Changes

Two years ago in early November I started a blog journey that now must undergo some changes. (On another note, who knows how this election day may develop.  We may see changes in our country as well.)

During a trainwatching session in Vancouver, Wash. in 2010, a fellow railfan remarked that he missed the SD40-2s.  He was probably 20-30 years younger than me, so had been too young for the heyday of EMD products that once dominated America's rails.

I had recently neared the end of a year-long project of scanning most of my older film negatives and slides, some extending back into the 1960s and 1970s. Over that time span, I scanned more than 6,000 photos, nearly all of them centered around railroads.  Most were from the early 1990s when I got reacquainted with trains. It seemed like I should share my wealth with those younger railfans who had missed the heyday of SD40-2s and with the older people who could remember them.

Those were heady days.  Southern Pacific had recently been purchased by the Denver, Rio Grande & Western Railroad.  After years of languish due to the ill effects of a prohibited merger with the Santa Fe, traffic started increasing.  The new SP, as it was called, desparately needed power.  So lots of older SD45s, GP40s and the like from Chessie, B & O and other eastern railroads started showing up in the Pacific Northwest.  Even the UP and BN yards in the Portland-Vancouver area saw frequent foreign power with CP, Grand Trunk, Conrail, CSX and Norfolk Southern present.  The last of the U-boats were still around on the BN as well.

Two shots from the early 1990s that I previously posted on this blog are shown above.

Starting in 1992, I was fortunate to obtain a job with a trucking company located between the SP's Brooklyn Yard/engine facility and Tri-Met's main garage.  New, weirdly painted units (at least to a UP or BN oriented railfan) showed up daily.

I was able to travel quite a bit, being newly single.  So California, here I came.  Columbia Gorge, Willamette Pass, Boise for the Morrison-Knudsen shops, Tri-Cities for the BN, and Canada for the CP and CN were frequent destinations.  In 1994, I started taking trips east to visit relatives in Michigan.  Some of these were by train, some were by car.  But I was able to railfan Chicago before the mergers and heightened security of the post-merger and post-911 eras.

Power abounded in the 1990s.  Since the most common locomotive was the SD40-2 at 3,000 hp operating on DC current, even the shorter trains sported 4-5 locomotives.  BN especially, was not shy about using GP39-2s on regional runs like garbage trains.  It was not unusual to see 3, 4, 5, even 6 Geeps pulling a train.

So on Nov. 6, 2010, I started a Google Blogspot page, posting at least one picture every day.  Over these past two years, I probably published 750 different photos, many of unique locomotives.  They ranged from "dinkies" (small industrial locomotives) to 6,000 hp GEs and EMDs.  Locations ranged from Pennsylvania to Indiana, to Arkansas to Arizona to California and all other the Pacific Northwest.

Times certainly have changed the past two years.  I've plumbed the depths of my files; the remainder of the photos are duplicates or shots without much interest even to me. Other outlets, such as Facebook, are available for publishing photos.

Recently I've come across Tumblr.  In my test usages, I like it much better.  Photos are displayed sequentially.  No header is required for a post.  All the photos are on display at one time.  Updates are easier to prepare & post. It seems more oriented toward photography.

I'm also ready to move beyond historical postings.  For years, I didn't take many photographs.  I had worked in newspapers for nearly 20 years, which burned me out on photography.  Other activites, like getting remarried, moving into a new house, adding grandchildren to the family, etc. took up time I once spent with a camera.  Besides, with the mergers between 1996 to 2001, everything started looking the same.

Culling my photo files and posting everyday reawoke my urge to use the camera more often. 

So, starting soon, all my photos will appear here on a page I'll call "photoeye": http://www.pdxrailfan.tumblr.com/

I'll keep this blog active as a photo storage source and as a fallback in case tumblr doesn't pan out. Also two years ago I started a sister site called "Photo Memories" for non-railroad stuff.  Within a couple of weeks, both Blogspot sites will be merged into the new Tumblr site. The new site will see new postings only when something really unique or new or interesting gets photographed. It won't always be rail oriented, but it will be the best I can produce at the time. 

If you've checked these sites over the past two years, thanks for viewing.  Hopefully, you'll follow me to the new location.