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Re: SP&S F3 leaving Portland June 1970
Author: Jim700
Date: 01-20-2009 - 12:06
Lee Hower Wrote:
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> At the time, I was a student at Oregon
> State University and made several trips up to
> Portland during that school year, but only
> acquired my first car, a Datsun 1200, the week
> prior to the start of Amtrak. On each visit, every
> time I saw any of the trains between Portland and
> Seattle all had pure SP&S power.
Lee, I probably misinterpreted ex BN's question as I was thinking of his "SP&S equipment" primarily in terms of the train set rather than the power. Because Drew's picture showed all SP&S power and cars in June 1970 it is surely BN #22. The front portion of the train set visible in the picture was captive to the PDX-SPK route as it made a round trip every day and was maintained at the Hoyt Street Coach Yard as well as having ex-SP&S back-up cars for the service stationed there. The cars for the ex-NP North Coast Limited coming off at Pasco and the ex-GN Empire Builder coming off at Spokane varied from trip to trip because of the many SEA-CHI train sets involved. As the 14-month time period between Merger Day and Amtrak Day progressed the power started to vary but as I recall the PDX-SPK-route-only cars stayed pretty much ex-SP&S. As an example of the power variance, I was the PDX-Bend fireman on a VSP&S charter passenger train in September 1970 and we had, rather than ex-SP&S power, an ex-NP F9 on the point, the BN 9818 IIRC. I found a reference to this in this post from 2003:
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Date: August 28, 2003 01:10
Re: Historical Specials.
Author: Jim700
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George, here's a 1970 excursion out of Portland. I was the fireman for George Gould from Portland to Bend on ex-NP F9s and rode the excursion the rest of the way as a passenger. I had the pleasure of being a guest fireman for Ray Piltz on the #25 going up the hill out of McCloud. It was a real classy train including an SP 3/4 length dome and a BN (ex-GN) Mountain series round end observation with the rear couch replaced with an organ which was played many hours each day by an old-time classy musician from Portland whose name I'm sorry I've forgotten. The BN took their best diner from train #22 (as the SP&S had done from train #2 on a nearly identical 1968 trip) and put the spare diner on the regular train to Spokane. Creston Miller was the dining car steward and he did his usual superb job. You should have seen engineer George Gould's eyes (when I came back to the cab from a trip to the diner while running along the Deschutes River) with a full dinner-from-the-diner for him served on china.
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The "George" addressed is PDX Amtrak engineer George Landrock. This post refers to the ex-SP&S diner "Columbia" which was still in regular PDX-SPK service at that time over six months after the merger. The dining car steward Creston Miller worked that car for many years on its PDX-SPK route.
-------------------------------------------------------
> At the time, I was a student at Oregon
> State University and made several trips up to
> Portland during that school year, but only
> acquired my first car, a Datsun 1200, the week
> prior to the start of Amtrak. On each visit, every
> time I saw any of the trains between Portland and
> Seattle all had pure SP&S power.
Lee, I probably misinterpreted ex BN's question as I was thinking of his "SP&S equipment" primarily in terms of the train set rather than the power. Because Drew's picture showed all SP&S power and cars in June 1970 it is surely BN #22. The front portion of the train set visible in the picture was captive to the PDX-SPK route as it made a round trip every day and was maintained at the Hoyt Street Coach Yard as well as having ex-SP&S back-up cars for the service stationed there. The cars for the ex-NP North Coast Limited coming off at Pasco and the ex-GN Empire Builder coming off at Spokane varied from trip to trip because of the many SEA-CHI train sets involved. As the 14-month time period between Merger Day and Amtrak Day progressed the power started to vary but as I recall the PDX-SPK-route-only cars stayed pretty much ex-SP&S. As an example of the power variance, I was the PDX-Bend fireman on a VSP&S charter passenger train in September 1970 and we had, rather than ex-SP&S power, an ex-NP F9 on the point, the BN 9818 IIRC. I found a reference to this in this post from 2003:
*******************************************
Date: August 28, 2003 01:10
Re: Historical Specials.
Author: Jim700
------------------------------
George, here's a 1970 excursion out of Portland. I was the fireman for George Gould from Portland to Bend on ex-NP F9s and rode the excursion the rest of the way as a passenger. I had the pleasure of being a guest fireman for Ray Piltz on the #25 going up the hill out of McCloud. It was a real classy train including an SP 3/4 length dome and a BN (ex-GN) Mountain series round end observation with the rear couch replaced with an organ which was played many hours each day by an old-time classy musician from Portland whose name I'm sorry I've forgotten. The BN took their best diner from train #22 (as the SP&S had done from train #2 on a nearly identical 1968 trip) and put the spare diner on the regular train to Spokane. Creston Miller was the dining car steward and he did his usual superb job. You should have seen engineer George Gould's eyes (when I came back to the cab from a trip to the diner while running along the Deschutes River) with a full dinner-from-the-diner for him served on china.
*******************************************
The "George" addressed is PDX Amtrak engineer George Landrock. This post refers to the ex-SP&S diner "Columbia" which was still in regular PDX-SPK service at that time over six months after the merger. The dining car steward Creston Miller worked that car for many years on its PDX-SPK route.
