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A Visit To Los Angeles To See Santa Fe 4-8-4 3751 2/5/2006



by Chris Guenzler



On the way to San Diego to ride the entire San Diego Trolley system, our conductor told me he saw Santa Fe 4-8-4 3751 getting ready to go to Los Angeles Union Station for use in the San Bernardino Railway Historical Society's Educational Outreach Program the following week. On the way back from San Diego that same day, Conductor Bob Riskie told me it was arriving at LAUPT at the same time his Pacific Surfliner 572 was departing. I knew I would then be going to Los Angeles to see my old and dear friend the next morning.

Pacific Surfliner 564



To get a few extra rail miles, I decided to ride Pacific Surfliner 564 to Irvine then catch northbound Pacific Surfliner 565 to Los Angeles. The train arrived at Santa Ana on time and 9.8 miles later, I detrained at Irvine then went up the pedestrian bridge to check photo angles.





Pacific Surfliner 564 departing and I returned to ground level.

Pacific Surfliner 565



This Pacific Surfliner arrived in Irvine also on time and I just sat back and enjoyed the trip to Los Angeles, stopping at Santa Ana, Anaheim and Fullerton before making our way to Los Angeles Union Station a few minutes early.

Santa Fe 3751 History

Built by Baldwin in 1927, Santa Fe 3751 was the first 4-8-4 steam locomotive built for the railroad and was referenced in documentation as type "Heavy Mountain", "New Mountain", or "Mountain 4-wheel trailer". It holds the distinction of being the oldest surviving 4-8-4 type steam locomotive in the world.

When built, tests showed that the new locomotive was twenty percent more efficient and powerful than the 3700 class 4-8-2 Mountain types, which at the time were Santa Fe's most advanced steam locomotives. In 1936, the locomotive was converted to burn oil and was given a larger tender that holds 20,000 US gallons of water and 7,107 US gallons of fuel oil two years later. No. 3751 was also present at the grand opening of Union Passenger Terminal in Los Angeles on May 7, 1939, pulling the Scout, one of Santa Fe's premier passenger trains as it arrived from Chicago. It was the first steam locomotive to bring a passenger train into Union Station.

In 1941, 3751, along with the other 13 locomotives in its class, received major upgrades that included replacing the original 73 inch spoked driving wheels with 80 inch boxpok wheels, a new frame, Timken roller bearings on all axles and more. That same year, it achieved its highest recorded speed at 103 miles per hour. It continued to be a very reliable working locomotive until August 23, 1953, when it pulled the last regularly scheduled steam-powered passenger train on the Santa Fe to run between Los Angeles and San Diego; this was its last run in revenue service before being put into stored at the Redondo Junction and retired from active service. On May 14, 1958, it was placed on display in San Bernardino.

In 1981, the San Bernardino Railroad Historical Society was formed with intentions of restoring and operating 3751. Four years later, it achieved its goal when 3751 was sold to it for one cent with the condition that the SBRHS must restore and operate the locomotive. In 1986, 3751 was moved from its display to California Steel Industries, where it was restored at a cost of $1.50 million. On August 13, 1991, it moved under its own steam for the first time in thirty-eight years. It made its first excursion run on December 27, 1991, running with two Santa Fe EMD FP45s and 16 passenger cars on a four-day trip from Los Angeles via Barstow to Bakersfield. Since then, it has been utilized for a large number of excursions and special trips and for display at many events.

The locomotive is currently owned by the San Bernardino Railroad Historical Society, the same organization that performed the initial 1986 restoration. In August 1992, the 3751 was found on its largest assignment so far, as the engine ran the entire route of Santa Fe's Transcon route between Los Angeles and Chicago with three (and later two) Santa Fe GE Dash 8-40CWs. The engine spent 18 days travelling over 2,300 miles in both directions. This run would include travelling to Topeka, Kansas to attend that year's Topeka Railroad days, where the locomotive was briefly displayed near Union Pacific 4-6-6-4 3985.

On April 22–23, 1995, 3751 was displayed in the Riverside Sunkist Orange Blossom Festival in Riverside. On December 31, 1996 when Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe merged with Burlington Northern Railroad to form Burlington Northern Santa Fe, the locomotive retained the same number. The excursion was operated again on April 20–21, 1996. In June 1999, the locomotive participated in Railfair '99. On the way to the fair, 3751, along with a BNSF Dash 9-44CW and mixed train of a tool car, ten BNSF boxcars and two passenger cars, from Los Angeles to Sacramento via San Bernardino, Barstow, Bakersfield, and Stockton. On the return trip to Los Angeles, the 3751 pulled another mixed train with several covered hoppers.

In October 2000, 3751 was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It been displayed at Fullerton Railroad Days in Fullerton, California a number of times. In August 2002, 3751 operated an Amtrak excursion train from Los Angeles to Williams, Arizona to participate in the 2002 National Railway Historical Society convention and ran over Metrolink, BNSF and Arizona and California Railroad tracks. After arriving in Williams, the locomotive pulled some excursions and photo runbys on the Grand Canyon Railway between Williams and the Grand Canyon Village, including a doubleheader with GCR 2-8-2 4960 and a tripleheader with GCR 2-8-0 18. The steam engine also pulled some of GCR's Pullman passenger cars for a photo charter requested by Goodheart Productions.

My Visit

I stepped off Pacific Surfliner 565 and across the platform on Track 13 was Santa Fe 3751.





The view of the steam engine the platform of Track 12.





The front of Santa Fe 3751.





To reach the sunny side, I had to walk to the end of the platform and around passenger cars, including "Pony Express" that were part of the Santa Fe 3751 Educational Outreach Program.







Santa Fe 3751 at the display location at Los Angeles Union Station.





I climbed the stairs to look into 3751's, then photographed along the boiler.





The builder's plate.





Union Pacific 6 double-bedroom/10 single roomette sleeping car "Pacific Sands" PPCX 800355, ex. Pullman Adventures 2003, exx. Amtrak 2881 1979, exxxx. Amtrak "Pacific Sands" 1971, exxxx. Amtrak 2630, exxxxx. Union Pacific 1436 1969, nee Union Pacific "Pacific Sands" built by Budd Company in 1950. Both the Pullman Company and Union Pacific had high hopes for the future expansion of rail travel by re-equipping the "City" trains with sleek, modern stainless steel cars. The early fifties was the high point of the showdown between the train, automobile and airplane and UP, Pullman and other railroads were coming out fighting!

Half of the Pacific fleet was delivered in the famous two-tone gray Overland paint scheme, the other half in Union Pacific's Armor Yellow, Gray and red Streamliner colors. By 1953, all of the cars had been repainted to yellow. "Pacific Sands" was first operated by the Pullman Company until the late 1960's when Pullman was dissolved and operation of the cars was taken over by the Union Pacific Railroad. It was a regular on the City of Portland, City of Los Angeles and City of San Francisco, among others, and provided classic Pullman service until Amtrak's formation on April 1, 1971.

The Pacific car fleet was one of Amtrak's best sleeper fleets in the 1970's and 1980's, mostly due the excellent maintenance provided by its previous owner. It lived through the purple and orange interior decor of 1970's and was redecorated to its current interior in the late 1980's. During the 25 years of Amtrak service, all of the Pacific cars were scattered through out the country in various Amtrak trains, but most, including "Pacific Sands", finished their service with Amtrak on the East coast routes, including Autotrain, as the West Coast routes were re-equipped with Superliners. A few Pacific cars served Amtrak as crew dorm cars until 2007 when the last one was taken out of service.

"Pacific Sands" was rescued into private ownership in 1996, after 46 years of railroad service. The exterior has been beautifully restored and polished to a partial Pullman/Union Pacific paint scheme by "Pacific Sands" first private owner. It has also been mechanically upgraded to all current Amtrak and FRA safety standards. LA Rail acquired the car in 2003, and has restored the interior of the car to its glory days of the 1950's while adding modern travel conveniences such as a shower.





"Pony Express" baggage car PPCX 800320, nee Canadian Pacific baggage-express 4210 built by Canadian Car and Foundry in 1941. I walked through the station to my favourite restaurant in Los Angeles.





A short walk from Union Station is Philippe's, where I always have a Roast Beef French Dip sandwich, cottage cheese and a lemonade. After a great meal, I walked back to Union Station to wait for Pacific Surfliner 572 then visited Santa Fe 3751 again and talked with several members of the crew. After a nice chat, I walked over to Track 9 and boarded Pacific Surfliner 572, which took me home on time to Santa Ana, ending another encounter with Santa Fe 3751.



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