I'm happy to report that the post utility railway at Fort Bliss is quite active. I was there in June 2001 for a couple of weeks as an Army Reserve railroader and watched the two RS4TCs depart via the seldom-used interchange on the south side of the post.

USA 1253 was acquired by NREX 3-23-00 and reportedly went to a shipyard in Avondale, LA. USA 1255 was listed as NREX in August 2008 and going on lease to EKA Chemicals, Columbus, MS.

The departure of the two locomotives, however, did not mean the end of rail operations. The Baldwins were being phased out Army-wide and had already been replaced by USA 4625 ( GP10), USA 4636 (GP16), and USA 4637 (GP18).

Years later USA 6004 (GG20B - Green Goat) arrived but didn't last, and the Army sent the handful of Green Goats it acquired to its rail shop at Hill AFB, UT, for scrapping. Reportedly Gensets USA 6500 and USA 6501 (both 3GS21B) are now at Fort Bliss, too.

Although the two Baldwins in the first link posted above at

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=82129

feature the two locomotives at Fort Bliss, the second link at

http://baldwindiesels.railfan.net/rs4tc/4003-4030.jpg

has two different Baldwins. The first, ex-USA 4003, came from Pine Bluff Arsenal, AR. It was sold to the Natchitoches Parish Port, located between Natchitoches and Clarence, LA, at the junction of Highways 6 and 486. The other, ex-USA 4030, came from Lake City Army Ammunition Plant, MO. Both were spotted at Nat. Parish Port by 18 January 1999.

Pine Bluff still has an active rail operation with two GE 80-tons (USA 1656 and 1677) while Lake City reportedly closed by September 1998 and most of its track was subsequently lifted.

Within a few years of my short stay at the post, a new load-out yard and a new enginehouse were built just east of the UP interchange at the northwest end of the post. You can easily spot them using Google Earth. Construction of the new yard and enginehouse made some of the old tracks on post redundant and as a result they were pulled up.

RE: "Is there any chance of logistical assistance from anyone there?" When I was there the post only had two rail employees, sometimes temporarily augmented by junior enlisted folks on medical hold or some other sort of limbo status, so there isn't a lot of extra manpower available. It's possible one or more support units on post might be able to offer some sort of limited assistance, but don't bet on it. These units already have plenty to keep them busy, their budgets are limited, and any assistance provided may not necessarily be for free.

So let me just clarify what exactly is stopping a group like the ones mentioned from restoring or repairing the 3420? Insurance or? I understand the need of funding and facilities but is insurance the main thing? Just hard to keep track of everything.
And is one of the starting p;ans to get 3420 back in operation?

I talked to the current Southwest Chapter president last night. He said there is a lawyer working on the legal issues with the city. The first focus is the Pullman car James Watt. The goal is to do some cosmetic work to make it look better. FMC has asked if there could be an effort to make all of the rolling stock look better.

The bigger issue seems to currently be the out going city manager. She is working hard to convert the space EP &SW #1 resides in into something else. For those of you who do not know #1 is an 1857 Breese Kneeland product. John H. White said the locomotive was about 80% original. After the restoration Mr. Conrad stated a higher number to me. It is amazing to realize that the boiler is original and that the couplers and air brakes are latter installations. It is a real piece of history.

Respectfully

Robby Peartree

The jaw doth drop. I had never heard of this loco until today. Something like this belongs in the Smithsonian, or at least deserves national attention. Wow.

photo credit: Denver Public Library
http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/si ... 149/rec/10

Olin -

What's even more amazing is that the locomotive was actually built for a forerunner of the Milwaukee Road! It was built as number 40 for the Milwaukee & Mississippi Rail Road and carried the name Spring Green. Carried a couple of railroad company names, engine numbers and even a different name at one time (Prairie Du Chien) before ending up as Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul #111. Sold out west in 1889 it did not become El Paso & Southwestern number 1 until 1902. Amazing that it has lasted so long and had such an eventful career!

Les

to see this happen to both Insights and the el paso railroad and transportation museum in the same year is sad. I feel like banging my head against the wall, being deployed I feel so useless not being able to do anything as I watch the city treat these groups like some nuisance. Right now is the perfect time to form an alliance between the two museums and work on trying to build a bigger and better museum. The hanger that I have been talking about seems to be owned by the city of el paso so if an alliance is formed it would be easier to acquire the hanger from the city. at first both groups can use the building but expanding to separate the museums is a must. Insights could take the hanger and the immediate area around the building and the railroad museum could build a building on the other side of the flightline, connected by an indoor walkway. the walkway could have the giftshop, food, planetarium, auditorium, and an omnimax theater (when money permits). my vision for a joint museum maybe drastic but I think it would save both groups.

cont.

FLO this is the No.1 in her current home, I took this picture right before I deployed.





Dave when I was a crew member of the SP&S 700 (a 4-8-4) we neither had our own tracks or museum but we did have an old four stall round house and a dedicated crew. just because you dont have tracks cant mean you cant run a steam or diesel locomotive, it just means you might have to do some butt kissing in order to run anything hahaha. now as far as my vision for the museum goes.......

you are a guest and you have just walked into the railroad and transportation museum part of the museum complex. As you walk into the main entrance you notice that the entrance is well lit with large windows. The entrance has railroading nicknacks and pictures on the wall, a display of a small ride on locomotive and cars can be seen. As you walk further into the "lobby" you notice stairs and elevators going to a second floor and a pair of large tunnel entrances on either side of the lobby beckoning you to enter as you begin to explore the museum. you decide to take what looks like an old wooden tunnel entrance on the right marked 1883 instead of a concrete tunnel entrance on the left. As you enter the tunnel you notice the tunnel curves left and right while getting smaller. it seems as if the tunnel is longer then it seems, as you begin to notice that you have been climbing a small grade no more the a couple of feet high. the lighting in the tunnel is dim but not so much so as it is hard to see but enough to make you feel like you are in a tunnel. when you make the right and exit the tunnel you notice that you are not in a museum but the past.

As you step foot into the first exhibit the first thing you see EP&SW No.1 coming out of a wooden tunnel from the side of the Texan desert mountain range in front of you. from the tunnel entrance the locomotive is coming out of, the tracks curve sharply in front of you until they go into into another portal on the mountain side. As you keep walking out of your tunnel entrance you notice that the path you are on is an old road, wagon ruts and hove prints are covering the road you walk on. as you cross the tracks and walk your way up to the locomotive you notice that the sounds of the desert can be heard, crickets, wind, coyotes and of coarse the sound of the locomotive fills your senses. you know longer feel you are in a building anymore but back in time. you walk up to the locomotive, the headlight is on lighting up the mountain face and tunnel entrance behind you. the engineer looks inpatient as he looks at his watch, the fire man taking a small break. though the road you are on continues up a hill, a small mule kart seems to be blocking you way. you look left where another smaller road goes into the side of the mountain. upon closer inspection you realize it is a mining entrance.

You walk into the mine, the sounds of the desert leave you and the tunnel once again seems to curve right and left as the lanterns hanging on the wall light your way. you realize you are walking on a pair of rails, seemingly swallowed by mud, sand, and dirt making them barely visible on the ground. As you continue on, you enter into what seems like the main elevator chamber in a natural cave. a lower set of tracks can be seen beside you, you estimate the lower set of tracks are about seven feet below you. below you you see a cart on the far end full of ore waiting to use the elevator. on the end closest to you the tracks go into another mine. a cable sits in between the lower tracks. suddenly the sound of a generator can be heard as the cables down below begin to move. slowly a mine kart begins to appear from the lower mine entrance until it stops behind the other kart waiting to use the elevator. you have seen enough and begin to move on however a mine kart blocks your path from delving deeper into the mine, so you turn left and go across a wooden bridge crossing the tracks below you. once again you go into a tunnel but this time your ready for what comes next, you know you're still inside a building and not a mine. you keep moving on and again the tunnel turns right and left or was it left and right? but your thoughts are interrupted as the sounds of the mine are replaced with...the city? indeed the tunnel walls have changed from the mining wall to a brick alleyway. as you walk into the streets of el paso, you notice a PCC car at a stop,doors open as if beckoning you to come aboard as if the car was going to the next stop. you realize its night, the city lights fill the street. buildings seem to tower over you. cars are parked in the street, and buildings and chain link fencing surround you. you stop as you begin to realize that this isnt just any museum but it is a museum unlike any other, it is a museum that truly takes you into the past.

hahaha sorry about the light novel but this is just a peace of what I think the museum should be like.

That only makes sense if the object is just to run it but not to run it for a greater purpose. We know better now for both economic and sustainability reasons. Major boiler repairs sren't cheap.....and unless you produce enough revenue in service to cover operating expenses, the next overhaul's cost, and capitalizing the current / last overhaul.....you aren't sustainable. Unless you have a reliable and committed - not just promised, sort of - source of ghost dollars adequate for it all. Think 20 years ahead.

Very interesting, marketable and ambitious ideas for the interactive multi-sensual experience in your museum plan. Borrowing from proven winners like Disney, CSRM and even the Cincinnatti history museum (not entirely a winner)......focused on making things happen around the visitors for them to experience as an organic whole. I didn't know El Paso had a mining hstory.

dave

SP 3420 does not have a place to run ( yet) but she has something that SP&S 700 does not...she is a fairly powerful locomotive which can be transported by road to almost anywhere. Taking her out to other railroads which might not currently have steam operating could be an option...

Dave the funny part is that I used to be A Disney Cast member before I joined the Army. I am trying to use the experience I have from Disney and apply it here. to make a museum work you first need to make the museum into a maze of sorts to confuse the guest as to how big the building is. by using lights sounds and by making each exhibit as in depth and detailed as possible the guest will start to think they are not in a museum any more but in that location it self, in short make the museum into an attraction of sorts. as far as the SP 3420, there is a reason why I put the restoration of that locomotive in the long term part of the plan. for now we need to work on a couple of PCC cars and restore SP3420 cosmetically, while still setting her up to be fully restartable on a latter date.




and just in case people where still trying to figure out what hanger I am talking about, here is the picture of the facility. the hanger is on the left and across the flightline to the right is the tracks and location where I want to set up the railroad museum. of course the parking lot will have to be redone and expanded but I think thats a given.

The El Paso & Southwestern is a product of James Douglas’ frustration starting in 1881 with both the SP and the Santa Fe’s reluctance to offer the service he wanted. In 1889 he started the Arizona & Southeastern. The railroad continued to expand until a solid eastward connection with good rate competition was obtained. Number 1 was purchased in 1889 at the beginning of the phelps dodge’s railroad history and by 1909 was sitting in a dead line when someone suggested it would be a great display in front of their General office building. It sat there until 1960 when it was moved to the Texas Western Campus. In 1968 a non temperature controlled building was placed around the locomotive. It was displayed At UTEP until about 2000 when J David did his restoration and the locomotive was placed downtown in it current location. The building #1 resides in today is owned by Sun Metro and the environment is supposed to be for its benefit. John White of the Smithsonian was the reason that the shelter was placed over it in 1968. He has had a passion for the locomotive and #1 has benefited from his attention

The picture of 3420 was taken during the 1985 R&LHS national meeting in El Paso. The operation occurred within the refinery. This would be the last meeting Gerald M. Best would attend. He passed away three weeks later. As a young 13 year old I was sent to the car that Mr. White and Mr. Best were chatting to give them directions on how to see SP 3420 operate. I remember Mr. Best expressing how glad he was to see a young person talking an interest in the locomotive and the group. If you look at the caboose you can see me. Fred Greher, the Diesel shop manager for the SP in El Paso was on the caboose with me. I remember him telling me that I needed to respond to the locomotive whistle signals with the caboose whistle. I did it and confused the engine crew. He then said maybe you should not do it. It was a learning experience for us all.

The last time 3420 operated was December 28, 1985. Its last display in operation (in November of1985) was for a PD’s employee picnic where it gave out 600 rides to 400 guest and we had to turn people away when we ran out of fuel. 3420 has had a history with PD for 20 years as a mainline locomotive and they have hosted it for the past 30 years as an effort to preserve their history. 3420 is the only remaining El Paso & Northeastern locomotive. The EP & SW purchased the EP&NE due to its coal and timber reserves that were needed for PD’s copper interest.

3420 has a history in the southwestern US and a brief history on lease to railroads in Mexico. She has handled coal trains and hot perishable trains. She then spent years switching cars at various locations until placed on display in 1956. When 3420 was returned to service there were retired railroaders who made efforts to help the young enthusiast. The stories of adventures of the young and willing are numerous. The refinery saw several such stories. One day with an old SP pipe fitter by the name of Bill Morris running around with six or seven volunteers in tow wanting to learn how to bend a pipe for the engineer’s injector. There was Alex Eason who had operated 3420 in the 1940’s and 1950’s who missed railroading terribly. Most days he would not get out of bed before noon if his wife had that long of a fight in her to get him out of bed. But when he got the opportunity to help educate the volunteers on how to operate 3420 he was up and shaving before she got up. Railfans talk about pictures they have taken or what should be restored so they can take a picture. Volunteers who do more than talk, can get so much more than photographs. I am fortunate to have some of those memories.

Respectfully
Robby Peartree

Rob are you still apart of the SW chapter in El Paso? from your posts it seems like you are a member and can speak for them more then I can. I can honestly say I wished I went to at least one meeting before i deployed but explaining my idea in front of an audience (and me being a non member still) kind of scares me, which is ironic considering I am deployed in a war zone. hahaha. I wish I could do more for the group from here but for now I can only get ideas together and wait out the rest of this deployment.

I am still a chapter member. When I was president of the chapter from January 1994 to June 1996, half of the chapter’s membership lived out of town. In spite of the distance since leaving El Paso in 1996 I have kept a few contacts in the refinery and several of the chapter members. A couple of years ago I answered the request of the retired VP for phelps dodge and informed the city that they were indeed the owners of the locomotive. He is now a banker in El Paso. A few years ago I had a copy made of a photo taken by Jack Neville’s of 3420 double heading with 4449 in 1984 and the city council presented it to the management of the refinery in appreciation of the refinery’s support of 3420 and the associated equipment.

Claudia Rivers with UTEP’s Special Collections Department and I keep in contact on how the railroad collections are doing. You can find the finding guide to the SP Collection here http://digitalcommons.utep.edu/finding_aid/1/ which has a lot of EP & SW and EP & NE material. The road to make this finding guide possible was long but the history it represents is unique and not found in other SP collections. There is railroad stuff for Northern Mexico and the United States in other parts of the Special Collections Department. The last I heard Groupo Mexico was giving UTEP Special Collections Department the files that were left from the ASARCO smelter. I still have a contact with BNSF in Field Safety Support for New Mexico and Arizona if she does not retire soon. And remember the EP & SW freighthouse is a local historical landmark after Fred Stindt encouraged me to do something to protect the building three weeks before he passed away (After having both Mr. Best and Mr. Stindt pass away 3 weeks after visiting El Paso we issued a warning to elderly R&LHS members about visiting El Paso).

The Southwest chapter needs to have an infusion of energetic people. But that needs to be tempered with the realization of what the chapter faces and an understanding of what it will take to move the situation off of dead center. Having a well thought out focused plan that gives people a path toward better preserving all of the equipment is critical.
3420 came out of the park in remarkable shape partly because of the dry climate but also because the SP had not worn out the locomotive before putting it on display and she had not been dramatically vandalized. She still has her builder’s plates bell, whistle safeties and refurbished gauges from when she was put on display. The issues today are more political than technical. I doubt 3420 will ever again highball on the Golden State at 40 MPH with a hot train but there might be a home giving 1 mile rides for toy donations to Toys for Tots or getting onto a spur track in south El Paso and distributing those toys or being the hook for an Operation Lifesaver event. 3420 has a lot of potential opportunities, the first step is getting the owner involved

Respectfully,
Robby Peartree

For the record there was a discussion between the EP&SW and the ICC over the value of #1. The ICC said it was worth $12 dollars and the EP&SW said it was worth more. I got to figure this one out and write it up. So just what is the value of an old truly historic locomotive.

Robby Peartree

Offer it for sale and see.

It's worth whatever its salvage value is, or it's worth the amount of what it will earn as a capital asset, or it's worth what a willing buyer will pay for it as a piece of cultural material - artifact or artwork.

There's no plan in place for it to earn by producing ton miles or moving butts in seats; we don't want to scrap it; so that leaves the market as a cultural resource as your option.

Most locomotives sell for a little bit of money, some are just given to somebody who can afford the high cost of relocating them, some very few sell for high values for what are probably not entirely rational reasons. It might be worthwhile to contact an equipment broker for an opinion if you don't want to pay for a legitimate appraisal.

dave