Unfortunately, railroads seem to have a poor appreciation for history. Many things like paper records or other items only still exist because some employee dug them out of a dumpster. I hope I'm wrong, but my guess is if SP didn't dispose of the items themselves, they may well have been tossed after UP took over.
Just read David Lustig's article on the SP's many paint schemes and this line caught my eye:
"More concept schemes, painted on O gauge models, were presented at board meetings until there was a consensus in the late 1950s on scarlet and gray, the color scheme that endured until the acquisition by Union Pacific in the 1990s."
That makes me wonder, does anyone know if any of those samples survived? More curious than collector, I'd kinda like to see some of the paint schemes the SP execs didn't use…
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