While looking up something on Hawaiian railroads, I came across this site with railroad footage; we'll start with what I consider a most amazing find, Oahu Railway & Land Co. footage from 1942--in color!

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675 ... d-on-train

Crowded commuter train on the same road:

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675 ... llman-cars

The site doesn't identify this location, but overall it looks like somewhere on the Detroit, Toledo & Ironton, possibly during the Henry Ford years:

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675 ... ls-a-wheel

Still not properly identified--could this be the Milwaukee in the Northwest?

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675 ... t-throttle

This is definitely DT&I--but where?

http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675 ... oad-tracks

Enjoy, and have fun exploring the site, too, although I have to admit searches there are not the easiest in the world.

That freight and commuter train were a lot longer than I would expect. Good footage! What happened to all their steam engines?

Sadly, almost everything is gone. There is a possibility a heavy 2-8-2 may survive in Guatemala (several were sold there after the end of operations). Most tragic is that one survived into the late 1960s or early 1970s, "preserved" in the roundhouse at Honolulu, but from what I understand, someone essentially thought it was just in the way, and it got cut up.

One Oahu engine that does survive is an outside-framed 4-6-0, which had been on display for many years at Travel Town in Los Angeles, and was shipped back for restoration to Hawaii some years ago. This engine had a little Hollywood history, having been run in the "Casey Jones" TV series of the late 1950s (Alan Hale, Jr., played the lead); an "insert" shot of its running gear shows up briefly in the movie adaptation of "The Music Man."

Oahu Railroad and Land Company was an unusual railroad in that it had typical narrow-gauge equipment, including a bunch of outside-framed Mikes that would have looked at home in Colorado, but otherwise was more like a main line railroad, complete with a fair amount of double track and a block signal system, and ran in that tropical environment (i.e., palm trees).

Here are some links I found on railroading in the island state:

http://www.american-rails.com/hawaiian-railroads.html

http://www.hawaiianrailway.com/index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oahu_Railw ... nd_Company

http://www.google.com/search?q=Oahu+Rai ... 87&bih=628

http://www.google.com/search?q=Oahu%20R ... a=N&tab=iv

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJPrEXANea8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzvzIKsY ... dded#at=17

http://bucketofbits691.files.wordpress. ... uley21.jpg

http://www.steamlocomotive.info/vlocomo ... isplay=393

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 545&nseq=2

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawaii_Con ... ed_Railway

http://www.tsunami.org/newsletter2.html

http://www.thetrainmuseum.com/history.html

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 348&nseq=0

http://www.google.com/search?q=hawaii+c ... 87&bih=628

Oh, boy, the internet can make you an instant expert--or at least make you look like one until you make a fool of yourself. . .have fun anyway.

Very impressive commuter train. I counted 16 cars before the film cut to palm trees.

Came across this, too--some vintage scenes of the White Pass & Yukon under construction, and a soundtrack by Del McCoury. Sumpter Valley patrons will find it interesting to see one or both of their repatriated locomotives at the end of the clip:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajgGo7u9CQk

Steve -

I was impressed by the length of that train too. And the fact that the cars seemed to all be packed to the gills!

When looking at that particular segment, I also brought up one of the related clips starting with "A horse drawn wagon waiting at at station...." This was REALLY a great clip! The horse drawn wagon was waiting at what appeared to be the lower level of a wooden depot. I am not sure where that was located, but I think that the rest of the clip was definitely Detroit, Toledo & Ironton. It shows a two car open celestory train arriving at a depot with a DT&I boxcar spotted on a siding. The cameraman pans and then cuts his shooting (Grrrr!) because a trolley (Birney?) comes in to his lens from the right. After the trolley apparently leaves, he continues to do his slow pan. Then there is a segment of a meet between two 3 car locals. The Ten-Wheeler on the one train as it leaves is definitely DT&I although I didn't catch the number of the 4-6-0. The segment ends with a train shot from the rear as it transverses a bridge and a very long trestle. Some DT&I afficiando's should be able to identify the locations. And maybe even advise if the two level station in the first segment is, or is not, DT&I.

Les

The mountain railroad footage appears to be the Great Northern on Marias pass. The steam engine seems to be working up the west side. The Milwaukee didn't have diesels in the mountains during WWII (electrified with boxcabs) and the Little Joes didn't show up until the 50's.


Michael Seitz
Missoula MT

Mountain RR segment is Western Pacific in the Feather River Canyon:

1. A-B-B-A FTs in original green-with-yellow-stripes (and red edges to the stripes!) paint scheme.

2. W.P. class 251 or 256 2-8-8-2s on eastbound freights on the 1.0% FRC grades. These were huge oil-burning engines, similar to D&RGW L-131 (#3600-3609) and L-132 (#3610-3619) 2-8-8-2s, and DM&IR 2-8-8-4s. One film sequence shows the shadow of the train on what may be the Keddie Wye bridge.

- Doug Debs