Feather River Route 1942 Trains Article

THE TRAIN SHEET ISSUE No. 19 SHEET SIX was appealed and in the summer of pletely vindicated. the result of will feel steam in her boiler 1963 a terial was held in the court this unnecessary situation meant and will be a very lively part of the of federal Judge Sherrill Halbert in that #8 never ran again under steam. Portola Railroad Museum. (We have Sacramento. Not guilty was the She was moved from her pad at the complete text of the trial, etc. verdict! But with red tape and more the Quincy RR depot to the Plumas for anyone interested in the whole appeals from the government, it was County Fairgrounds where she sat story.) not until November of 1964 that the quietly for twenty two years. But #8 and the Quincy RR were com- the day soon will come when she IT The three forks of the Feather River flow The following article is from a March 1942 ITTRAINS down into California's Sacl'amento Valley from the east and north, from sources high in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. These are the mountains that must be conquered by any railroad entering the Central Valley of the Feather River Route Golden State from the east; and appropriately . named they are, for * Western Pacific, newest of the transcontinentals, Sierra is Spanish for crosses the high Sierras with only ja.gged or saw-tooth one per cent grade. mountains and Nevada means white as snow. The range is, geologically, a giant granite chartered in 1903 by a block some 350 miles north and south and 80 By A. C. Kalmbach. * group of San Francis miles east to west, heaved up at an angle by co bankers to build some prehistoric convulsion. EORGE GOULD, son of Jay Gould, worked a competitive route Through this formidable natural barrier G late in his office on the fifth floor of the across the high Sierras the Feather River (named because early ex old Western Union Building on lower Broad to Great Salt Lake but plorers found pigeon feathers floating on the way in New York. He worked hard with shirt Gould soon took over. 'Water) cuts a natural path from the summit sleeves rolled up, and he carried bulging The ukase came to the great level valley of Central California. cases of papers out to his country place over down that the Western In its upper reaches the Feather River Valley the week ends. It was 1905, and Gould was Pacific must be built is broad and green, in its lower portions a the overlord of some 15,000 miles of railroad, so well that it could veritable canyon cut deep in the red and . not just a financial manipulator but a pro efficiently compete brown rock, with feathery foam rising from gressive, fighting operating officer. with the solidly estab- boiling rapids. The Gould lines centered about the wealthy lished Southern Pacific, the one-time Central Before the coming of the railroad the Feather River was well known. The miners Missouri Pacific, dominating the Mississippi Pacific and first of the transcontinentals. The of '49 worked the canyon and the surrounding Valley and extending along the Arkansas Denver & Rio Grande, solid, substantial road hills, and Rich Bar, a station on the Western River Valley to the foot of the Rockies. The safely embedded in the rich local traffic of the Pacific 16 miles below Keddie, was the scene connecting Wabash rolled east over the corn Colorado Rockies, took two-thirds of the country and the Great Lakes Basin to Toledo capital stock and guaranteed the interest arid of a veritable bonanza: There are no official records extant, but estimates of the gold and Buffalo. The Wheeling & Lake Erie sinking fund payments for Western Pacific. taken from this one spot range from 14 brought the system wi~ plunging distance The bond trust agreement provided that the million to 23 million dollars. of Pittsburgh, originating point of as much new road must have no grade steeper than The old histories record that in July of 1850 tonnage as Chicago, New York, and Philadel one per cent compensated, no curve sharper than 10 degrees (573-foot radius) in its thou a man named Greenwood realized $2900 from phia combined. The new Wabash Pittsburgh two pans of gravel from the river bar, whence Terminal audaciously put the Gould lines sand miles or so of main line. the name Rich Bar. Thereupon a stampede of right into this traffic fortress of the Pennsyl Little does it matter that in the panic of gold seekers ensued and Rich Bar's popula 1907 the Gould financial house of cards vania. The Western Maryland, with a few tion rose to 2500. "So rich the gravel," toppled under the weight of the Pittsburgh w~s . more miles of connecting up, would be the says George Mansfield in a booklet on the seaboard end of this mighty aggregation of Terminal and the Western Pacific extension. Feather River Canyon, "that claims on mileage. The individual roads were sound. Denver & the bar were limited to 10 feet square." Rio Grande and its affiliate, Missouri Pacific, To the west the Denver & Rio Grande In the later gold boom days, when the went right ahead. They needed a friendly carried the Gould banner from the Missouri chartering of the Central Pacific made Pacific connection at Pueblo across the West Coast connection, and they got it. The railroad connection with the East seem last spike was driven November 1, 1909, near Rockies to Salt Lake City jlIld Ogden. But a near reality, the Feather River Valley Keddie, CalH., and marked the completion of here the Gould trackage ended, with no hope was considered for the route by that the last major transcontinental railroad. of friendly traffic connection, for west of grandfather of Sierra railroad survey In four years the road had been built com Ogden was only the Southern Pacific, then ing, Theodore Judah. He ran a line plete almost as it exists today, and engineers united with the Union Pacific under Harri- through the valley of the Middle Fork, called it the finest railroad construction job man. Even any hope south of the present Western Pacific since the West Shore. In the new picture, of using Senator North Fork Route, but the construction Southern Pacific had competition in its home Clark's new Los An work would have been too heavy for the territory and Denver & Rio Grande had its geles & Salt Lake as a pioneering railroad. Grades and operat- West Coast feeder was West Coast extension. stymied when UP se • With the assistance of the cured an interest in "FEATHER RIVER ROUTE," says the Western following people in gather the Los Angeles road. Pacific herald. And Feather River Route ing illustrations and data: But Gould's eyes lit on has been advertised in timetables, tourist cir T. B. Aldridge, W. C. Whit a new venture, the culars, and on the sides of box cars so well taker, Guy Dunscomb, and and so often that the route is almost better Thomas E. Brown, publicity . Western Pacific Rail manager of the Western Pa road. It had been known than the railroad itself. cific Railroad with offices in San Francisco. THE TRAIN SHEET ISSUE No. 19 SHEET EIGHT x more rocky. Blairsden, 11 miles below of this wye bridge carries the track for the More suddenly than it began, the deep Portola in Mohawk Valley, is the starting Northern California extension by which the rocky gorge flattens out into a tranquil point for trips to Johnsville, which lies in the Western Pacific connects with the Great wooded ravine and the train pulls into shadow of Mount Eureka, where the famous Northern. For a mile or so the tracks of the Oroville. This is at an elevation of 203 feet Plumas-Eureka mine was discovered in 185l. Northern California extension can be seen above sea level, and the descent from the Just when the train is really 'getting into a climbing along the opposite side of the canyon. Sierras is accomplished. deep valley, it dives into the 7343-foot-Iong By comparison with the early days, Rich From here the Western Pacific track points Spring Garden Tunnel, in the construction of Bar, which once was a trading post and prin nearly straight south across the smooth valley which engineers were compelled to fight for cipal town in the Feather River Canyon of the through Marysville, Sacramento, and Stock months against obstacles such as boulders gold rush era, is now a ghost town. However, ton--crossing, recrossing, and at times using and sands of an ancient river-bed and the a number of persons still dwell at Rich Bar, tracks jointly with the electric Sacramento waters of an underground stream. When the which has a little hotel-resort; and the old Northern. From Stockton the road turns line emerges into the North Fork watershed diggin's are still being worked. west, crosses the summit of the Coast Range it is in a beautiful high mountain meadow Fishing abounds and, in fact, Tobin, at at Altamont (a great mountain pass in minia surrounded by forest trees, and but a short milepost 253, is one of the many points in the ture), threads and twists through Niles Can distance farther swings about this meadow in Feather River country which has caused it to yon, and swings north into Oakland, where it the famous Williams Loop. be known as the paradise of trout fishermen. terminates on a mole or ferry landing. Pas Quincy Junction at milepost 288 (reading The truly rocky character of the canyon senger trains have used Southern f'acifi\.

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