Freight trains at Dillon (or Keystone)?

[Jim Courtney]

Wow, step away from the computer for 24 hours and look what happens--all kinds of wonderful photos and posts to comment on!

Where to start?  First, I think we should all take a deep breath and pour ourselves a stiff drink of Old Poole's Skepticism.  For over 30 years, I was sure that I knew a lot of things about the DSP&P / C&S from studying old photos in books.  One thing that Derrell's "Eight Wheel Caboose" thread taught me is that my known "truths", weren't, when I was confronted with knowledgeable people who had access to written resources unavailable to me.

Ok, let's start with stock cars in the daily passenger train:
a) Yes, they obviously happened, the photos prove that.
b) They may have been very rare occurrences, the photo's may be anomalies, not reflecting the routine.  Otto Perry began recording the C&S beginning in the mid to late teens, well versed in C&S routine.  Seeing a passenger train with stock cars on the head end may have been such an anomaly to him that he chose to expend (then) precious frames of film to record them.
c)Though they are likely headed to Denver, we do not know where they were loaded.  It doesn't mean they came from Dillon.  Both Grants and Buffalo had stockyards as large as Dillon, on trailing point tracks, for a Denver bound passenger train.

Mike, the photos do justify adding a couple of On3 stock cars at the head end of the passenger on your Dickey diorama. (Ahem, I'm expecting a photo of such a train soon, like the photos of the rotary train--if you don't have the stock cars, best to get busy building them!)

The double deck loading chute on the mainline at Georgetown:
No, Chris, I can't think of any other similarly located chute on any railroad.  At first I wondered if they were temporary chutes, erected in the fall by the sheepherders to facilitate loading.  But in the close-up photo they look awfully substantial, very permanent.

The Mason Bogie with "stock car" at Nathrop:
Although it fits in with the narrative that the C&S ran stock cars in passenger trains from the earliest DSP&P days, I don't believe that is a stock car in the photo.  I agree with Ron Rudnick's interpretation that the car is an early make shift boxcar, hastily built on a flat car, being used as a baggage car, in this Chalk Creek bound train.  I have copied Ron's comment's on this photo from his Denver, South Park & Pacific Modeling Guide, Version 4.1, page 14, rather than paraphrase it, so you can read Ron make his own case, free of my biases. (BTW, Ron has a different take on female sensibilities regarding horse manure).



Cooke #112 and train in lower Platte Canon:
Chris, thanks so much for this wonderful enlargement of this classic photo.  Little did you know that I am slowly rebuilding a basket case Sn3 Overland 2-6-0 into this very engine, as I acquire or build the parts for the conversion.  The recent acquisition of Leadville Shops castings are starting to get the project moving. And I've purchased some TLS stock car kits so the head end of the train will be prototypical.

The last photos of long strings of stock cars in freights:
These are more of what I was expecting with regard to C&S livestock movements.  Great photo enlargements, thanks again, Chris!

[Mike Trent]

 Hi Jim. Thanks for Ron's comments. I don't have any arguement with any of it. It looks like a stock car, but if it isn't, thats OK because it is still a freight car being used for express purposes of some kind, and that is what the stock cars were being used for in later C&S years. But those stock cars are stock cars and are surely hauling livestock for the purpose of transporting them under the regulatory limits.

For sure this was uncommon, but obviously did occasionally happen. By the way, it was Robert McFarland who posted about sensibilities of the time.

Regardless of how often this happened or didn't, we now have a greater understanding of such things on the C&S. It's also possible that livestock in those cars may have been destined for some other location than Dillon, but it certainly fits our discussion nicely and could have surely happened.

[Jim Courtney]

We are in complete agreement, Mike. (Sorry about the confusion re: Mike vs Robert--I need to proof my posts better).

Stock cars were used for many purposes, outside the spring and fall stock seasons--hauling lumber, ties, mine props, mill work, even coal.  As such, they are universal freight cars in narrow gauge modeling.

[Keith Hayes]

Way to start a fire, Dude!

[Robert McFarland]

I'm not versusing anything or anybody-I'm just engaging in lively discussion.Anybody on this thread could be right -or wrong

[Chris Walker]

I'm interested to see what Rick and Derrell have to say about the Nathrop Stockcar, you'll note in my post http://c-sn3-discussion-forum.41377.n7.nabble.com/Freight-trains-at-Dillon-or-Keystone-tp1868p2532.html  I never made any speculation on the contents, remembering having had a long talk with John Robinson many years ago regarding this photo so I was kind of mischievous in throwing that photo into the ring.  

On enlargement of the picture it is clear that there are goods inside.  However I wouldn't go so far to say that it is hastilly built as there is a proper roof structure with roofwalk and brakestaff along with trainbrakes (air or vacuum).  More likely an outgrowth of design drawing from a continuation of those stakeracks visible in the earlyday Buffalo pictures.  A comparison with the very first D&RG stockcars would reinforce that notion and the SP ng Stockcars continued with that style of Door of slightly heavier braced construction.  

I note that there is never any mention of Mule, Burro and Horse transport in regards to supplying new stock to the mining camps, these must have been needed in ever increasing numbers until the Silver Panic of '93.  As for the smell and women, it is easy to forget that a lot of people kept a housecow, rode horses or trailed behind horsedrawn transport and stepped over the manure in the street.  I would also imagine the Ladies being more at unease with the smelly Male population of the time, IF we are to be generalizing on the actual shipment of animals ahead of passengers.  

Oddly the three decent pictures of C&S Passenger trains with Stockcars on the head don't show enough detail to see whether loaded or not and are all in the last decade of operations.  If I was modelling then that is all the excuse I'd need to run the occassional car on the Pass.
 

http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/76332/rv/singleitem/rec/1

Enlargement of W.H.Jackson's picture on Marshall Pass.  Quite obviously not loaded with Stock.

http://cdm16079.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/61838/rv/singleitem/rec/1


One of the pictures taken at Rocky Point in Clear Creek shows an outside-braced Boxcar, one having the usual inside sheathing but not slatted as in Stockcar design.  This is shown on pg42 of CRRA#10 but I haven't yet found an online copy.


from C.W.Hauck Narrow Gauge to Central and Silver Plume:Colorado Rail Annual Number Ten CRRM.

Throw on the Coal

[Jim Courtney]

Quite true, Robert.  I tend to be wrong more often than right!

[Jim Courtney]

Chris, thanks for posting the enlargement of the flat?stock?boxcar at Nathrop.  This is the first time that I can clearly see the vertical rods in the side door, that Ron Rudnick describes in his plans.  And the silhouette of the Eames brake cylinder with the linkage to the left hand truck is also about the clearest I've ever seen.  I covet your DPL enlargement and cropping skills.

"Hastily built" is probably the wrong phrase.  The flat car conversion was meant to solve an interim house car shortage on a rapidly expanding railroad, until the Litchfield cars could be delivered.  I'm not sure what to call this car, perhaps a "ventilated merchandise car"?  Was equine merchandise ever carried in the car?  Who knows.  The 26 foot stock cars were definitely ordered to fill this need and Ron's discussion above clearly suggests they were considered multipurpose merchandise cars as well.

Your point about the relative malodorousness of horse manure vs. 1880s Colorado men got me wondering, when was deodorant invented?  This is what I discovered:

In the 9th century, Ziryab introduced under-arm deodorants in Al-Andalus from Baghdad. In 1888, the first commercial deodorant, Mum, was developed and patented by a U.S. inventor in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, whose name has been lost to history.  Mum was a paste applied to the underarms. It was soon followed by Everdry, the first effective antiperspirant.

I suspect that Colorado women of the era weren't always pleasant to be around.

[Mike Trent]

OK, Jim. You got it right.

When the train came through Dickey this afternoon, being Friday Westbound, I got a picture. There's very little time to waste, so one picture was all I got.

So here it is, based on Jim's post of freight operations to Dillon, spurred on by Chris's find of stock cars being handled as Express cars on the Passenger train, and a lively discussion with Robert's comments, etc, a most unanticipated photo indeed.

The train has arrived on time into Dickey, and will pass the depot on the Leadville Main, stop at the wye, and back the two miles to Dillon. Once there, based on the map of Dillon Jim supplied, #6 will spot the two passenger cars at the depot, and pull ahead to switch the two "Express" cars at the stock pens for unloading. Then #6 will back up to the depot, couple on to car #13, and puff away with nary a railfan ever having been the wiser that such a thing ever occurred.

Who'da thunk it?

The stock cars are Grandt Line, the scale is On3.

   

[Jim Courtney]

Way to go, Mike!  Art imitates Otto Perry!

[Mike Trent]

Thanks Jim,

In my mind, the grizzled old agent at Dillon is a veteran of some 25-30 years on the job up there named Jim Courtney. Full of stories, they say.  

[Chris Walker]

Mike Trent wrote

When the train came through Dickey this afternoon, being Friday Westbound, I got a picture. There's very little time to waste, so one picture was all I got.

Winners are grinners!  

[Jim Courtney]

Who knew that posting a few odd photos of an obscure place like Dillon would lead to a thread offering so much fun and information!  Thanks to all for participating with so much zest.

Jim (old but not yet grizzled)

[Mike Trent]

Jim, given that your desired period is 25-30 years earlier than mine, you are pretty grizzled in 1935. Outside  of that, I too, am old but not yet fully grizzled. I figure that a lot of us are somewhat more grizzled than we realize.

Yeah. Very cool thread, after a bit of a dry spell.

[Chris Walker]

Here I go again


http://www.narrowgauge.org/images/tkcok/m0048.jpg

[Tim Schreiner]

I definately agree that this topic has been a blast to follow!

[Jim Courtney]

Found another stock train hiding in DPL files:


http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15330coll22/id/42526/rec/17

The photo is mislabeled "#60 and #65", when in fact #61 is the lead engine.  Per the caption: "Freight; westbound; 17 cars, 15 MPH. Photographed: Leaving Denver, Colo., September 17, 1922."

The coal car behind the second engine disguises the true nature of the train.

[Keith Hayes]

...and 61 appears to be the helper.

[Chris Walker]

....with a seated Weston figure on the Pilot.

I figure that there just wasn't the agricultural traffic on the C&S that other than an occasional large movement to warrant the running of "pure" stocktrains hence the "several cars" type showing up in a number of pictures.  I note there are 2 or 3 pictures on the Western slope of Alpine with one or two stockcars per train.

[Jim Courtney]

Speaking of hidden DPL photos, on page 292 of Mal Ferrell's, The South Park Line, there is a small photo of a stock train closer to my era--Cooke 2-8-0 #53 pulling a stock train near Sheridan Junction c1902-1903. The photo credit is Denver Public Library. For the life of me I can't find the photo on the DPL website.  Anyone know if it has been digitalized?