The C&S Coal Chutes: Pine, Como, Dickey, Pitkin and almost Breckenridge

[Chris Walker]

Jim,

I had often wondered what happened to the Chutes at Pitkin but I doubt they were kept in service by the D&RGW given the proximity to Gunnison's Tower some 25 miles away from Pitkin.  I'm also looking for the photos I took a looong time ago of my version for you.

And Mike,

the C&S Coal Loader at Leadville was considerably different from the Rio Grande's "Red Devil" loaders both in application of height adjustment and orientation to the service track.  I can't see any details to determine whether the C&S Elevator was a Chainbucket or Conveyor Belt type version.
see this NGDF post for detail differences: http://ngdiscussion.net/phorum/read.php?1,145620


Another detail feature touched on by Mike, not common to all was that the Chutes for the two larger Bins at Pine Grove were Steel rather than Timber.


http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/42241/rv/singleitem

[John Schapekahm]

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[Mike Trent]

Holy smokes! Thanks, Chris. Never noticed that at all. Can you make out what the counterweights looked like?

I wrote my reply using my phone, which I always try not to do, especially after sitting around for hours waiting for a tech at the Apple Store to fix my better half's iphone. You know the old adage, "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy." I'm sure there must be an equivalent saying down under.

I think I may even have reported something as having inappropriate content in my clumsy effort to use the damn phone to reply to that post. Been that kind of day, all day long.

I believe, Chris, that all the Red Devils were conveyers, but I don't have any real knowledge of that. I do know that I have heard the Leadville tipple referred to as a "Red Devil" numerous times over the years, back into C&S times. I'll stick with that unless someone comes up with something definitive to the contrary.

[Jim Courtney]

John,

See my earlier post.  The original single chute bin at Schwanders was apparently the one removed in 1894.  The annotated DL&G B&B book of 1894 records a new 8-bin chute built in November of 1900. See the B&B Addendum to the Trout Creek Valuation Maps in the "Files" section.  

This sure is confusing stuff.

[Chris Walker]

John,

Is there any information available on the Princeton Coaldock that shows up in the earlyday photos? As to how long that lasted?

Buena Vista coalsheds.


http://cdm16079.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/252/rv/singleitem/rec/21



http://cdm16079.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/1472/rv/singleitem/rec/12



http://cdm16079.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/246/rv/singleitem/rec/11

[John Schapekahm]

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[John Schapekahm]

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[Robert McFarland]

There's a picture of it in chapter 9 of DSP&P Pictorial(p303 in the original.Its been reproduced in other sources.

[Jeff Young]

John Schapekahm wrote

Last (bottom ) picture - - - Chris, nice capture of 4 of my favorite things - - -in no particular order, stockyard, depot, coal bins, coal dock, courthouse, gaol (forgive me my Chaucer on that last one) ...

... and in the first picture, a block-lettered yellow reefer.

Cheers,
Jeff.

[Jim Courtney]

Geeze Louise, Chris!

How many times have I studied the McClure 1890s photo of the passenger cars at Pine, and not noticed the ash pit on the west leg of the wye!?  You have an eagle eye, my man!

Guess that goes to explain why the west leg of the wye seemed the designated place to spot helper engines, when they were between westbound assignments.  Especially in the early years:


From the J. Phelan Collection, in Pictorial Supplement to the Denver, South Park and Pacific

Newly renumbered Mason Bogie number 46 has its portrait taken, while resting on the house track, just west of the Pine depot.  In the background, Baldwin 2-8-0 number 191, still with Congdon stack, is in repose on the west leg of the Pine wye.  Another unidentified helper engine is behind the Mason Bogie.  Perhaps number 191 has just dumped her ashes.  (c1885-1886).  The photographer is standing where the coal trestle would later be built.

You'd think there would be a small sand house at Pine to service the helpers.  Perhaps you could use that eagle eye of yours to spot it!

[John Schapekahm]

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[John Schapekahm]

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[Jeff Young]

John Schapekahm wrote

Jim
help - - - just not finding your reference ...
John

Hi John,

This is a direct link to the folder:
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B-i5uO4f-XsCaFJVckJOWDdOcEU&usp=sharing_eid

(It's the text document in the folder.)

Cheers,
Jeff.

[John Schapekahm]

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[Jeff Young]

Pages 9 - 12 of that text file are from the 1894 DL&G B&B book.  (The Schwanders coal chute comment is about 3/4 of the way down the last page.)

(You might have been looking at pages 2 - 7, which are from the earlier 1886 UP B&B book.)

Cheers,

Jeff.

On 20 Dec 2015, at 19:49, John Schapekahm [via C&Sn3 Discussion Forum] <[hidden email]> wrote:

Jeff Young wrote

This is a direct link to the folder:
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B-i5uO4f-XsCaFJVckJOWDdOcEU&usp=sharing_eid
(It's the text document in the folder.)

 OK - - - I've already been there and seen THAT, but what I am still not seeing anywhere is "the annotated DL&G B&B book of 1894 record[ing] a new 8-bin chute built in November of 1900."

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[Jim Courtney]

John,

Click on Jeff's link.  The last page, on the far right is a 12 page PDF of 3 different documents.  The last set of documents is the 1894 DL&G B&B book, "annotated and updated". I believe Schwanders is on the very last page.

Jim

[Jim Courtney]

OK, Chris, as John has documented, Pine had a 6 foot by 9 foot sand house.  So let's start looking for it.

Do you think that's it, under the ramp of the coal trestle?

[Jim Courtney]

John wrote in response to my Schwanders question:

Per information Rick Steele shared with me: on (and before) August 28, 1919, the Chalk Creek Mixed, from Buena Vista to Romley, coaled up at the 14’ (W) x 79’ (L) x 7’ (H) coaling platform in Buena Vista.

I've been rereading Margaret Coel's Goin' Railroading.  In Chapters 13 and 14, Sam Speas, Jr,  describes his adolescence in Buena Vista, while his father Sam Speas, Sr was engineer on the Chalk Creek Mixed run, from 1912 to 1922.  

Sam Jr describes working part time for Fred Hyde, the C&S Yard Watchman in Buena Vista, shoveling coal into his father's locomotive, with his brother Neil.  After school they would shovel 4 tons into the tender, making 10-cents per ton. (I knew my kids were lazy as teenagers!)  Evidently, they moved coal from the coal bins in Chris's photos above.

So it seem that the water tank and coal chutes at Schwanders existed only to service the helpers over Alpine and Trout Creek passes.  When those routes were closed after 1910, Schwanders ceased to be of use. If the coal chutes at Schwanders were built in late 1900, they saw less than ten years of service.

Also described in the book is how Sam Speas, Sr, "bought the water tank at Schwanders for twenty-five dollars. He and Conroy (his fireman) steamed up locomotive number 73, coupled on two flatcars, and started for Schwanders. After steaming into Schwanders, we threw cables around the pillars of the tank.  It came crashing down. We loaded the redwood onto the flatcars and chugged back to Buena Vista where, not long afterward, Dad transformed the South Park water tank into a porch on our house."

[Chris Walker]

Jim Courtney wrote

Geeze Louise, Chris!

You'd think there would be a small sand house at Pine to service the helpers.  Perhaps you could use that eagle eye of yours to spot it!

Hehehe,

It's hiding in plain sight, as usual.


http://cdm16079.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/fullbrowser/collection/p15330coll22/id/12030/rv/singleitem/rec/2

[Jim Courtney]

Another photo of the coal chutes at Dickey:


E.J. Haley collection, from Coel's Goin' Railroading, page 108.

Multiple engines, taking coal, 1930s.  Next stop Breckenridge, before taking on the Boreas grades with full tenders.