Was Southern Pacific the ONLY railroad in the West to run steam until 1958 All of the railroads in the West were entirely dieselized by 1954
Actually SP ran steam on it's Western Division and out of San Francisco on the Peninsula commuter runs through 1968 and the UP operated its Challengers, Northerns and Big Boys until that year as well and kept them as protect power until 1959. Santa Fe concentrated its most modern steam between Belin, New Mexico and Kansas City up until 1954 when they became reserve power.
JimValle Actually SP ran steam on it's Western Division and out of San Francisco on the Peninsula commuter runs through 1968 and the UP operated its Challengers, Northerns and Big Boys until that year as well and kept them as protect power until 1959. Santa Fe concentrated its most modern steam between Belin, New Mexico and Kansas City up until 1954 when they became reserve power.
1968????? The SP ran it last steam in regular runs in 1956 with fantrips in 57. The 4274 ran a trip in 1957, November 30 to Reno and back on Dec 1, which was the last run of a Cab Forward steam on the SP.
In May of 1958, the 4460 pulled an excursion from Oakland to Sacramento and then it was used again on the very last SP run October 19th to Reno from Oakland.
An interesting sidelight to this story is a Cab Forward boiler was sold to a lumber mill near Placerville and was in steam until about 1970! Someone posted pictures of the boiler with its dual stacks and other features.
CZ