SPR: I Need A Name

Scratch-Pad Ramblings:
I Need A Name


Photo by Chuck Donaldson at Somewhere West
Part of the fun of freelancing is developing your own railroad.

Part of the hassle is making your railroad fit into the real world, in a satisfying way. (At least, satisfying for you.)

Lately I have been on a Western Pacific kick. The WP was an interesting railroad; built in the nineteen-oughts to allow George Gould's rail conglomerate to compete with the Harriman-owned Union Pacific and Southern Pacific empire, it spent much of its life hanging on by its fingernails. But the Wobbly was an underdog you could root for.

One of the WP's quirks is, at the time of its building, its charter prevented it from building any branch lines. It was to run from Salt Lake City to Oakland without any detours. This attitude would actually make sense in modern Western railroading, as much of modern freight traffic is just passing through, between ports of entry. But in 1910, the freight traffic was resource-based, and you had to get to the traffic in order to haul it.

By 1920, this prohibition had ended, but SP and a host of small railroads already had tracks where the WP wanted to go. So in true business fashion - if you can't beat 'em, and they're smaller than you, buy 'em. In this fashion, the Sacramento Northern and the Tidewater Southern were added to the WP letterhead.

One of the facinating aspects about these subsidiary roads is that they maintained an individual identity right up to Union Pacific Marger Day. Locomotives were painted in Western Pacific paint schemes but lettered for the subsidiary road.


Photo by Jim Munding at RailPictures.Net
Now, I'm not interested (at least not this week) in modelling the interior valleys of Northern California. I want the WP to run somewhere it actually didn't, and do so realistically.

So - I'll invent my own WP subsidiary. I'm not the first to come up with this, actually. Rob Spangler did it first, with his HO scale Northern Nevada running from Elko north to Twin Falls. (See the June 1997 Model Railroader for details.)

Actually, I'm thinking I'll invent two: the Salt Lake & Western (SL&W), an unmodelled terminal road serving the Salt Lake environs (as a tip of the hat to home), and... the other.

Therein lies the problem. I envision a branchline, either running between Westwood and Susanville, CA (and possibly on to Reno), or running from Reno to points south, Las Vegas and/or Mojave and a connection with the Santa Fe. So what do I call it?

Some ideas:

Sierra Nevada (I like the sound of it, but does it seem too similar to the Sacramento Northern, a real subsidiary?)
Nevada Western
Nevada Central
Sierra Mojave
Sierra Pacific (But there are already several companies by that name)
Sierra Eastern or Eastern Sierra
Lassen & Reno

I need something railroady, but realistic. If you have any ideas, suggestions, or preference. please leave me a comment. Thanks in advance.

For More Info:
The Tidewater Southern
Ken Rattenne's Website

SPR: The Hazards Of Videos

Scratch-Pad Ramblings:
The Hazards of Videos

I recently started watching Pentrex's The Joint Line. That probably wasn't the best idea.

Now, I'm hankering to run Rio Grande, BN, and ATSF trains, rather than the Pacific Northwest roads I mentioned below in the Layout Design Journal series. I've decided I'm simply weak and easily influenced.

Plus, there's also the WP factor - the Western Pacific factor. You see, the Denver & Rio Grande Western and Western Pacific were hometown roads, scrappy underdogs against the yellow might of the Union Pacific. (The Southern Pacific was pretty much a non-factor until the D&RGW-SP merger in the late '80s, as until then it only had a presence in Ogden, which was outside my range then. Even after the merger I didn't pay much attention to it - I was mad that they were absorbing the Grande. Some of the moves involved in that merger still don't make any sense to me, such as why did the Rio Grande have to be the road that disappeared? The Rio Grande bought the Southern Pacific.) Not that it matters now - both of those roads and the once-mighty Southern Pacific have faded into a yellow blur. I never saw the WP run - something I could only make up for by modelling it, or some version of it.

But back to my lack of willpower for a moment. My model railroad roster is a reflection of my lack of modelling discipline. I can put together at least one decent train for any of a number of railroads: WP, D&RGW, SP, UP, BN, NP, GN, MILW, CPR... That's not a boast. That's an admission of shame.

And I still have videos of Beaumont Hill and the Highline to watch....