When I was attending high school in El Toro, CA, 40-plus years ago, before I had fully begun to recognize names like Steinheimer, Benson, and other Californians in any rail mag, it was the photography and writing of Don Sims that opened my eyes to the amazing world of railroading in the Golden State.

Not mentioned in that Trains obit is the fact that Sims was once the editor of Railway Quarterly, an offshoot of sorts to Rail Classics. Say what you will about those two mags produced by Challenge Publications, with their sections of uncoated paper and occasionally sketchy reproduction. Railway Quarterly was often a showcase of Don's material from cover to cover, and it typically received better treatment than Rail Classics.

The Summer 1980 issue of RQ, all 80-plus pages, was an all-Sims look at California main line railroads of the period: SP, UP, ATSF, WP, plus close-up stories on West Colton and Barstow. And if you managed to snatch up the 116-page Rail Classics 1978 Yearbook, among the more than a dozen features inside there were three by Sims: 16 pages on Tehachapi, 9 pages on Cajon, and 10 pages on UP between Green River and Cheyenne.

Wish I had known that Sims spent his final years up here in the Northwest. It would have been a tremendous honor to meet up with him, and tell him how much his photography inspired me to set out on countless adventures of my own back in the California of my youth. Let's hope his collection winds up in the hands of someone who will give it proper care, as well as the space it deserves both in print and online.