July 1988 :8'i��B�¥1¥�GAZETTE Order Form Name Address City State Zip Send $18.00 for a one year, six issue subscription in U.S.A., to: Benchmark Publications p. O. Box 26, Los Altos, CA 94023 FIRST-CLASS RAILROAD PINS By the premier supplier of pins to the rail­ roads, railway historical societies, railroad museums, SIGS and model railroad organi­ zations. Not the poorly-done, cheap jewelry normally encountered, but first­ class representations of railroad heralds, name-train logos, builder's plates, etc. See your dealer or order direct - $4 each plus $1 per order for P&H. No credit cards. Send SSAE for updated listing. .. the mere men/ion of the name brings forth railroad images larger than life. It wasn't just tracks and trains. It wasn't just an Indiana institution-though it MONON'certainly was that. Oh. my, no. What the Monon was ... well. it was every American railroad. every American hometown. every American underdog rolled into one.Why, the Monon was practically human. Its birth was a cause for rejoicing. its operation a source of Hoosier pride.And when it died. a thousand legends lived on. Now. legend and fact are woven together in a brand-new, finely crafted illustrated history of the Monon. We take you from beginning to merger into the L&:N. from Louisville to French Lick to Indianapolis to Michigan City to Chicago ... from Hoosierland to hotshot. from 4-4-0 to Century 420. We're proud to announce the creation of Monon-The Hoosier Line by Gary and Stephen in production and will be published by Interurban Press in the Fall of 1981. Its ed!it!o�r==;;;�=���; 2. JULY 1988 July 1988 No. 296 PACIFIC RAILNEWS and PACIFIC Nh"lflS are registered trademarks of Interurban Press, a Morrison-Knudsen 1987 Locomotive and California Corporation. Norman Anderson 16 Carbuilding Activities/Part II .... E. PUBLISHER: Mac Sebree Concluding our annual report of M-K happenings EDITOR: Jim Walker NEWS EDITOR: Dick Stephenson ASSO CIATE EDITOR: Mike Schafer Idaho's Logging Wonder ..............Bruce Kelly 20 EDITORIAL ASSISTANT: Don Gulbrandsen The St. Maries River Railroad ART PRODUCTIO N: Mark Danneman PRODUCTIO N MANAGER: Ray Geyer CONTRIBUTING ARTIST: John Signor David Busse 28 Rebirth of the White Pass .......... R. CIRCULATIO N MANAGER: Bob Schneider Alaska's narrow-gauge line is operating again STAFF: LaVerne W. Andrcessen, Michael W. Blaszak, Departments: David R. Busse, P. Allen Copeland, Harre \Y/. Dcmoro, R.C. Farewell, Thomas Higgins, Rail News . .. Transit Herb Horton, Don Jewell, Ken Meeker, Steve . .......... 4 Morgan, Brian Norden, Clifford Prather, Karl Letters ...... .. Portland .. ........6 ..............35 Rasmussen, John A. Rushton, Jim Seal, Joe Expedited News ..... San Diego Strapac, Charles Vercelli. ... 7 ............36 Railroads San Francisco ......... PAc/nc RAlI.NE\\'S (USPS 862840) is pub­ 37 SP Preservation .. .... lished monthly by Interurban Press (a corpora­ ....................8 ... ....38 tion), 1212 South Brand Blvd., Glendale, CA C&NW ............... Out West . ...... ........ 91204. Second-class postage paid at Glendale, 10 38 AT&SF Call Board ...... ..... CA 91209 and additional offices. POSTMAS­ ..............11 ... 39 TER: Send address changes to: PACIFIC SOO Photo Focus ...... ... .................12 . ... 39 RAil_NEWS, P.O. Box 6128, Glendale, CA Books/Videos ...... 91205. ISSN 8750-8486. D&RGW .... .........14 ..... 40 BN From the Past ...... CORRESPO NDENCE: Please use P.O. Box ...................14 .... 43 6128, Glendale, CA 91205 for ALL correspon­ Regionals Photo Stop .. ..... .............31 .... ..44 dence. UPS deliveries only to IIS-C E. Palmer Amtrak Interurbans Newsletter .... Av e., Glendale, CA 91205. ...............32 46 UP Extra Board Ads ... SUBSCRIPTIO N RATES: $27 (U.S.) for 12 ...................34 ...... 47 issues, $49 for 24 issues. Foreign add $4 for Mexico ...............34 each 12 issues. Single copy $2.75 (subject to change without notice). First-class/air rates available on request. COVER: Biggest news of late for Santa Fe fans was the unveiling of F7A&B set 347C&B, restored CHANGE OF ADDRESS: The Post Office {from the "yellow bonnet" schemel to the Warbonnet livery which-in part, anyway-made Santa does not regularly forward 2nd Class Mail and Fe famous. The work was done for California State Railroad Museum, Sacramento, owner of the Fs, PACIFIC RAiLNEIfIS is not responsible for by Santa Fe's San Bernardino Shops. copies not forwarded or destroyed by the Post -ELROND G. LAWRENCE Office. Replacement copieslPO notifications will be billed. Please allow us at least four weeks for any address changes. ADVERTISING RATES: On request, or call (818) 240-4777. A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR Articles and photographs for the magazine are What's news? When is it stale? Should we bother to print it if we welcome. When submitting material for con­ don't have a "scoop"? sideration, include return envelope and post­ Our magazine serves both as a news bulletin-board and as a age if you wish it returned. PrlCIFiC RA/LNEI<'S does not assume responsibility for journal of railroad happenings. In the latter case, even if we aren't the safe return of material. Payment is made the first magazine to cover an item, we still think it should be upon publication. reported. 1988 INTERURBAN PRESS © We figure many of our readers don't also read other rail Mac Sebree, President Jim Walker, Vice-President periodicals, so they would never know about some items of interest ARL if we did not include them. We strive to keep on top of things, but � will include items that don't come to our attention first. -JIM WALKER PACIFIC Rail NEWS - 3 DA-I-··-� Amtrak F40s 250 and 252 lead Pacific Railraad Society's II-car Mojave Limited westbound through Soledad Canyon near old Russ siding in Southern California on April 17, 1988. The excursion train, which carried eight privately-owned cars plus three Hi-Levels, covered SP routes through Soledad Canyon and over the Palmdale-Colton Cutoff on the same day. -WILLIAM T.MORGAN (arising out of an antitrust case involving group of investors led by Howard Kaskel D&RGW + SP Traffic a coal slurry pipeline) in the amount of had an effect on net income, with over Impact Weighed $200 + million will have a profound effect $5 million spent on the purchase of on the company. Though there are plans shares. Lastly, profits were influenced by As part of its application to acquire to appeal the verdict, substantial costs high legal and consulting expenses associ­ Southern Pacific, Rio Grande has esti­ will be associated with the appeal. ated with KCSI's efforts to obtain control mated that diversion of traffic from other Secondly, repurchase of stock from a of Southern Pacific in proceedings before railroads to the combined system would bring in $124 million per year; Union Pa­ cific would lose an estimated $87 million, Burlington Northern about $26 million and Santa Fe about $8 million. The application by Rio Grande has been soundly supported by a variety of local and state governments and labor un­ ions. KCS Reports Ups and Downs Kansas City Southern Industries an­ nounced first quarter earnings for 1988 were slightly better on a net basis than the comparable period last year. Three fac­ tors greatly influenced the earnings and Chicago Central & Pac ific GPI 0 1775 (ex-Illinois Central Gulf 8156) sports the road's newly adopted value of the stock in the corporation, point scheme of red with white markings and the road's Illinois Central-inspired green diamond logo. however. The unit is shown at Council Bluffs, Iowa, on April 22, 1988, shortly before heading east with a An April 8, 1988, jury verdict in the manifest. Federal District Court for South Dakota -GEORGE COCKLE 4.JULY 1988 One of the locomotives UP has leased to ease its shartage of motive power is Great Western Railway GP7 1589 (ex-BN), seen here at La Salie, Colo., on March 27, 1988, with B30- 7 A 254 (ex-MP). Other GW units which have been leased include ex­ UP GP9s, back for a stint on home rails. -JOHN RUS In a scene typical of poor traffic lev­ els on the Chicaga, Missouri & West­ ern Railway, No. 3020 and another ex-WP GP40 head a seven-car train southbound through Lockport, III. on Nov. 12, 1987. Operations an CM&W cantinue, though a trustee has been appointed to oversee its op- erations. -MIKE BLASZAK 4: 17 a.m. on April 30, 1987, near Odell, Ill., and this was my introduction to Chi­ cago, Missouri & Western. Two days before, CM&W had closed its purchase of 631 miles of Illinois Cen­ tral Gulf trackage between Joliet, Ill. (with trackage rights through Chicago), St. Louis and Kansas City for $81 mil­ lion. For ICG, the sale was the last in a series establishing large regional railroads on lines that the carrier no longer needed or wanted. For CM&W parent Venango River Corporation, the sale represented a marked expansion of its railroad interests from the 90-mile South Shore, acquired from Chesapeake & Ohio in 1984, to a system extending almost 600 miles from South Bend, Ind., to the Kansas border in Kansas City's West Bottoms. The new property represented a diffi­ cult marketing challenge for Ve nango's three owners, Chairman John Darling, President Jack Alexander and Vice Presi­ dent Tim Jorgenson. CM&W has no ma­ the Interstate Commerce Commission, Award for employee safety for the second jor "captive" shippers; just about every­ and the above-mentioned court case, consecutive year. SP's Bill Lacy, vice thing it can haul is subject to diversion. which went to trial in late January and president of operations, in a message to The Chicago-St. Louis main line is large­ concluded in April.