Thursday, November 29, 2018

Links to Sources for Books Listed in the Bibliography


Many of the books I used as references are listed in the bibliography, and most of these are still in print or available on the used book market for those who wish to learn more. Below are links to locations online where these are available for purchase.

I have listed the sources in order of my purchasing recommendations. Railroad historical groups are listed first, as proceeds from sales support their various preservation efforts. Publishers are listed next for those books still in print. Next comes Powell's Books, an independent, new and used bookseller located in Portland OR, and finally, of course, Amazon.com. And, if you can't find what you're looking for, there's always e-(buyer beware)-Bay.

Disclaimer: I cannot assume any responsibility for any title's availability or condition at any of the listed sources. Shop at your own risk.



Asay, J., Union Pacific Northwest: The History of the Oregon-Washington Railroad and Navigation Co., 2nd ed., (Cheyenne, WY: Union Pacific Historical Society, 2014)

Austin, E., Spokane Portland & Seattle in Color: Diesels of the Northwest’s Own Railway (Flemington, NJ: Morning Sun Books, 2007)

Austin, E., and Dill, T., S.P. & S.: the Spokane, Portland, & Seattle Railway (Edmonds, WA: Pacific Fast Mail, 1996)

Beach, P. F. “Highballing the Palouse and Lewiston Branch,” in The Mainstreeter, Summer 2007

Beach, P. F., Wheat Country Railroad: The Northern Pacific’s Spokane & Palouse and its Competitors (Pullman, WA: Washington State University Press, 2018)

Burg, T. E., White Pine Route: The History of the Washington, Idaho and Montana Railway Company, (Coeur d’Alene, ID: Museum of North Idaho, 2003)
           WI&M Ry. HPG Company Store
           Powell’s
           Amazon

Carter, C., Inland Empire Electric Line: Spokane to Coeur d’Alene and the Palouse (Coeur d’Alene, ID: Museum of North Idaho, 2009)

Clemens, D. R., “The Camas Prairie, Part Two” in Railfan, February, 1978
(no longer available from publisher, search online for a used copy)

Derleth, A., The Milwaukee Road: Its First Hundred Years (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2002)

Ehernberger, J. L., and Gschwind, F. G., Smoke Along the Columbia (Callaway, NE: E&G Publications, 1968)
Powell’s – Union Pacific Steam Northwestern District (Includes both Smoke Along the Columbia and Smoke Down the Canyons in a single title)

Entze, M. A. “Hometown Geeps: Union Pacific’s 2000s and the Northwestern District Branch Empire” in The Streamliner, Autumn 2014

Entze, M. A. “Marengo, Washington: Forgotten Junction of the Union Pacific and Milwaukee Road” in The Streamliner, Summer 2013

Fahey, J., Shaping Spokane: Jay P. Graves and His Times (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1994)

Grande, W. R., The Northwest’s Own Railway: Spokane, Portland & Seattle Railway and its Subsidiaries, Vol. 1 (Portland, OR: Grande Press, 1992)

Holley, N. T., The Milwaukee Electrics, 2nd ed., (Edmonds, WA: Hundman Publishing, 1999)

Kooistra, B., and Entze, M., “Walla Walla Valley: 1968” in Trains, December 2004

Leachman, R., Northwest Passage: Twenty-Five Years of the Burlington Northern in the Pacific Northwest (Edmonds, WA: Hundman Publishing, 1998)

Lentzner, J., “Washington Division in Twilight” in The Milwaukee Railroader, 1st Qtr. 2003
(This issue out of stock at MRHA, search online for a used copy)

Lewty, P. J., To the Columbia Gateway: The Oregon Railway and the Northern Pacific, 1879-1884 (Pullman, WA: Washington State University Press, 1987);

Lewty, P. J., Across the Columbia Plain: Railroad Expansion in the Interior Northwest, 1885-1893 (Pullman, WA: Washington State University Press, 1995)

Meinig, D. W., The Great Columbia Plain: A Historical Geography, 1805-1910, 2nd ed. (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995)

Petersen, K. C., Company Town: Potlatch, Idaho, and the Potlatch Lumber Company (Pullman, WA: Washington State University Press, 1995)

Priest, Dr. C., The Union Pacific Diesel, Vol. 1, Dieselization-1959 (Kansas City, MO: Paired Rail Railroad Publication, Ltd., 1999)

Renz, L. T., The History of the Northern Pacific Railroad (Fairfield, WA: Ye Galleon Press, 1980)

Riegger, H., The Camas Prairie: Idaho’s Railroad on Stilts (Edmonds, WA: Pacific Fast Mail, 1996)

Schrenk, L. P. and Frey, R. L., Northern Pacific Railway: Diesel Era, 1945-1970 (San Marino, CA: Golden West Books, 1995)

Shontz, J., “Malden, Washington: The Rise and Fall of a Milwaukee Road Town” in The Milwaukee Railroader, 4th Qtr. 2017. Pp. 4-13

Stauss, W. F., The Milwaukee Road in Color, Vol. 5: Pacific Extension 1941-1961 (Flemington, NJ: Morning Sun Books, 2008)

Sullivan, T., “The Camas Prairie, Part One” in Railfan, December 1977
(no longer available from publisher, search online for a used copy)

Waite, T., and Streamliner Staff, “Union Pacific Hub-and-Spoke Train Operations in Eastern Washington” in The Streamliner, Winter 2001, pp. 28–35

Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Errata: The Ainsworth-Wallula Connection, Pages 10 and 22

On page 10, my text creates some confusion over which railroad originally built the line connecting South Ainsworth with Wallula, and at which of those two points interchange between the Northern Pacific and the Oregon Railway & Navigation Co. actually took place. It turns out I was confused myself about these points, so I took another look at my sources including Jeff Asay's Union Pacific Northwest and Peter J. Lewty's To the Columbia Gateway: The Oregon Railway and the Northern Pacific, 1879-1884.

Wallula was the western terminal of Dr. Baker's Walla Walla & Columbia River RR, where freight and passengers to and from Portland were transferred to the steamboats of the OR&N. In early 1880, Henry Villard and Hans Thielsen initiated construction of the OR&N's new railroad to Portland at Wallula.

At this same time, the Northern Pacific had established Ainsworth on the north bank of the Snake River, right where the Snake empties into the Columbia River. From here, NP forces were constructing its transcontinental line eastward to meet up with crews working west through North Dakota and Montana.

(Click the linked caption for either map to view a larger version)

Wallula Rail Lines circa 1918
Villard negotiated with the NP to reach an agreement in October 1880 that the NP would interchange freight and passengers with the OR&N at Wallula. Shortly after signing this agreement, the NP sent contractors across the Snake to begin building a line south to Wallula. The terminal point on the Snake would be known as South Ainsworth.

According to Mr. Lewty, the NP built this line as narrow-gauge to match the 3-foot gauge of the WW&CR and the OR&N line running west from Wallula. This makes a deal of sense, since freight would need to be barged across the Snake until a proper railroad ferry, and later a bridge, could be implemented, so it really wouldn't matter whether the gauges matched.

Although the Northern Pacific built the South Ainsworth-Wallula connection, OR&N trains operated the line while it was still narrow gauge. But, once the line was re-gauged (along with the Walla Walla-Wallula-Umatilla line) in May 1881 and the Ainsworth railroad ferry established in July 1881, NP crews took over. Also, the NP constructed a small yard and engine terminal at Wallula where OR&N-NP interchange took place. Wallula would also soon serve as the jumping off point for branches to Walla Walla and Pendleton, built by George Hunt's Oregon & Washington Territory RR but soon acquired by the NP.

A few years later, after the OR&N had been reorganized as the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Co., the ORR&N built its new Yakima Branch parallel to the NP line for several miles until turning west and crossing the Columbia River to Hedges, near Kennewick.

Wallula Rail Lines circa 1955
Also, to clarify the story on page 22:

Upon completion of McNary Dam near Umatilla in the early 1950s, the original Wallula yards and much of the connecting tracks were submerged in its back pool. The NP, Oregon-Washington Railway & Navigation Co. (as its parent road, Union Pacific, had re-named it in 1910), and the US Army Corps of Engineers cooperated to re-configure Wallula. The NP line remained in place for much of its length, being relocated to a higher elevation only as the tracks approached the new Wallula.

Union Pacific trains received trackage rights on the NP line north of Wallula as far as a new Villard Junction, where UP's Yakima Branch joined in. South of Wallula, UP trains also ran on NP trackage rights as far as Zangar Jct., where the UP continued east to Walla Walla and the NP south to Pendleton.

Today, BNSF owns and operates the branch from Pasco yard to Wallula, where BNSF trains then travel east to Ayer on the UP mainline for interchange with the Great Northwest Railroad. UP trains still have trackage rights as far as Villard Jct.

Friday, November 2, 2018

Maps, Part 2

In another attempt to assist readers of Palouse Rails: Granger Railroads of the Inland Northwest, here is a series of view-able maps covering each of the railroads that are the subjects of the book. Click on the link below each image, and a second window will open to the full-size image in my Flickr account. See the bottom of this page for notes regarding the maps.








Note: the source map for most of the lines in question is a 1906 ORR&N promotional map from my collection. The darker black lines are those of the ORR&N, while other lines are shown as smaller black lines. Since some of the lines addressed in the book were not in place when this map was first published, I have attempted to show their approximate location relative to the lines that are included on the map.

Links to Sources for Books Listed in the Bibliography

Many of the books I used as references are listed in the bibliography, and most of these are still in print or available on the used book ...