Recently I posted a photo of a railroad bridge near Noti, Oregon. This bridge is on the line that ran between Eugene and Coos Bay, on the coast. I noted that the father of a buddy of mine was assigned to that route back in steam days. I thought he was an engineer then, but that came later on. He was fireman at this time. Anyway, my friend used to ride with him at times when he was a youngster of about 12 or 13. His father is the one at the controls in this photo. The photo was probably taken in 1953, on the last passenger run out of Coos Bay.
Here are some really interesting thoughts my buddy shared with me:
"What info. I have is what Mom wrote on the back of the picture. She just put the year, so I don’t know the month. The Owl was what was called a milk train as it had a combination of freight cars and passenger cars. It would stop on the run from Eugene to Coos Bay at places along the way and pick up 5 or 10 gal. cans of milk and or cream which is where the name milk train came from. It left Eugene at around 2 AM and I would be riding in a passenger car. Some place at probably Noti, it would stop and the conductor would come to where I was sitting and tell me I was wanted up on the engine. So I got to ride in the cab from there on to Coos Bay. So that is how I learned to fire that particular engine because the same one was almost always used on the run. Of course S.P. was not aware of me being up there as it was against the rules for anyone not an employee to ride the engine, but since this was way out in nowhere the crew , which consisted of the engineer, fireman and conductor didn’t worry about it."
"After S.P. abandoned the line, and I don’t remember the year, there were no more trains run on the line. Some company in Coos Bay was started and was going to run trains again but there are about 3 or4 tunnels between there and Eugene and they all needed work, so the last I knew there were still no trains running. Have you seen any since you have been out and around there?"
Trains are running again between Eugene and Coos Bay on this same line. The line is now called CBR (Coos Bay Rail Link). I am not sure how often it runs, though it can't be more than once a day, and I don't think it runs that often. Interesting to see that it was revived after being abandoned for so long. Here is a shot of the engines used today:
