Ran across this photo recently on the ABPR. Were some GS-class 4-8-4s of the SP painted from Daylight colors to black before the skirting was removed? Previously, I had only seen them in black with skirts removed.


bobyar2001@yahoo.com

> Ran across this photo recently on the ABPR.

It is a very tiny photo showing a white with red "X" livery - don't recall a GS-4 like that with or without skirting.


shawsinoly@aol.com

Yep - you may recall Doyle McCormack mentioning that there are a very few photos of GS engines (including, if I remember, one of 4449 itself) with skirts in black. They didn't last long that way.

When it comes to GS-class engines, there's probably a prototype for everything.

JAC

Many of the GS class on the Oregon Division were black with skirts. The reason behind this was the amount of tunnels in southern Oregon and northern California made the Daylight colors to hard to keep clean. Also, if I remember correctly, the streamlined "Shasta Daylight" was introduced as deisel powered.

We have an "in service" picture of the 4449 in black skirts in the tool car so we can say, "see, it was this way before!" It's hard to argue with a picture!

I'd still like to find a picture of the 4449 having no skirts, black pilot, but Daylight cab and tender. I think this scheme is somewhere in our "20 year plan" file. I think the only GS I've seen in this scheme is the 4444.

Smokebox

> It is a very tiny photo showing a white with
> red "X" livery - don't recall a
> GS-4 like that with or without skirting.

Will try again. If it doesn't work. look at the ABPR site for 11/23/01.

http://www.railfan.net/cgi-bin/thumb/abprphoto.cgi?/railpix/ABPR/november01/11-23-01/SP4410_00016047.jpg
bobyar2001@yahoo.com

I have seen several photos of GS-2 and GS-3s' (especially) on Oregon Div. trains with skirting and painted black. Probably due to number of tunnels on Shasta and Oregon Div. I personally recall seeing a GS-4 or two in black with skirting in the 1950s' in Indio, Ca. See "A Century of Southern Pacific Steam Locomotives" by the late Guy Dunscomb.


edwinsinclair@hotmail.com

It's possible that the locomotives that you've seen in black without the skirting were GS-6 locomotives. These were the very last batch of SP Northerns, and were built black without skirting in the first place. They were much the same as GS-4s, vut with 74" drivers, larger boilers, and no mars light. Built late in the war, they were more austere and functional than their brethren. (They may truly have lived up to the "General Service" reclassification that SP undertook to get permission to build the locomotives. Previously GS had stood for "Golden State.")

Sincerely,

David Ackerman

david_ackerman@yahoo.com