SP Sacramento Local train 247 carried the romantic name El Dorado.

The first westbound out of Sacramento, #247 was scheduled out of the capital city at 6:15AM in April 1957, with stops at Davis, Suisun-Fairfield, Martinez, Berkeley, and Oakland 16th Street before terminating at Oakland Pier at 8:15AM, with the ferry to San Francisco docking at the Ferry Building at 9:10AM.

Train 248, the eastbound El Dorado, departed Oakland Pier at 4:25PM, and made the same stops (with the addition of Crockett) before tying up in Sacramento at 6:20PM. Heavyweight chair cars and a baggage-parlor were featured on the trains through most of the 1950s, with the final runs coming on December 7, 1960--the same day that SP discontinued West Coast trains #59-60 between Sacramento and Los Angeles.

Diesel power on the El Dorado ran the gamut from passenger Geeps and boiler-equipped SD7s to FP7s, Alco RS-11s, and PAs. Solo PA units were often seen, and I've got a negative in my collection (see page 4 of Joe Strapac's Southern Pacific Historic Diesels Volume 20) depicting a PA-PB set powering #247 in 1956.

Here's a toast to one of the best train names in SP history. Long live the El Dorado!