This past weekend was consumed by the 2014 edition of the
Espee in Oregon meets. Organized
by notable railfan and modeler Rod Loder, these meets have been a great place
to meet with rail buffs of similar interest (the Southern Pacific in
Oregon!!!). This year’s meet
focused on the Tillamook Branch and the northern end of the Westside Line
(Newberg, McMinnville, Forest Grove).
The meet featured a train excursion on Thursday, a paper mill tour and
layout tours on Friday, and an all-day meet with informative presentations on
Saturday.
Thursday’s excursion was conducted by the Oregon Coast
Scenic Railroad using Tillamook Branch tracks from Garibaldi to
Salmonberry. The Tillamook Branch
is isolated from the U.S. rail system by a washout east of Salmonberry. Salmonberry is significant as being the
furthest point north on the historic Southern Pacific. Thursday’s excursion began and ended at
Garibaldi, on the Oregon Coast, a welcome relief from the Spring heat (90
degrees!) experienced in Northwest Oregon this past week. Ride along via the following pictures
and captions:
Excursion power was provided by
the McCloud No. 25.
The train was prepared for boarding at Garibaldi. Our “Fearless Leader,” Rod Loder is in
the orange shirt.
The photo line prepares for a photo run-by through the
bridge over the Nehalem River near Mohler.
The
photo run-by over the Nehalem River near Mohler.
Riding up the Nehalem River Canyon gave a sense of what
passenger specials to the Coast were like “back in the day.” By mid-morning it was shirt-sleeve
weather.
Photo run-by at Salmonberry.
Salmonberry is at the junction of the Salmonberry River
meeting the Nehalem River. The
furthest point north on the SP is behind the train.
Our excursion met regular OCSR service at Wheeler. The GP9 was painted by the Port of
Tillamook Bay Railroad into a fanciful cow paint scheme in honor of the dairy
farming of Tillamook County. Think
CHEESE!
Friday morning we met in Newberg for a tour of the SPFT
paper mill. This is the former
Publishers Paper, now reorganized in the rapidly changing paper business. The Plant Manager and his staff gave us
an outstanding tour, beginning with a great briefing on the paper business and
the functions of the Newberg plant.
SPFT Newberg still produces newsprint, though that business
is declining world-wide as printed newspapers decline. SPFT remains competitive, still
supplying major customers in Los Angeles and Denver, among others. Newsprint uses pulp from recycled paper
and new pulp, extracted from a blend of wood chips using a thermal-mechanical
process. Drying heat and power are
supplied from a boiler that burns recycled wood, notably old railroad ties.
Rail ties arrive in “trash” containers on flatcars and are
ground up for fuel. Building
material trash also provides fuel.
Heat for the boiler burns at 1700 degrees Kelvin, hot enough
to destroy nasty chemicals like creosote, which becomes just more fuel.
Recycled paper comes into the plant in bundles which need to
be further separated with other than paper removed, and then pulped and
de-inked.
Part of the foreign object
separation includes a centrifugal separator.
Paper machine #6.
The recycled paper pulp is mixed with the fresh wood pulp into a slurry
that flows onto papermaking racks that feed the paper machine.
The paper is formed by gradually squeezing the water out of
the pulp slurry, fusing the pulp fibers into paper. This involves many passes through paper press rollers.
Water squeezed out and drying heat applied, the pulp slurry
that began the process emerges as newsprint.
Shipping is via both rail and
truck.
Rail service is provided by the Portland and Western. The old Publishers Paper had its own
in-plant railroad, including a pair of locomotives. They would interchange cars up the hill (away from the
Willamette River) with the Southern Pacific. Today, SPFT finds it cost effective to contract with P&W
to provide switching service.
Friday afternoon and evening were devoted to layout tours. My SP Cascade Line featured prominently
on the tour and I hosted two dozen visitors. Two layouts were open Friday evening. I took in Rick Ernest’s SP&S
layout. Rick models—very well!—in
n-scale.
Wishram on Rick Ernest’s
SP&S layout.
Drano Lake (east of Cooks in the Columbia River Gorge) above
and Camas, WA, below, on Rick Ernest’s SP&S layout.
Saturday featured a number of good presentations as we
gathered in Forest Grove. The
morning featured several picture presentations on the Tillamook Branch and SP
railroading in the Northwest corner of Oregon. The afternoon featured a number of model railroad topics and
a videotaped interview with a former SP station agent. The evening presentation by Lloyd
Palmer, with significant input by Paul Clock (“Punk Rotten and Nasty, the Saga
of the Pacific Railway and Navigation Co,”) traced the history of the Tillamook
Branch.
This was an outstanding Espee in
Oregon Meet. Thanks Rod and your
assisting staff!
