Describes the construction, development, passenger operations, and history of the Southern Pacific Railroad's Shasta Route, which links Portland, Oregon, to San Francisco

Rails in the Shadow of Mt. Shasta: 100 Years of Railroading Along Southern Pacific's Shasta Division

Signor, John R.

Business & Money

Howell-North Books

Tehachapi, Southern Pacific - Santa Fe

Travel

Reference

Golden West Books

Southern Pacific's Sierra Crossing John R. Signor 8½x11 - Hardbound, 290 pages, 492 illustrations, maps, profiles, bibliography, and index. This volume presents all you ever wanted to know about Southern Pacific's rail passage over California's Donner Pass. At the summit, over 90 feet of snow falls annually. Everything about the Sierra crossing was monumental: the grade, the locomotives required to lift the trains over the Sierra, the helper locomotives, the tonnage handled, and those unique snowsheds that protected the tracks from the record snowfall and rock slides.

Donner Pass: Southern Pacific's Sierra Crossing

Engineering & Transportation

Transportation

Fascinating history of the Southern Pacific's lines in Mexico, detailing the construction and operation of the Southern Pacific of Mexico (the Ferrocarril Sud Pacifico de Mexico) and its West Coast Route (the Ruta de la Costa Occidental) which stretched 1094 miles from Nogales to Guadalajara. The American capitalists and Mexican politicians who combined forces to build this railroad system -- men such as Collis P. Huntington, William Barstow Strong, E. H. Harriman, Porfirio Diaz, Venustiano Carranza, Alvaro Obregon -- are brought vividly to life as the railroad struggled through revolution, banditry, tremendous engineering feats and sharp economic disappointments. Covers the railroad through the takeover by the Mexican government in 1951 and the major upgrading that occurred thereafter. The author also provides a very interesting look at the SP practices that continued to influence the railroad even as late as 1986. Illustrated throughout with black and white photos. With all-time roster of the railroad and associated lines, 9 maps, route profile, and bibliography. End papers show system map. 168 pages with index.

The Southern Pacific of Mexico and the West Coast Route

Kirchner, John A.

Fascinating and lavishly illustrated history of the Los Angles and Salt Lake Railroad, the Union Pacific's Salt Lake Route. The author, a noted railroad historian, traces the line from its origins as the San Pedro, Los Angeles &amp; Salt Lake Railroad under Sen. William A. Clark. The book provides a detailed look at the construction of this and predecessor lines, the extension into Utah's Tintic mining district, construction across the great Amercian desert, trackage rights from the Santa Fe over Cajon Pass, purchase of the Los Angeles Terminal, and establishment of the famed Los Angeles Limited. E. H. Harriman's role in obtaining a 50% interest in the line and the eventual merger into UP are described, as are the battles with floods in the Meadow Valley Was and Afton Canyon, freight and passenger operations, dispatching and signaling problems, early dieselizatin due to water shortages, the Mission style stations, tunnels, bridges, shops and physical plant. Also covered are service to Zion, Bryce, Cedar Breaks and the Grand Canyon, development of the desert helper district, the discovery of oil on Terminal Island, the coming of the streamliners, branch line operations, electrification of the Glendale line, the effect of World War II, and the arrival of CTC, piggyback and container service, and the Day Live Stock service. All the locomotives are on view -- steam and diesels of every kind, Centennials, U-50s, SD-40s and experimental turbines. including Illustrated throughout with black and white photos and a few color photos. With numerous maps, timetables. 256 pages.

The Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad Company: Union Pacific's Historical Salt Lake Route

From its origins in the 1870s, through its completion in 1901 and its flowering in the late 1930s, to its ultimate development in the years after World War II, Southern Pacific's Coast Line between San Francisco and Los Angeles is an historic rail route. And it is more than that: it is regional history, it is geography, it is freight as well as passenger trains, and it is people, the people who did the railroad's work, those who lived along the line, and those who rode the trains. With roots in the time of the padres, the Coast Line fostered development of towns, agriculture and industry, and the social fabric of the region itself. Accordingly, any history of the Coast Line is also in part a history of California. 
 John R. Signor, well-known for six previous books on western railroads and in particular Southern Pacific, has drawn on many historical sources, including the extensive files of the railroad itself, to produce this outstanding history. Liberally illustrated with hundreds of photographs, many unpublished, and with railroad graphics and ephemera, the book also includes the author's own fine maps. 
 This outstanding treatment of the Coast Line is a welcome and very fitting addition to the history and lore of this part of the Southern Pacific railroad. It will also enrich one's understanding of the history of California and the West.

Southern Pacific's Coast Line

Signature Press

Southern Pacific Lines - Pacific Lines Stations, Vol. 3: Shasta Division, Tucson Division, Western Division, Northwestern Pacific, San Diego & Arizona Eastern

the Southern Pacific Historical and Technical Society

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Books by Signor, John R.