Exhibits

The search for Anna Judah's artwork became a personal journey which revealed Anna Judah as a woman who lived in her own right. Anna was a talented artist and she made a significant contribution to the Transcontinental Railroad through her art. We continue to tell her story.

“When I started my research journey, I had no idea where it would lead. My original search was to find the watercolors and sketches that Anna Judah created in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Her husband, Theodore, invited her to accompany him as he surveyed for the Transcontinental Railroad. But I have discovered so much more!”

-Christine Pifer-Foote, Guest Curator & CSRM Volunteer

After the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad in 1869, many Californians turned to farming the fertile Delta. Ice-cooled railroad cars transported locally grown fruit and produce. The exhibit examines the critical role the railroad played in transporting the Central Valley’s agricultural bounty to the surrounding region, state and nation. The railroad helped to create the foundation for the movement known today as farm-to-fork.

See the original 8x10-foot Thomas Hill painting depicting the ceremony and compare his version of the day to actual photographs. Our visually impaired visitors can personally experience the painting with our three-dimensional depiction of the painting. The California State Railroad Museum is the first museum to offer 3-dimensional artwork west of the Mississippi.

The highlight of the gallery is the 1869 golden spike! It was hidden from public view until 2005, when the California State Railroad Museum acquired it. And don’t miss the golden locket given to Leland Stanford’s sister-in-law, Anna Marie Lathrop. It features a golden spike souvenir made from the original golden spike.

Sefton collected thousands of toy trains during his lifetime, and his family donated his prized collection to the Museum in 2001. Learn how early toy trains evolved from pull and push toys to wind-ups, friction-powered, and live steam and electric toy trains. Whether expert or novice, visitors of all ages will appreciate these remarkable toy trains.

The exhibition also features historic trains and model kits, illustrating the popularity and innovation of the hobby throughout the 20^th-century and into the 21^st with exciting new technology.

The National Model Railroad Association (NMRA) is the oldest and largest scale model railroad organization in the world. Since 1935, the not-for-profit organization has set the standards for the model railroading industry to ensure a smooth operating experience for hobbyists.

Photo courtesy of NMRA.

The Gov. Stanford had the distinction of pulling the Central Pacific’s first excursion train, first revenue freight train (March 25, 1864), and first scheduled passenger train (April 15, 1864). The locomotive also hauled materials for the construction of the Central Pacific over the Sierra Nevada. It was later downgraded from mainline service. From 1873 until its retirement in 1895, the locomotive served as a switcher and fire engine (outfitted with a water pump and hose to extinguish small fires along the track) in the Sacramento area.

The Southern Pacific saved the historic engine from being scrapped in 1895. The Gov. Stanford was refurbished and in 1899 presented to Jane Lathrop Stanford (1828-1905), widow of former California Governor Leland Stanford (1824-1893). She, in turn, donated the engine to Leland Stanford Junior University, where it was placed on display until 1963.

In May, 1963, the locomotive was loaned to the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society for inclusion in its historic railroad equipment collection. Those pieces, including the Gov. Stanford, form the nucleus of the California State Railroad Museum collection.

As the Gov. Stanford aged, parts were replaced or exchanged among similar Central Pacific or Southern Pacific locomotives. The locomotive was also painted numerous times. Reconstruction to its 1860s appearance would literally have destroyed the existing locomotive and resulted in a replica. After careful research, it was therefore decided to refinish the locomotive to its 1899 appearance, the year it was presented to Stanford University.

Today, the Gov. Stanford occupies a prominent place in the Museum’s Sierra Scene diorama, a short distance from where it began its life under steam on the banks of the Sacramento River.

The C. P. Huntington (No. 3 of the Central Pacific) was used in the construction of the transcontinental railroad. In February 1871 it was transferred to the newly reorganized Southern Pacific Railroad and renumbered No. 1. It pulled local passenger trains on the Southern Pacific line between San Francisco, San Jose and Hollister, and was also used on maintenance and construction trains. The locomotive was involved in a head-on collision in 1872 that nearly destroyed it, but was rebuilt in 1875 at the Southern Pacific San Francisco Shops. The C.P. Huntington finished its working career as a weed burner, clearing the track in the 1890s, and was officially retired in 1900.

From 1894 on, the C. P. Huntington became a symbol of Southern Pacific and was widely known from its many appearances in station openings and other railroad-related celebrations. Among its more notable appearances were:

• 1892 California State Fair display by Southern Pacific
• 1894 California Mid-Winter International Exposition
• 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition
• 1922 Days of ’49 Exhibition
• 1922 California State Fair
• 1924 Filming the movie The Iron Horse by Director John Ford
• 1926 Dedication of the new Sacramento depot
• 1930 Opening of the Benicia-Martinez Bridge
• 1934 Chicago Railroad Fair
• 1936 Opening of the Huey P. Long Bridge in New Orleans
• 1939 Opening of the Los Angeles Union Passenger Terminal (last time it was steamed up and operated under its own power); and New York World's Fair
• 1955 Southern Pacific Centennial Celebration
• 1958 Salute to Steam Age
• 1969 Gold Spike Centennial Celebration

In 1964, Southern Pacific donated the engine to the State of California. The C. P. Huntington was placed on display at the old state fairgrounds on Stockton Boulevard, in Sacramento, where it remained until a 1970 refurbishing at Southern Pacific’s Sacramento Shops. In 1979, it was placed in the reconstructed Central Pacific Railroad Passenger Station in Old Sacramento.

The locomotive entered the Museum’s restoration facility in 1980. The Museum decided to restore the locomotive to its appearance when it was refurbished for display at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. The complex, artistic gold leaf striping on the C. P. Huntington is similar to that seen on other nineteenth-century steam locomotives.

The C.P. Huntington is significant nationally as a rare single-drivered locomotive, and the sole surviving standard-gauge 4-2-4 in the U.S. The unique engine is the second oldest locomotive owned by the California State Railroad Museum.

The railroad always faced financial difficulties and by the end of 1879, for reasons unknown, the Sonoma was sold to the Nevada Central Railroad. The Nevada Central ran a narrow-gauge line connecting Austin, then Nevada’s second largest city, with the Central Pacific Railroad at Battle Mountain.

Nevada Central renamed the locomotive General J. H. Ledlie and renumbered it NC No. 5. It performed mixed duty as a yard, construction, and road engine. When the bankrupt company was abandoned in 1938, the engine was still in service. Acquired by Nevada Central General Manager J. M. Hiskey, the 4-4-0 was loaned to the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society’s Pacific Coast Chapter.

On December 15, 1938, the Sonoma was taken to the Southern Pacific shops in Berkeley, where it was extensively repaired and restored to an “old-time” appearance. By February 18, 1939, the Sonoma had been outfitted to resemble Central Pacific’s No. 60 Jupiter for its appearance in the re-enactment of the completion of the transcontinental railroad, part of the daily performance of Cavalcade of the Golden West at the Golden Gate International Exposition, on San Francisco’s Treasure Island. The following year the Sonoma participated in the Exposition’s revised presentation “America! Cavalcade of a Nation.”

In October, 1940, the Sonoma completed its service on Treasure Island and was placed in storage in the San Francisco Bay Area where it remained until moved to the California State Railroad Museum in 1977. The engine was donated to the Museum in 1978 by the J. M. Hiskey family.

The Sonoma has been restored to its as-built appearance, utilizing Baldwin drawings and specifications. It pulls a narrow-gauge passenger train in the Museum’s Great Hall.

Deluged with business, the V&T found itself without an adequate number of steam locomotives and passenger cars to handle the increase in traffic. Superintendent Yerington solicited the Central Pacific and Union Pacific Railroads for surplus engines and was able to rent several CP American-type locomotives on a monthly basis. This solution was only temporary however, and Yerington reluctantly concluded that the railroad needed additional motive power.

Locomotive No. 13 was delivered to the V&T in February of 1873. Empire was an appropriate namesake: Empire City, located three miles east of Carson City, was an important territorial town and station on the Overland Route, and site of several cord wood yards and ore reduction mills. The engine quickly entered freight service on the line from Virginia City to Carson City and Reno. From the late 1880s to 1902, as frantic traffic conditions abated, the V&T held No. 13 in reserve. With an upswing in the economy, the No. 13 received a major overhaul and was once again placed in regular freight service. In 1910, the Carson City shops converted the Empire from wood to fuel oil. Because V&T engine crews considered No. 13 an unlucky number, the number was changed to V&T second No. 15 at this time.

The locomotive was placed in storage and retired in 1918 because of declining business on the V&T. It was sold in 1924 to the Pacific Portland Cement Company of Gerlach, Nevada, where it saw service as PPC Co. switcher No. 501 until 1931. In 1938, the Empire was donated to the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society and moved to the San Francisco Bay Area. There it remained until 1966 when it underwent a cosmetic restoration at Bethlehem Steel Corporation’s San Francisco shipbuilding yards.

In 1976, the locomotive moved into the newly-reconstructed Central Pacific Railroad Passenger Station in Old Sacramento. A total restoration effort by the Museum began two years later. The tender was stripped, rust and holes filled, and it was repainted in original V&T colors. The trucks were cleaned and repainted, and new brake beams of oak were added. Except for a single end timber, the tender frame was replaced.

The locomotive was stripped to its driving wheels, frame and boiler. A new brass steam dome wrapper and simulated Russian iron boiler jacket was fabricated and installed, as was a new Baldwin Yankee-style smokestack. A new cab made of ash, as on the original engine, and numerous small fittings reconstructed from period photographs and drawings brought the locomotive close to completion. In a final step, craftsmen repainted the locomotive in the original V&T colors, complete with gold-leaf striping.

Since 1981, the Empire has been displayed surrounded by mirrors where visitors can appreciate all aspects of 1870s locomotive construction.

By 1873, the year the Genoa was completed, the 4-4-0 had reached a mature design with calculated proportions, improved details, a graceful appearance, and an elegance and effectiveness which remained unchanged for nearly a quarter of a century.

The Virginia & Truckee Railroad Company was organized in Nevada on March 5, 1868, to connect the Comstock ore-producing mines with quartz-reduction mills located along the Carson River, approximately three miles east of Carson City. The twenty-one mile standard-gauge line between Carson City and Virginia City was completed on January 29, 1870. A thirty-one mile extension south from Reno to Carson City through Franktown, Washoe City, and Steamboat Springs connected the Comstock with the Central Pacific Railroad in August 1872. An extension from Carson City to Minden was completed in August 1906.

The wood-burning Genoa was outshopped in January of 1873 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works of Philadelphia. For nearly thirty years No. 12 hauled passenger, mixed and freight trains for the Virginia & Truckee Railroad between Carson City, Virginia City, Minden and Reno, Nevada.

Early Virginia & Truckee engineers liked to operate the Genoa, believing her to be one of the fastest of the railroad’s original twenty-four steam locomotives. For this reason, it saw considerable duty on special and excursion trains. When requisitioned for freight service, the Genoa easily handled up to seven of the Virginia & Truckee’s fully loaded wooden freight cars.

Shop wipers worked at 25 cents per hour for ten-hour days to polish brass fittings and keep V&T locomotives sparkling. The Virginia & Truckee took great pride in its maintenance procedures, and the passenger locomotives in particular received special attention. By 1902, the paint scheme of locomotives on the Virginia & Truckee and most other railroads, had been simplified considerably with black replacing the bright colors of earlier years. Even then, the Genoa retained most of her brass trim and V&T crews continued to provide careful maintenance and cleaning.

By 1908, passenger service had declined to a point where the locomotive was no longer needed for revenue service. On December 31, 1908, No. 12 was retired to a stall in the Carson City engine house. As she had run only 3,246 miles since her last overhaul, she was stored in prime operating condition.

The locomotive remained in storage until 1939 when, after sale to the Eastern Railroads Presidents’ Conference, it left for the East Coast to begin a two-year career in excursion and display service. The Genoa was modified to represent Central Pacific’s No. 60 Jupiter for performances in the Golden Spike scene at the pageant “Railroads on Parade” during the New York World’s Fair (1939-1940). It also operated at the Chicago Railroad Fair in 1948. After the Chicago fair, ownership was transferred to the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society which in turn presented the locomotive to the State of California in 1969.

The Genoa, painted as the Central Pacific Jupiter, operated under steam at the 1969 ceremony at Promontory, Utah, marking the 100^th anniversary of the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. Facing the Genoa/Jupiter was Virginia & Truckee locomotive No. 11 Reno dressed up as Union Pacific No. 119. After the ceremony these locomotives were replaced with Virginia & Truckee No. 22 Inyo as the Jupiter, and No. 18 Dayton as Union Pacific No. 119 on static display.

After its last wood-fired operation under steam in May 1979 at the California State Railroad Museum, the Genoa was restored to its 1902 appearance. It is displayed in the Great Hall of the Museum of Railroad History, pulling Virginia & Truckee combination car No. 16 across an 1884 Phoenix Bridge Company cast-iron railroad bridge.

During the late 1970s when the Museum staff was researching and assembling artifacts for the Museum of Railroad History, the full-size equipment collection lacked a dining car or other food-service car to interpret one of the most memorable images of classic long-distance passenger train travel. The Museum staff were delighted to find former Santa Fe diner No. 1474 named Cochiti for sale at $7,500 in Tea, South Dakota. The car was built for the Santa Fe Super Chief, judged by many to offer the ultimate in fine dining. The Cochiti was the first in a long line of lightweight Santa Fe dining cars which were the pride of the line, noted for custom menus and fine quality meals prepared by trained chefs.

The 36-seat Cochiti was ordered by Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway in April 1936, one in a set of eight cars for a new streamlined stainless steel train – the once a week first class Super Chief running between Chicago and Los Angeles. One year earlier, Santa Fe had introduced a new Super Chief schedule of only 39 hours, 45 minutes between Los Angeles and Chicago using diesel-electric locomotives and heavyweight steel passenger cars. Santa Fe’s first lightweight stainless steel coach received in January 1936 was followed three months later by an order for a completely lightweight Super Chief from the Edward G. Budd Manufacturing Company of Philadelphia. Received in April 1937, the eight-car Super Chief began regular service a month later and quickly became the premier train in the system.

All of the cars for this new Santa Fe train were named for Southwest Indian pueblos or tribes: Isleta, Laguna, Acoma. The Cochiti was named for an old Indian-Spanish pueblo which surrounded the mission San Buenaventura de Cochiti, located on the Rio Grande river about 30 miles southwest of Santa Fe and north of Albuquerque, New Mexico. The pueblo dates back more than 700 years. Even today, its population remains largely Native American.

Santa Fe spared no expense on its new train. A team of designers and architects carefully decorated each car. Most interior walls were covered with “Flexwood” panels – a 1/85th-inch thick wood veneer applied to Masonite panels. Exotic woods were used throughout the train as were custom woven Indian-design carpets, upholstery, Art Deco ceiling lighting fixtures and other special touches. The Cochiti originally featured Bubinga wood and chocolate brown moldings with a flesh-colored ceiling. The chairs were burnt-orange leather; the carpet was brick-red and ebony. The railroad commissioned Mary Coulter to design new china for the Cochiti with distinctive designs inspired by ancient pottery makers of the Rio Mimbres Valley in New Mexico. Named Mimbreno, this china remained a trademark of the Super Chief for more than 30 years.

A meal in the Cochiti was a gourmet experience. Presiding over the Cochiti cuisine was 51-year old Peter Tausch, a trusted steward trained in the tradition of Fred Harvey to provide fine dining service aboard Santa Fe dining cars. On the Super Chief’s maiden run on May 18, 1937, the Cochiti’s menu included sirloin steak for two for $2.75, Swordfish Steak Saute for 75 cents, Poached Tranche of Salmon for 70 cents, and Old Fashion Boneless Chicken Pie for 85 cents.

As years went by, newer dining cars ultimately replaced the Cochiti and the car lost its initial special assignment and decor. By the fall of 1946, the Cochiti was in dining car service on the first section of Santa Fe’s California Limited between Chicago and Los Angeles. During the mid 50s, the car was in operation during the summer months for special Chicago-Grand Canyon-Los Angeles tours. The Cochiti’s original “Flexwood” veneer was replaced early on by more easily maintained painted color schemes favoring the southwest. Still, Santa Fe’s standards were high and the AT&SF dining car pool was well maintained throughout its life. Not until its final years in service was the Cochiti’s seating capacity expanded from its original comfortable 36 to a more crowded 46. In 1968, the Cochiti was finally retired and sent to join hundreds of other out-of-service Santa Fe passenger cars stored in Marceline, Missouri. Having easily served more than a million meals over the course of its 31 years of service, the Cochiti’s Santa Fe career had finally ended.

In the summer of 1968, Wayne Kerslake and his father canvassed the Santa Fe’s cars at Marceline to identify equipment for possible use in a stationary railroad-themed restaurant in South Dakota. Two years later the Kerslakes selected the Cochiti for its good condition from among more than two dozen AT&SF diners along with several other pieces at Marceline. Years of preparation ensued. The car was relocated to Tea, South Dakota. Most of the diner’s underframe equipment was removed and the heating and air conditioning system re-plumbed. Unfortunately the restaurant was not successful. After six months of operation in 1977, the venture closed and the equipment was placed on sale. Invoiced to the California State Railroad Museum effective September 21, 1978 for $7,000, the Cochiti was moved west by Burlington Northern along with recently donated Great Northern Railway Post Office Car No. 42. For the next decade, the dining car would remain among the Museum’s stored full-size equipment.

With a generous gift from William R. and Barbara C. Breuner, the Museum began research on the Cochiti in 1989. Over the next several years, miracles were worked as rust, corrosion and fatigue were discovered and painstakingly removed. In the hands of artisans, many of the adverse effects of Santa Fe modifications and a decade of storage in South Dakota were removed. After considerable consultation, Museum staff selected a mid-1940s restoration period for the car which was consistent with the Cochiti’s condition and general arrangement. Archeological evidence confirmed a basic salmon interior color which was carefully masked and reapplied late in 1993.

Today the Cochiti sparkles as it did in the 1940s while in service on the Santa Fe’s Super Chief. One table for four is replete in appropriate Mimbreno-pattern china while the other tables offer an opportunity to examine china settings from the Museum’s collections.

Christened the Silver State for the Nevada state motto, the coach saw irregular service as a first-class car on the Nevada Central until the early 1900s when it was placed in storage at Battle Mountain. When the railroad was abandoned in early 1938, the car was donated to the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society. It appeared at the Golden Gate International Exposition in 1939 and 1940 lettered as Central Pacific for the daily pageants depicting the 1869 Gold Spike ceremony. From 1940 until 1977, No. 3 remained in storage in the Bay Area.

In 1969, the Silver State was donated to the State of California for future display in the Railroad Museum. Restoration efforts began in February 1977. The coach was examined and thoroughly documented for restoration to its 1881 appearance. New exterior wood was applied, worn parts replaced, and all colors matched to the original paint. The oil-painted headlining cloths, brittle with age, were fully replicated by hand on fine linen canvas. The original ceiling cloths have been removed and preserved by the Museum. The interior walls proved particularly interesting: they are embellished with an intricate pattern of birds and flowers. Remnants of the designs appeared while the walls were being sanded and were restored to their period appearance. Elaborate multi-color floral brocade seat upholstery replaced the worn floral mohair plush material. All hardware in the car was re-plated with silver to match the original finish which is typical of an 1870s/1880s passenger car.

The Silver State appears on the main floor of the Railroad Museum as part of a typical 1880s narrow-gauge passenger train pulled by North Pacific Coast steam locomotive No. 12, the Sonoma.

The idea of shipping fruit and vegetables as well, quickly caught on. In 1887, there were 2,200 shipments of citrus from California and, by 1893, that number had more than doubled. California growers were no longer restricted to local markets and, as a result, the agricultural industry expanded until California became the number one farm state in America. In 1924, when this refrigerator car was built, more than 150,000 similar cars were in service.

Refrigerator cars could not operate efficiently without an elaborate support system. Icing stations had to be located at regular intervals, railroad scheduling had to be reliable so that trains would reach the icing stations before the ice melted, and a dependable marketing system had to be in operation so that the most perishable produce would not rot on the loading docks. Most railroads were slow to recognize the significant profit to be made with refrigerator cars. Initially, private companies owned the reefers and contracted with the railroads to haul them, operating “fruit blocks,” special trains consisting entirely of refrigerator cars carrying perishables. These trains were given priority over most other traffic. Eventually most railroads purchased their own refrigerator cars or formed refrigerator car subsidiaries with other railroads.

The most successful private refrigerator car company was the Armour Car Lines, including its subsidiary, the Fruit Growers Express. Though their success led to their downfall as, in 1919, the Federal Trade Commission ordered the sale of the produce hauling subsidiary for antitrust reasons. A group of eastern and southern railroads formed a new Fruit Growers Express Company in 1920 to take over the operations. By 1926, FGE had expanded service into the Pacific Northwest and the Midwest through its partly owned cooperating subsidiaries, Western Fruit Express and Burlington Fruit Express. FGE refrigerator car No. 35832 was built in the Company’s Indiana Harbor shops in 1924. It was designated a type RS car which is the Association of American Railroads’ abbreviation for a refrigerator car using ice, or ice and salt in combination to cool the load space. The steel-framed wood-sheathed car operated for thirty-eight years in general railroad service until its retirement in 1962.

The car was sold to the Rainier Ice and Cold Storage Company of Seattle, Washington and subsequently purchased by the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society for $1,500 in 1973. The Chapter reconditioned the car at a cost of $14,367.51 and donated it to the California State Railroad Museum in 1974. The Museum restored the reefer to its 1938 appearance to represent a typical refrigerator car of the 1920s to 1940s.

Fruit Growers Express Company refrigerator car No. 35832 is displayed in the Museum’s Great Hall beside an icing platform. Museum visitors may enter the car, where an audio-visual program tells the story of refrigerator cars and their influence on the development of California’s agriculture.

The St. Hyacinthe was assigned to trains in central Canada during its early years of service. In 1936 an ice-activated air conditioning system was installed. Fortunately for the Museum, the car escaped the Canadian National’s modernization of the early 1950s. During its last fifteen years of service, the sleeper was generally assigned to trains running through the cooler region between Montreal and the Atlantic Coast because of its older cooling system. Open section sleepers with aisle-curtained upper and lower berths became less popular with passengers who preferred the privacy of roomettes and bedrooms.

After retirement in 1971, the sleeping car was purchased for scrap value by the Pacific Coast Chapter of the Railway & Locomotive Historical Society. It was presented to the California State Railroad Museum in 1980. The exterior of the St. Hyacinthe has been restored by the Museum to its appearance during the late 1940s. Because it was not possible to completely replicate the interior decor of that period, the interior reflects a somewhat later era: the early 1950s.

The St. Hyacinthe is displayed in the Museum as a typical sleeping car traveling at night: a mechanical device built by the Museum rocks the car to simulate motion, berths are made-up, a lone passenger is sound asleep in his compartment, and lights of passing towns and grade crossings flash by the windows. A soundtrack simulates the typical night sounds of a fast-traveling heavyweight passenger train: the rhythmic clicking of the wheels, the distant whistle of the locomotive, and the descending Doppler effect of passing crossing bells.