For the record, the red and yellow weren't YW colors, but instead those of Bryan Whipple's Northern Nevada Railroad. Whipple set up the Northern Nevada to rehabilitate and then operate most of the old Nevada Northern Railroad mainline, working in conjunction with Magma Copper who was then reopening the copper mines outside of Ely. However, Whipple only got the #244 painted in the orange and yellow scheme- note it's similarity to the Eureka Southern paint scheme- but had yet to get it moved out of Portola when Broken Hills Properties bought Magma and decided they wanted to run the railroad themselves as BHP Nevada Rail. YW bought the #244 a few years later. As to why the YW scrapped it, a lack of any other revenue stream forced the company to start scrapping most of the equipment on the property. The #244 had been for sale for quite some time with no takers before the railroad cut it up.

Jeff Moore
Elko, NV