While you're at it, visit the Futurama article and listen for those references to floating rotating dirigible hangars and autogiro pads on the tops of buildings ... coming by 1960!)


Some toy trains are properly large scale models. Here's a one-off, with a passenger train behind.


The display cases include a number of classic O gauge trains. Here's an original Lionel 262E in excellent condition, with the extra flags, and a Marklin electric.


After Lionel bought Ives, the Lionel 257 steam locomotive and the second series of 603-604 passenger cars became the Ives line. I believe the Ives line later became the O-27 offering of smaller, tight-radius equipment.



This display case didn't register, until a docent pointed it out. Lionel's apple green, with cream trim and dark green roof. There are such cars at Cold Spring Shops headquarters. (That's a Lionel 257 pulling the train.)


I'll risk publishing one photo of a full-sized locomotive, just to demonstrate that the full-sized C. P. Huntington did not have Blomberg leading and trailing trucks.


Then it was time to leave. Amtrak California kindly set aside space in one coach for the convention party. I did not have time to walk the train before departure. Capitol Corridor service train 543, leave Sacramento 3:34; Davis 3:47 - 3:49; Suisun - Fairfield 4:11 - 4:13; good viewing conditions of the mothball fleet.


That passenger train in the middle ground is probably Capitol Corridor 536, although I've not worked out the split-grade track arrangement in the area. Those mothballed ships are beginning to decay.


Martinez 4:31 - 4:34; Richmond 4:58 - 4:59; Berkeley 5:06 - 5:07, lots of on and off traffic, passengers awaiting the East Bay commuter trains; Emeryville 5:10 - 5:14, Jack London Square 5:22 - 5:27, Coliseum 5:35 - 5:39, not a baseball night; Hayward 5:47 - 5:51; Fremont 6:05 - 6:06; Santa Clara 6:25. California's commuter and intercity trains impress: roomy equipment, frequent headways, hight load factors. Time to get into model railroad mode.

(to be continued)